Government confident of meeting budget deficit target

Government is confident it would meet its budget deficit target for this year.

Budget Secretary Emilia T. Boncodin said government is confident it will be able to meet its target deficit of P145-billion for this year with the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) registering impressive performance in November.

Tax collections of the BIR amounted to P354.75 billion in November, P400 million more than its target.

The Bureau of Treasury (BoT) also surpassed it November target.

"In October alone, the BoT registered earnings of P2.4-billion," Boncodin said. The earnings came from unexpected earnings from dividends, and high interest rates from investments. BoT earned an unprogrammed P864 million from fees and charges in October alone.

Meanwhile, the budget secretary also is optimistic that the PEA-Pagcor deal would still be consummated by the first quarter of 2002. Initially, the DBM is looking at a minimum P5-billion earnings from the privatization of government assets.