Africa-Press – Cape verde. Elected members of the PAICV municipal bench (opposition) in Porto Novo, Santo Antão, today drew the attention of the municipality’s president, Aníbal Fonseca, to the level of debt that the municipality has already reached.
In a note sent to Inforpress, the municipal elected officials from the PAICV bench highlighted that in addition to the debt with the bank that exceeds 300 million escudos, there is also the debt of Águas do Porto Novo (APN) which is also close to 250 million escudos .
“We recently learned that there is a debt with the INPS, resulting from taxes withheld from chamber employees and which were no longer sent to the institution after a certain period of time, and which already amounts to 112 million escudos. The concern is still that the president of the chamber was asked if there was a debt owed to creditors, he said yes, but he did not want to advance the amount”, the note reads.
According to the document, “in view of this situation, it is understandable why there is widespread unemployment in the municipality, especially among young people, which reaches 25 percent (%) and the level of poverty and extreme poverty that the municipality has already reached has led a large portion of the municipality’s population to live in a situation of food and nutritional insecurity.
When analyzing the Report on the State of Municipal Administration for the year 2023, according to the note, those elected from PAICV came to the conclusion that the municipal council, throughout the year, was under current management, which is why no major investments were made that generate income and that the level of unemployment and poverty in the municipality reflects all of this.
“Throughout the presentation and discussion of the amending budget for the year 2023, we found that the city council is very dependent on the Government’s goodwill in transferring funds to Porto Novo, which has functioned as a slush fund, as the city council team has had little ability to obtain other means of financing”, he highlighted.
And in this sense, the elected members of the PAICV bench alerted the municipal council to the “difficult situation” in which the municipality lives and the need to involve public and private partnerships in the municipality’s development process in order to minimize the suffering of the population.
For More News And Analysis About Cape verde Follow Africa-Press
