There’s nothing to worry about, says Neri on election overspending

Socioeconomic Planning Secretary and National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) director general Romulo Neri gave assurances yesterday that "there is nothing to worry" about overspending in the coming elections, as warned by Finance Secretary Margarito Teves the other day.

Officials said efficient tax collection and quality spending would be the key to sustaining the stable ratings outlook the country received from the credit ratings agencies.

Neri said the only election-related spending would be the budget allotted to the Commission on Elections (Comelec).

"But as regards the elections expenses of the candidates, the government is not the one spending for them," Neri said over radio station dzRB.

To sustain the favorable ratings, the most important thing is tax collection, he said.

Neri and Budget Secretary Rolando Andaya also said the government is focused on spending for education, health and infrastructure.

"We need to build more roads and airports and reduce cost of doing business in the country. We need to do something about high power cost, reform the airline industry to attract more tourists, improve our ports because delays in cargo shipping can also raise cost of doing business here," Neri said.

He added that the people would only start to feel the gains of the economy once jobs are generated through investments both from the government and the private sector.

He emphasized that the country should also invest more in biofuel such as jatropha and ethanol plantations to lessen the dependence on imported oil.

"There are still many things to be done like convince the banks to lend more and push for power sector reforms to bring down cost of electricity," he said.

Meanwhile, Teves and Andaya said Moody’s would watch out whether the government would overspend during the elections since it would want to see the administration allotting its new revenues only for essential projects such as health, education and infrastructure.

Andaya also said that existing laws restrict state expenditures during elections.

"We will not exceed the parameters of our budget authority. We will not deviate from the program," he said.

"Remember, our election laws actually constrict spending. You are faced with a public works construction ban, and a prohibition in hiring, so there will be a temporary dip in capital outlays utilization and payroll costs but we have all factored these in when we made the budget," he said.

Teves, for his part, said it is important to maintain fiscal discipline to be able to convince credit ratings agencies that the gains would not be temporary. — Aurea Calica