Alhagie Nyangado, Director General for the Department of Strategic Policy and Delivery at the Office of the President has revealed that most of the grants components of the National Development Plan (NDP) are here but the greater part of that grant is going into maintaining ECOMIG which is entrusted into the hands of ECOWAS.
He also said government is yet to receive the most important part of funding for the NDP that is meant to build roads, infrastructures, improve on hospitals.
He made this revelation at Statehouse in Banjul where his office briefs the media on the ongoing preparations for the first Gambian International Economic and Investment forum in Spain.
The forum is gear toward mobilizing resources for the government to carry out its projects and programs captured in the National Development Plan 2018-2021.
Nyangado further revealed that the NDP is having funding difficulties and the reason is the Gambia cannot take loans.
“The only loans this government can take is loans that are 50 percent free and getting these types of loans is a difficult for the country and that is the reason for funding opportunities such as the International Forum expected to be hosted in Spain are good to be looked into,” he pointed out.
According to him, Gambia- Brussels Roundtable Donors Conference pledge of Euro 1.45 billion ($1.7 billion) majority comes in the form of grants that includes the expenditures of ECOMIG contingent in the Gambia, disclosing that a greater number of the pledges have not been forthcoming because of the indebtedness of the Gambian economy.
He explained that out of the of Euro 1.45 billion ($1.7 billion) pledged at the Brussels conference, eight hundred million dalasi (D800,000M) that is expected to come as loans are not accessible due largely to the indebtedness of the Gambian economy making it harder to realized the aims and objectives of the National Development Plan (NDP).
He added: “This is why Gambia government is looking at other opportunities such as the proposed Gambia International Economic and Investment Forum in Spain in other to attract investors to carry on with the National Development Plan agenda.