Finance Minister: Outstanding bills will be settled by end of next year

Finance Minister Abdulla Jihad has said that government’s unpaid bills would be cleared by the end of next year.

In a news conference held at President’s Office by the Economic Council of the government today, Minister Jihad said that because there are many pending bills, they have to be paid from other codes of budget, and Public Sector Investment Program (PSIP) projects have to be paused for that reason. He also said that the pending bills would be cleared by the end of next year.

“There were many pending bills of former president Nasheed’s government, when we took over. Those bills are being paid now. Amounts are specified in 2012, 2013, 2014 and 2015 budgets to pay these bills,” said Minister Jihad.

Minister Jihad said that current government aimed to bring economic stability to the country and efforts were being made to maintain expenditure at a particular level and to increase income of the country. In that regard, Minister Jihad said that 20 percent has been reduced from government’s recurrent expense and some PSP projects have been frozen.

Minister Jihad said that the government aims to have a balanced budget within next three years and government has not decided to have a supplementary budget for this year.