Chamber wants action on Tobago projects

Vice Chairman of the Tobago Chamber of Industry and Commerce, Martin George, is calling on the central government to kick-start promised projects for Tobago.

On Monday, the Tobago House of Assembly (THA) received $2.229 billion for fiscal 2019. Of this $1.979 billion would be used for recurrent expenditure, $231.63 million for capital expenditure and $18 million for the Unemployment Relief Programme (URP).

THA allocation represents 4.03 per cent of the national budget which was presented in the House of Representatives by Finance Minister Colm Imbert. George, in a telephone interview with Newsday Tobago after Imbert’s presentation in which he suggested the minister was trying to keep within the statutory requirements by giving an allocation at the lower end of the scale, said:

“What is of concern is that the majority of that, over $2 billion, is allocated to recurrent expenditure… you are just paying for goods and services and salaries, it does not go towards capital expenditure. There is no way you can build a sustainable economy if all you are doing is just paying salaries and wages, you really need to do some more in terms of your allocation for infrastructure development that would allow opportunities to facilitate the ease of doing business.”

Reiterating that Tobago projects must get going, George cited “two fast ferries that we were told about several months ago…the Sandals project which has been mentioned for years along with the airport expansion which has been mentioned for more than a year now.”

“It is very nice that the minister has garnished and decorated and drilled the promises in this regard, but the proof of the pudding is really in the eating. While we are listening to the promises, we are still cautiously optimistic in the sense that the greater the promise, the greater the expectation.

I think the people of Tobago are at their maximum peak of their expectation in terms of the promises thus far from the Government. So, they want to see some delivery and going into the action now,” he said.

George also called for a direct repeal of the land license registration as he noted Imbert’s mention in the budget that “the Government intends, in consultation with the THA, to make it simpler and faster for foreign investors to acquire property in Tobago, through suitable amendments to the governing legislation and/or the regulations and guidelines.

“We prefer if he would come out directly and announce the repeal of the legislation, so while he indicated that they would seek to make some amendments or some changes to it, the fundamental change we would have liked to see was the definite repeal of that legislation providing an immediate stimulus to direct foreign investment into Tobago,” he said.