Parliament sitting will resume today with MPs responding to the 2019/2020 National Budget that was announced on June 7th.

Opposition leader Sitiveni Rabuka will be the first to respond and it will be wrapped up by Economy Minister Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum giving his right of reply.

Government has set its expenditure at $3.84 billion and total revenue forecast at $3.49 billion.

This places our net deficit at a budgeted $349.2 million or 2.7 percent of our Gross Domestic Product.

Given the level of net deficit, the government’s debt stock is estimated to be around $5.97 billion or 47.1 percent of GDP at the end of July next year.

Government expenditure growth is around 4.8 percent with revenue projected to grow by 7.2 percent and tax revenue growth is expected to be around 5.9 percent in line with the nominal GDP growth rate.

The parliament will debate on the national budget starting today and will be put to vote.