The Minister for Finance and Economic Affairs, Hon. Seedy Keita, yesterday gave an explanation on how Gambia Government Consolidated Fund (GLF) had been managed and executed during 2023 fiscal year.
Speaking before deputies, Mr. Keita disclosed that the consolidated GLF Revenue Performance for the 2023 fiscal year indicates an outturn, reaching D21.9 billion compared to a budget of D19.7 billion, representing an over performance of 11%.
He said the main drivers of this strong performance include an improvement in Indirect Tax collections due to an increase in VAT receipts on non-oil imports, nontax revenue and substantial realisation of programme grants (budget support) received late December 2023.
He also disclosed total GLF expenditure as D20.4 billion compared with annual budget of D20.3 billion. "The main drivers for this 0.6% overrun are Personnel Emolument and Debt Interest payments," he stated.
"Given the over performance of domestic resource mobilisation and budget support disbursements in December, the budget balance recorded a surplus of D1.5 billion."
The Finance minister further stated that domestic revenue performance for the 2023 fiscal year indicates an outturn, reaching D17.81 billion compared with a budget of D16.89 billion, representing an over performance of 5%.
This performance he said is the result of better-than-expected outturn for international trade taxes, which registered a 29% growth.
Hon. Keita also dislosed the total revenue including programme grants reached D21.9 billion compared to a D19.7 billion budget.
"By specific tax heads, import duty grew by 15%, whilst import VAT recorded a growth of 47%."
"Nontax revenue performed 48% more than expected as results of an improved revenue collection of CED (Customs and Excise Duties) by Gambia Revenue Authority (GRA). The capital revenue also performed more than expected by D701 million, which is attributed to the sale of Mega Bank."
The minister said the overall consolidated expenditure amounts to D20.4 billion, which is beyond the budget for the year by just 0.6%.
"It should be noted while we were able to constrain discretionally expenditures within their budget, statutory expenditures such as PEs and interest payment exceeded their annual budget due to unexpected increase both in wage bills and interest payments by 12% and 4% respectively," he flagged.
"The overrun expenditure in PEs can be attributed mainly to Ministry of Basic Education (D470 million), Ministry of Foreign Affairs (D320 million), Ministry of Interior by (D83 million) and Ministry of Health (GMD 81 million)."
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He said expenditure on other charges was judiciously managed within their budget with an execution rate of 99%.
"Expenditure on Debt Interest exceeded its annual budget by 4% due to 10% increase in domestic interest payment. The short-term nature of domestic debt portfolio has exposed it to interest rate to hikes in interest rates. Capital Expenditure was lower than its target by 11%."
He alluded that the budget implementation during the year under review has been prudent. "The overall actual revenue budget over performed by D2.2 billion and actual expenditure as inclined with budget (only an over run of 0.6%) leading to a surplus of D1.5 billion."
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