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{
    "id": 1618378,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1618378/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 4482,
    "type": "other",
    "speaker_name": "",
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    "speaker": null,
    "content": "As I move, I want to first begin by thanking the Members of the Budget and Appropriations Committee for their diligence in processing the Estimates that were brought before us. Budget making is the sole mandate of this House. All Members of this House participate in the budget making process through their various departmental committees. In reviewing of the Budget Estimates, the Committee listened to the departmental committees represented by their chairpersons who I want to thank. The departmental committees brought to us very progressive highlights of the programmes that the Government is implementing in various departments. In the course of processing the Estimates, we listened to departmental committees’ proposals. Some proposed changes while others wanted the Estimates stayed. It is not in the DNA of the Budget and Appropriations Committee to refuse to adopt changes brought by Members through their committees. As we processed the Estimates, there were some changes that the Committee did not carry, but 99 per cent of the proposed changes were allowed. One of the proposals that was not allowed by the Committee was the reallocation of funds that are meant for fertilizer subsidy. Agriculture is one of the corner stones of this country. It remains to be one of the anchors of our economy. I will talk later on some of the programmes that have been funded. The Committee did not believe that reallocating resources from the fertilizer subsidy was necessary. The other thing that the Committee did not adopt was the reallocation dealing with the Coffee Cherry Fund. Coffee is becoming one of the most strategic cash crops of our country leading in foreign exchange and also its income to farmers is substantial. As a matter of fact, as I will be discussing some of the strategic allocations, you will notice that in one of the allocations, coffee development is one of the areas that we are putting more resources. As I go to the content of the Report, I would like to thank the National Treasury. For the first time, we have revenue projections from the National Treasury that are less than what has been projected by our own Parliamentary Budget Office (PBO). Our PBO is a premier think tank. In this region, it is the leading PBO. In fact, regional parliaments are coming to us for benchmarking within that space and it has been leading in helping them to develop some of their ways of running budgets. Hon. Temporary Speaker, I want to thank our PBO and the National Treasury because for the first time we are aligning in our thinking. The thinking within PBO is that higher revenue projections has not been tenable. Even as we speak, we have not been able to meet our revenue projections because we over project. However, for the first time, the revenue projection given to us by the National Treasury is less than what our own PBO has projected. It means, therefore, that we are making a more realistic budget because revenue collection projected is what will determine the kind of programmes we want to implement. I want to thank the new Cabinet Secretary for the National Treasury and Economic Planning because it is a more realistic budget and we are seeking to live within the confines of our means. Going forward, public debt is not going to be a solution for our problems. In the past, we have been running very huge budgets without factoring in our limited revenue sources, and we end up running a very huge fiscal deficit. In this Budget, the fiscal deficit that we are applying is 4.5 per cent to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Remember that when we did Supplementary II here, our fiscal deficit was 5.2 per cent. We have moved downwards by over 0.7 per cent basis point. This shows that for the first time, the broad-based Government which is approaching development in a more inclusive way is becoming a reality."
}