The National Assembly’s Public Finance Accounts Committee (FPAC) has suggested cutting back on funding for the president’s office and other government agencies.
FPAC wants to cut D25,400,000 and D19,000,000 from the Office of the President’s recurrent and development budgets, respectively, according to a report.
Additionally, it has suggested that the D3,000,000 operating cost from the development budget be used for the National Disaster Management Agency’s (NDMA) operating costs (OC) and personnel emoluments (PE).
Additionally, the committee suggested cutting the National Assembly’s budget by D5,000,000 from the development budget and D6,250,000 from the recurrent budget.
Additionally, FPAC requests that D86,101,338 be taken out of the Independent Electoral Commission’s (IEC) recurring budget.
Nearly all government institutions are affected by this cut, and some have been transferred to other government organisations, such as the National Roads Authority, which received D100,000,000 for road rehabilitation, the committee stated.
Yahya Sanyang, the Latrikunda Sabiji National Assembly Member, stated during the discussion of the 2025 budget estimates that “it is sad that for the third consecutive year, the minister has present a budget that is bad news for Gambians.”
When I looked at the budget, I couldn’t find a single item that would help reduce poverty in this nation. The budget is actually designed to make poverty worse, and in my opinion, the goal of any good budget worldwide should be to reduce poverty, he stated.
He added, “The president’s Meet the People Tour budget was raised from D30 million to D50 million, which is really annoying.” “This is unacceptable given the significant reduction in higher education scholarships,” he said.
