The Minister of Public Works, Rafael Sabonge, stated that $350 million is not enough to cover the holes in the streets throughout the country and attributes its lack of execution to the limited budget granted by the Ministry of Economy and Finance (MEF).
Sabonge argued that the MOP has the lowest budget of the last 15 years, that to cover the holes in the streets that Panamanians complain so much about, it needs a budget of approximately one billion dollars, “but it only has $350 million to pay old bills and a situation that makes management difficult”.
Regarding the strong questions and harsh criticism that he has received from the PRD deputy and president of the Budget Commission of the National Assembly, Benicio Robinson, about his inability to fix the bad state of the streets, the head of the MOP said that “If we don’t have the resources, which is what we have been fighting for three years, we can’t find a solution.”
He clarified that Deputy Robinson reiterated that the budget is not the responsibility of the commission, but of the Minister of Economy and Finance, Héctor Alexander, who wants to “co-govern the country” and in which he described as nonsense that the MEF now asks the institutions certify the budget item before uploading a tender to Panama Compra.
Sabonge added that, despite not having the necessary resources, you can see completely repaired streets. “We have looked for creative solutions, to be able to carry out projects, projects that are already starting, we have important orders to proceed that we are going to be delivering, 100 bridges in places of communities in areas of difficult access, and without recourse,” he said.
