Op­po­si­tion shad­ow min­is­ter of fi­nance, MP Dave Tan­coo said that while the Gov­ern­ment was forced to ex­tend its spe­cial Ex­im­bank for­eign ex­change (forex) win­dow due to pub­lic pres­sure, the fi­nance min­is­ter still has not an­swered the ques­tions about how he got cus­tomer in­for­ma­tion from the Ex­im­bank .

“He has still not an­swered the ques­tions as to un­der what au­thor­i­ty he act­ed to ac­cess pri­vate bank­ing in­for­ma­tion. The Ex­im­bank chair­man and board of di­rec­tors must al­so clar­i­fy how this PNM min­is­ter was able to gain ac­cess to the Bank’s in­ter­nal in­for­ma­tion.”

On Sun­day, Min­is­ter of Fi­nance, Colm Im­bert, an­nounced the re­sump­tion of the for­eign ex­change win­dow at the Ex­im­bank, which was es­tab­lished dur­ing the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic, to al­low the im­ports of es­sen­tial foods and phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals. He said the Ex­im­bank's es­sen­tial-im­ports for­eign ex­change win­dow would ac­com­mo­date US$25 mil­lion a month of im­ports, down from US$30 mil­lion.

Tan­coo, who is the chair­man of the op­po­si­tion Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress said that ad­di­tion­al­ly, hav­ing put a prover­bial choke­hold on the necks of the 110 im­porters us­ing the fa­cil­i­ty over the last two months by re­fus­ing to pro­vide them with US dol­lars, these im­porters now face ac­cu­mu­lat­ed in­ter­est charges as well as an ad­verse trade and cred­it rep­u­ta­tion.

“Notwith­stand­ing his bold­faced ac­cu­sa­tion that im­porters were hold­ing the pub­lic to ran­som, it is ob­vi­ous that the mount­ing pub­lic pres­sure has got to Min­is­ter Im­bert, caus­ing him to re­treat from his pre­vi­ous in­sult­ing and com­bat­ive po­si­tion. I con­grat­u­late the me­dia, the few busi­ness­es who dared to speak up, and the Op­po­si­tion Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress for lead­ing this bat­tle to avert the risk of food short­ages and high­er prices,” he lament­ed.

The Oropouche West MP in­di­cat­ed that these im­porters and the coun­try as a whole are now ful­ly aware of how Min­is­ter Im­bert views these busi­ness­es en­gaged in im­port­ing es­sen­tial food and med­ical sup­plies.

“Which im­porters or which prod­ucts will now be left out or re­duced, and how was this de­ter­mined? Giv­en the high ap­pre­hen­sion ex­pressed by those busi­ness­es who com­plained, would they now be sub­ject­ed to vic­tim­i­sa­tion by the Min­is­ter?”

Fi­nal­ly, the Op­po­si­tion MP stat­ed, "While to­day's head­lines screamed 'Forex ease', noth­ing has been done or said about the promised fa­cil­i­ty for Mi­cro Small, and Medi­um-sized En­ter­pris­es (MSME), or for oth­er im­porters of raw ma­te­ri­als or for na­tion­als seek­ing to trav­el abroad or make small pur­chas­es on­line etc. There re­mains a deaf­en­ing si­lence about the es­tab­lish­ment of a trans­par­ent and open sys­tem of ac­cess to for­eign ex­change.

"The un­ac­cept­able sta­tus quo which favours cer­tain busi­ness­es, hous­es and in­di­vid­u­als with se­cre­tive ac­cess to for­eign ex­change, es­tab­lished by Mr. Im­bert and this PNM regime con­tin­ues to ex­ist. "

-"