Haiti - Politics : Financing of Parliament, half-truth of Moïse
Last week week, Youri Latortue Senate President announced the reconstruction of the Parliamentat the cost of about 3 billion Gourdes (+/- $ 48 million). The new parliamentary complex will consist of 3 buildings. A first of 10-storey for the offices of parliamentarians, the working and meeting rooms of the Standing Commissions and the offices of the administration. A second one will comprise three large hemicycles (Chamber of Deputies, Senate, and National Assembly), and finally the 3rd will include a four-storey closed parking for parliamentarians and visitors...
On Friday in his message to the Nation regarding the publication of the budget, President Moïse wished to silence criticisms relating to the high budget of Parliament by stating that 50% of the 7.2 billion gourdes allocated to senators and deputies in the budget would be used for the reconstruction of Parliament adding "people have lied a lot to the population on this budget..." https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-22135-haiti-flash-moise-asserts-his-authority-and-publishes-the-budget.html
However, in reality, it is stated in the budget that the 7.2 billion Gourdes of the Parliament are divided 50/50 between the Senate and the Lower House, ie 3.6 billion for each Chamber. For the Senate 2 billion are devoted to the functioning and an "investments" heading has an envelope of 1.5 billion which will be allocated to the reconstruction of the Parliament. As for the budget of the lower chamber, it is essentially devoted to functioning and does not include any heading "investments". This means that only 50% of the estimated costs of reconstruction of Parliament will come from Parliament's budget and not all as Moïse said and the other 1.5 billion gourdes to complete the cost of the work, will have to come from other items in the State budget...
If Senator Latortue evokes an amount of about 3 billion Gourdes for the new parliamentary complex, Clément Bélizaire, the Director of the Unit of Construction of Housing and Public Buildings (UCLBP) shows more reserved "We do not know yet how much will cost Parliament nor the firm that will carry out the work because adjustments have been requested," specifying that there will be no traditional call for tenders for the construction of the Haitian Parliament.
