PM Barrow Explains Petrocaribe Loan Motion

Dean Barrow

Tuesday’s Special Sitting of the House of Representatives was crafted for the presentation and passage of what Prime Minister Dean Barrow is calling a validation motion relating to the Petrocaribe monies. As House meetings go, the debate stayed on target on the loan motion, even as the issue of the use of the Petrocaribe millions is one of the most contentious of the U.D.P. term. The debate was a marathon session which lasted over six hours, so on Tuesday, we had to select only the highlights. Today, we revisit some of the more notable moments of the sitting, starting with the Prime Minister’s rationalization for his government’s use of the loan money prior to coming to the House for approval. Barrow calls the Petrocaribe money a strange creature which merited that things be done exactly as they were.

Prime Minister Dean Barrow

“It is then no straightforward loan from a bank or other financial institution with a known principal amount borrowed for a fixed period at a determined rate of interest. As I have set out this purchase of fuel partly on credit, or principally on credit, is kind of a movable feast. The amount of the financed portion, the sum being borrowed since we are now putting it in those terms, can never be known beforehand. It clearly depends on the volumes of fuel shipment we receive in any given period, and the volumes fluctuate from month to month. It also depends on the price we pay and the quantum of that price we retain for ourselves and these also fluctuate in accordance with the price on the very volatile global oil market. We thus have had to struggle with how exactly we frame this motion, and at what point during the ongoing cycle we come to the House. We clearly can’t come beforehand since the essential particular, the amount we are borrowing, is unknowable until we actually receive it. Do we come at every point during the fiscal year once the receipts of the finance portion exceed ten million dollars, or do we wait until the end of the fiscal year then pass a validation motion covering the exact figure received for that year? It is the latter we are doing now, and that is the way we will continue to proceed in the future for as long as this program lasts.”