Problems related to the financing of important areas can appear at the end of this year, former minister of finance Mihai Manoli said in an interview for Radio Free Europe. According to him, it’s good that Moldova chose to path to the EU, but it will have to deal with the consequences, IPN reports.
Asked to comment on the statements of ex-minister of finance Veaceslav Negruta, who asserted that a hole of about 8.4 billion lei is being formed in the state budget, Manoli said he didn’t do calculations, but would give justice to Negruta. “I go sometimes to the Central Market, which is full of excellent grapes, fruit and vegetables, and become worried as I realize that the price at which these products are sold will prevent many of the producers from working next year,” he stated.
He noted that even if the fiscal administration improved, many of the companies working in agriculture lost the export market. They encounter an increasing number of difficulties in fulfilling their obligations to the budget and the budget revenues cannot thus grow.
The ex-minister reminded about the debt of US$713 million to Gazprom, based on which the Russian company filed a lawsuit. This is the debt of the right side of the Nistru River only. The debt of the left side totals US$4.8 billion. “Once we reduced this debt (of the right side, e.n.) to zero, but now it is almost 10 billion lei,” stated Mihai Manoli.
According to him, all these taken together will cause problems and the state budget at the end of year will be unable to provide financing for key areas. The 2015 budget law is drafted with delay and Moldova may enter the new year without this important law.
Recently, former minister of finance Veaceslav Negruta, who worked in the pro-European government, published on his blog an analysis saying a gap of about 8.5 billion lei is being formed in the country’s budget, similar to that of 2009, when the current government came to power. “There is a hole in incomes even if the depreciation of the leu caused this hole to be relatively small, of only 800 million lei. But there is also the expenditure and projections show costs of almost 5 billion lei cannot be covered. The deficit is 0.9 billion lei,” said Negruta. In an interview, Prime Minister Iurie Leanca said these figures are inflated, but the Ministry of Finance should provide accurate data.
