Senator Deonarine calls for forex ombudsman

INDEPENDENT Senator Amrita Deonarine called for the creation of a post of an ombudsman specifically to monitor the allocation of foreign exchange, speaking in the Senate on Tuesday.

Moving a motion complaining that micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) have difficulty accessing forex, she urged the Government table in Parliament within six months a policy on how the Government would navigate tightness in the forex market.

Saying it was now no secret that it was hard to get forex from private banks, she said this was causing much frustration among young entrepreneurs who had otherwise been eager to take up various tax incentives offered by the Government.

She said, at present, applicants must approach banks to seek to get US$300 per week and try to accumulate a required sum but are sometimes required by banks to take a loan and open a line of credit.

Deonarine said the Government must set clear guidelines for the Central Bank to allocate forex to businesses and to students studying abroad. She said the lack of a forex policy would hurt TT's efforts at diversification and in growing the non-oil sector.

Opposition Senator Wade Mark urged that a commission of enquiry be held into what he alleged was discrimination in the allocation of forex. He alleged that private banks taking advantage of customers, as he metaphorically said they were "tying you up like a crab" despite the fact the forex belonged to the people of TT and not to the banks.

Complaining that big business was given forex in preference to small and medium businesses, Mark asked what the Central Bank was doing to ensure a fair distribution.

Mark took issue with Finance Minister Colm Imbert's earlier call for local entrepreneurs to not be importers of luxury items for consumption but rather to produce things locally. Mark complained that he just saw a big conglomerate open a showroom to sell imported cars of a top brand from Sweden, saying that country would not accept TT dollars but scarce forex

He said anyone with a child studying abroad was experiencing problems to get forex, but other people were accessing it.

He wondered if the Central Bank was properly doing its job, as he urged fair treatment for forex applicants. Mark cited an Index of Economic Freedom (run by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative US think-tank) which he said had rated TT's economic state as "mostly unfree."