PHILIPSBURG – Minister of Finance Richard Gibson has refuted rumors on social media that he is planning on reducing civil servants salaries to help deal with the financial challenges facing the country.
“The question of cutting the civil servants vacation allowance also came up when we were attempting to balance the budget. I addressed it then. The source of that was indeed measures that the previous government were thinking about in order to balance to 2015 budget. They couldn’t and they had to do a lot of cutting or try to propose cutting in order to balance the budget,” the Finance Minister said.
He noted that things are different now than under the previous government and thus there is no need to cut vacation allowance.
He said these are just rumors, which are rife in a political season. “It is a vexing rumor mongering that’s going on as far as that is concerned and that comes about because of the season of election,” Minister Gibson said.
“It is the season of election and it’s an art form at times to confuse the public with rumors and other innuendos in order to seek certain benefits and advantages of a political point of view,” Gibson said.
