Saudi govt to settle dues with private sector companies before year-end

A package to clear all the government dues owed to private sector firms before the end of 2016 has been announced. 

This is part of a raft of measures and procedures approved during a meeting of the Council of Economic and Development Affairs (CEDA), chaired by Deputy Crown Prince Muhammad Bin Salman, second deputy premier and minister of defense, at Al-Yamamah Palace in Riyadh on Monday night. 

The meeting has authorized the Deputy Crown Prince, who is also chairman of CEDA, to present the package to Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Salman. 

The measures include reviewing a number of projects and rearranging priorities of spending, in addition to halting the signing of several mega projects amounting to a total of SR1 trillion. 

The meeting came out with a package of solutions and procedures for the settlement of dues that fulfilled the requirements. The package entails quick start of settling the dues and complete them before Dec. 31, the last day of the current fiscal year, the Saudi Press Agency reported. 

The meeting discussed a number of economic and development issues including complete payment of amounts owed to the private sector, while noting that this has been delayed in light of a sharp decline in oil revenues. 

The Council discussed the mechanism for the disbursement of these dues based on rearranging priorities of spending by achieving the highest degree of transparency through an electronic portal so as to become a tool to provide accurate information about public expenditure. 

The Council discussed the state of completed government projects, associated measures taken by the state to review a number of projects and rearranging priorities of spending, according to their significance and efficiency, including the application of procedures by overcoming operational obstacles.  

The meeting also discussed the reports of government agencies as well as that of the Office to Raise Efficiency of Spending about the actions taken to raise the efficiency of government spending, including orders and decisions of restructuring some government sectors and the actions taken for reviewing the amounts approved for a number projects in alignment with the priorities, developmental needs and standards of efficiency in spending. 

These included a review of hundreds of contracts so as to re-schedule execution of some of them, modify contractual formulas and technical specifications for others, in accordance with the statutory regulations and the terms of the contract that contributed to the savings of tens of billions of riyals.