National Assembly - Finance minister to present amended Budget 2020 next Tuesday |03 April 2020

The National Assembly will sit on Tuesday April 7, 2020 at 0900hrs when the Minister for Finance, Trade, Investment and Economic Planning, Maurice Loustau-Lalanne, will present an amended Budget for 2020 before the House at Second Reading, namely the Appropriation (Amendment) Bill, 2020.

It is to be recalled that the revised budget requiring the National Assembly’s approval for extra sums of money to cater for the unexpected expenses related to the coronavirus (COVID-19) was to be presented to the house last Tuesday after the leader government business Charles De Commarmond had asked the National Assembly to suspend the seven days required before the second reading of the motion of the Appropriation Amendment Bill.

However, the Linyon Demokratik Seselwa (LDS) members voted against the procedures to allow for the revised budget to be presented and debated.

The no vote followed a disagreement between Speaker Nicholas Prea and the LDS on the interpretation of Article 154 of the Constitution on the issue of a revised budget.

The leader of the opposition in the National Assembly Wavel Ramkalawan, through a matter of privilege at the start of last Tuesday’s sitting, informed Speaker Prea that there is an issue in the procedure to allow the revised budget to go through, a point which he had already raised in a session the week before.

He questioned the legality of the procedure under which the government is asking the National Assembly through an Appropriation Amendment Bill 2020 to amend the Appropriation Act 2020 to allow for the revised budget to be presented, noting that it was not the right procedure according to Article 154 of the Constitution which addresses all matters related to the country’s finances but makes no provisions for a revised budget.

Press release from the National Assembly secretariat