The government has exhausted the MVR 101 million allocated in this year’s budget for compensation and spent above the budgeted amount.
The "Weekly Fiscal Developments" report released by the Finance Ministry last week shows that MVR 107.4 million had been spent during the first 16 weeks of the year on compensation payouts. This was MVR 6.4 million above the amount budgeted for this year.
The issue of spending above the budgeted amount also emerged last year.
While MVR 101.2 million was allocated for compensation last year, more funds were added in a supplementary budget and MVR 436 million was spent by the end of the year. This was threefold higher than the budgeted amount.
At the time, the government said it was forced to spend in excess of the budget on compensation due to judgments against the state in court cases.
The government previously said that payouts were made on the advice of the Attorney General as further costs would have been incurred over delays in disbursing the funds.
