The Regional Council delies the reallocation of 111 MDH TO AL HOCEÏMA (article LesEco.ma)

The Regional Council Souss Massa denies  information  that has been circulating about the reallocation of 111 MDH to the province Al Hoceïma within the framework of the Fund of Interregional Solidarity.

 The Regional Council Souss Massa denied  categorically this Monday the information  of  a   budgetary envelope of 111 MDH that has been debited from its budget  to the account of the province Al Hoceïma within the framework of the Fund of interregional solidarity, that was created pursuant to Article142 of the  Constitution.  « No budgetary envelope has been trnsferred from the region Souss Massa to the province Al Hoceïma », asserted Brahim Hafidi, the President of the Region Souss Massa. According to him « all the regions in Morocco have currently  a deficit which is due to the late receipts of tax revenues transferred by the state, mainly  the regions share from tax revenue and  corporate tax, taking into account that the balance sheets are submitted by the end of the year.»

In this regard, these provisions represent 20% of the budget of the council, around 90 MDH , will be received at the end of next March , the date for the closing of budgets by the  Directorate-General for local authorities  which is responsible for the allocation of budgets to the regions.  The trnsfer of budget from one region to another is  unconstitutional as there is a whole procedure to follow., explains Hassan Merzouki,  member of the Regional Council of  the political party USFP . ‘’ For the budget, the Regional Council prepares its program on the basis of fiscal forecasts , among others, the receipts transferred by the state through tax revenue and  corporate tax  accounting for 5%.Hence, the above sum equals the budgetray deficit of  90 MDH which should be collected by the contributions of tax revenue and  corporate tax  for the fiscal year 2018 » emphasized Jamal Diwany, member of the Regional Council from the political party PI.

However, "this deficit in terms of projected expenditures will directly impact the budget architecture of the Regional Council for the year 2018," adds Merzouki. Today, although Decree No. 2-17-598, is made pursuant to Article 231 of the Organic Law No. 111-14, relating to the regions, which concerns the Social Upgrading Fund, and the decree n ° 2-17-667 ° which defines the criteria of distribution of the incomes of the same fund, the distribution coefficients will be fixed by the Interior, after consultation with the presidents of the Regional Councils, according to the article 2 of the same decree ( n ° 2-17-667 °), published in BO, on December 4, 2017.

Regarding the modalities for the allocation of revenue from the Interregional Solidarity Fund, six criteria were taken into consideration by the decree of the Ministry of the Interior. These are the human development index, the gross domestic product per capita, the number of unemployed, the number of inhabitants of rural areas, the number of inhabitants of urban suburbs, as well as the nature of the projects financed. according to the priorities of public policies. With regard to the allocations to the Interregional Solidarity Fund, pursuant to Article 20 of the 2016 Budget Law, and from 1 January 2016, the Trust Account entitled "Interregional Solidarity Fund", of which authorizing officer is the Minister of the Interior, has already started accounting for transactions aimed at the equitable distribution of resources between regions, with a view to reducing the disparities between these regions, in accordance with Article 234 of Organic Law no. 14 relating to the regions. According to the article, "this trust account will credit, the contributions of regions with significant resources and debit, the sums paid to the budgets of the regions faced with shortcomings of their resources and intended to finance regional development projects in addition to the sums available to local and regional authorities, public institutions and enterprises for carrying out regional development operations, within the framework of interregional solidarity ". In addition, a meeting is scheduled today (Tuesday) between the DGCL and the Association of Regional Presidents on the RDPs.

-Yassine SABER pour LesEco.ma