El Caribe’s editorial today urges the government to learn from its mistakes. El Caribe says that this year the government estimated current expenditures would account for 67% of the total budget. So far, they make up 75%, primarily due to the increase in public employees from 329,383 in 2000 to 352,753 as of June this year, according to Central Bank figures. Capital expenditures that would have been 33% of the total budget, have declined to 25%. El Caribe also criticizes the government for increasing military spending at the expense of the Education Department’s budget. President Mejía said yesterday that current expenditures would not increase. El Caribe says it hopes that the excesses will not increase and urges that military spending be contained. “Next year the foreign debt payments will have to be at least 40% more than this year due to dozens of multi-million dollar loans taken this year with European banks which have no grace period,” says the newspaper. It urges an end to this borrowing without transparency. It also asks the government to stop borrowing from local banks to compensate for fiscal deficits. The newspaper says the country needs an austere budget, both in concept and execution, to offset the effects of international terrorism on Dominican services exports.
