Imbert: No obeah in finance bill

FINANCE Minister Colm Imbert said he was baffled by claims from the Opposition UNC that the Finance Bill 2023 involved obeah or foreign exchange for PNM financiers.

He was speaking in the Senate before the bill was passed on Tuesday.

Referring to claims made earlier in the sitting by Opposition senators Wade Mark and Anil Roberts, Imbert said he checked through the pages of the bill several times.

"I had to look at the bill about three times."

Imbert said in doing so, he found no reference to foreign exchange.

But he said, "I saw senator Mark fulminating about not being able to get not more than a couple hundred US dollars in the bank."

"Then I heard somebody speak about necromancy (the supposed practice of communicating with the dead, especially to predict the future)."

"Thank God I wasn't here (in the parliament chamber) for that."

Government senators thumped their desks when Imbert said there was no substance to any of the contributions from UNC senators in the debate.

"It seems to me that honourable (opposition) senators on the lower bench (of the Senate), it is now routine that when we come into Parliament to debate these bills, what we're going to hear is 'election coming soon, time for all you to go, their leader is the best thing since sliced bread, PNM is the worst, people suffering, the economy has crashed' and so on."

"It's best I just come and play a tape recorder. Hand all of them a tape recorder and say just press the button because it's the same thing over and over."

He disagreed with Independent Senator Anthony Vieira, SC, that the December 20, 2023- January 31, 2024 amnesty provided by the bill to allow employers to ensure their National Insurance System (NIS) contributions were up to date was "a folly."

In his contribution, Vieira did not believe the amnesty would achieve its stated objective.

Imbert described this argument as academic.

He said there were many legitimate reasons why small and medium businesses are not current with their NIS contributions.

Imbert said this often results in them being unable to tender for the opportunity to provide goods and services to public entities.

He disagreed with claims from Opposition Senator Jayanti Lutchmedial that the amnesty would benefit PNM supporters.

Imbert said UNC supporters would be the first to support the amnesty.

He said there was nothing sinister about the bill.

The Senate was later adjourned to a date to be fixed.