Parliament approves MVR 42.8B budget for 2023

Parliament, on Monday, has approved a state budget of MVR 42.8 billion for the upcoming year.

The budget was approved with the votes of 61 parliamentarians from the 69 who took part in the vote. Eight voted against approving the budget.

The government proposed state budget of MVR 42.7 billion for next year to the Parliament on October 31. Budget Committee, following their research of the budget, decided to approve a budget of MVR 42.8 billion – with an added MVR 161 million.

The Committee has recommended to pay special attention to securing MVR 161 million as grant assistance, and the collection of taxes from individuals that have not paid up. They also emphasized to propose a supplementary budget if necessary, ahead of time, for approval.

Apart from this, the Parliament also approved a supplementary budget of MVR 5.8 billion to this year’s approved budget on Monday.

This supplementary budget will be used to fund Thilamale’ bridge project, Addu road development project, oil subsidy, SIFCO housing project and Aasandha.

During his presentation of the budget – Finance Minister Ibrahim Ameer stated that 2023’s budget is a s a trustable roadmap based on previous experiences. He went on to state that it was a plan that will allow the government to continuously ensure the people’s affluence and social welfare.

The projected revenue for the state next year is MVR 32.1 billion – of which MVR 23.5 billion are expected from taxes whilst only MVR 6.4 million are expected from avenues other than taxation. MVR 3.7 billion of the tax revenue is project to be received from the hike of tax rates.