Fiji may need to reassess the size of Government if the current global economic crisis deepens, says former finance minister and leader of the National Federation Party, Professor Biman Prasad.
Speaking on The Fiji Times online portal The Lens@177, Prof Prasad said one area where Government could have performed better was in managing the size of the administration.
“One thing that we probably could have, we probably didn’t do very well, is to manage the size of the Government,” Prof Prasad said.
“And I think everyone would agree, the Prime Minister would agree. Ideally, as Finance Minister, I would have liked government to be smaller than what it is now.”
Prof Prasad said the current economic pressures, driven largely by rising global oil prices, could force government to reconsider its spending priorities.
“Perhaps, this crisis is going to make that happen in the future, that we would learn from this crisis and look at the size of government.”
He warned, though, that if oil prices remained near $US100 ($F220) a barrel for the next six months to a year and economic conditions deteriorated further, difficult decisions could become unavoidable.
Prof Prasad urged Government to tighten spending in other areas first, echoing recent calls by Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka to curb unnecessary expenditure.
“No conferences, no additional expenditures.
“That must be respected by ministers, civil servants and everyone in Government so that we do save funds to direct it into appropriate areas.”
He said the priority should be protecting people’s livelihoods.
“One thing we have to make sure is that people don’t lose income. People don’t lose jobs. People don’t get their salaries reduced.”
