IMF Calls for Slashing Public Sector Wages, Imposing Taxes Global Lender Warns That Without Reforms, Kuwait’S Financing Needs Will Grow Rapidly
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
JUMADA ALTHANI 3, 1441 AH TUESDAY, JANUARY 28, 2020 28 Pages Max 20º Min 06º 150 Fils Established 1961 ISSUE NO: 18046 The First Daily in the Arabian Gulf www.kuwaittimes.net Filipino FM’s remark infringes Eilish dominates Grammys as 4 months after ‘Howdy, Modi!’, Nadal weathers fierce Kyrgios 4 on Kuwait’s security, judiciary 20 music world mourns Kobe 24 some Indians abroad protest 28 challenge to reach quarters IMF calls for slashing public sector wages, imposing taxes Global lender warns that without reforms, Kuwait’s financing needs will grow rapidly KUWAIT: The International Monetary amplify fiscal financing needs while slow Fund yesterday urged OPEC member progress on the structural front would Kuwait to introduce a package of reforms dampen growth,” the IMF said in a report. Kuwait denies that includes imposing taxes and phasing out Kuwait’s economy grew by just 0.7 percent subsidies to plug a chronic budget deficit. last year and is forecast by the IMF to grow by entry to 9 as Kuwait, which heavily depends on oil for 1.2 percent this year. The IMF said that without almost 90 percent of its revenues, has been reforms, the government’s financing needs are hit hard since crude prices crashed in mid- projected to grow rapidly, accounting for $180 virus spreads 2014 and earlier this month approved a billion over the next six years. The global WUHAN, China: China’s capital yesterday budget with a huge shortfall for the sixth lender proposed specific reforms over the next recorded its first death from a deadly coron- year in a row. Income from investments held decade to help the state adjust its finances. The avirus as it struggles to contain a rapidly through the government’s sovereign wealth plan calls for gradually reducing public spend- spreading disease that has sparked global fund is not included in ing and curtailing the the budget. FULL REPORT ON PAGE 14 public wage bill, which alarm, with countries scrambling to evacuate Spending, mostly accounts for nearly their citizens from the epicenter of the epi- on hard-to-reverse categories such as half of public expenditures, by making private demic. Meanwhile, Kuwait airport authorities salaries and social aid, expanded by 25 per- sector jobs more attractive. prevented nine passengers arriving from cent only in the past two fiscal years while The government should phase out fuel, China from entering Kuwait over suspicions the public wage bill has grown by about 6.0 electricity and water subsidies and social they were infected with the coronavirus. percent annually, the IMF said. Kuwait, aid, which currently account for 7.5 percent The death in Beijing raises the death which pumps 2.7 million barrels of oil per of GDP or $10.3 billion annually, IMF said. It toll from the new virus to 82, with more day, has huge fiscal reserves estimated at called on the government to follow in the than 2,700 people infected across the $644 billion by the IMF. Unlike other Gulf footsteps of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab nation and cases found in more than a states, Kuwait has a lively parliament which Emirates and Bahrain in imposing a five-per- BEIJING: A woman wearing a protective mask to help stop the spread of a deadly virus checks dozen other countries. has repeatedly blocked government plans to cent value-added tax and excises on luxury her look with the camera of her smartphone at Beijing railway station yesterday. — AFP impose taxes or charges on public services. goods, as well as broadening profit tax on Continued on Page 24 “Delays in fiscal reforms would further domestic companies. “ — Agencies regarded as one of the greatest basketball Angeles County Sheriff Alex World mourns players in history. He was an iconic figure Villanueva told reporters. The National who became one of the faces of his sport Transportation Safety Board said an 18- during a glittering two-decade career with strong team of investigators would be sent Kobe Bryant the Los Angeles Lakers. All-time basketball to California to probe the crash. LOS ANGELES: Basketball legend Kobe great Michael Jordan said Bryant was “like a Tributes to Bryant flooded in from former Bryant’s death in a helicopter crash along little brother” to him. “Words can’t describe US presidents, pop stars and athletes from with his teenage daughter sparked an out- the pain I’m feeling,” the former Chicago different sports, a sign of how the man pouring of grief across the worlds of sports Bulls star said. “We used to talk often and I known as the “Black Mamba” had transcend- and entertainment yesterday. Bryant, 41, was will miss those conversations very much.” ed basketball. “Kobe was a legend on the traveling Sunday with his 13-year-old daugh- Dozens of firefighters and paramedics bat- court and just getting started in what would ter Gianna and seven other passengers and tled across hilly terrain to reach the flaming have been just as meaningful a second act,” crew when their helicopter slammed into a wreckage of the Sikorsky S-76 but found no Barack Obama tweeted. rugged hillside in thick fog in Calabasas, west survivors, officials said. Fans and mourners HH the Amir Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al- of Los Angeles. There were no survivors. descended on the area but police warned Jaber Al-Sabah sent a cable of condolences people to stay away. “As you can imagine, it’s to US President Donald Trump over the heli- MANILA: A boy with a basketball walks past a wall painted for former Los Angeles A five-time NBA champion and two-time Lakers basketball player Kobe Bryant yesterday, following his death overnight in Olympic gold medalist, Bryant is widely a logistical nightmare in a sense because the copter crash. HH the Crown Prince Sheikh crash site itself is not easily accessible,” Los Continued on Page 24 the US. — AFP (See Page 26) Caspian Airlines, was flying from Tehran’s Mehrabad News in brief Iran plane slides off Airport with 135 passengers plus the plane’s crew. IS urges attacks State TV reported that all were safe. A state TV Currency forger arrested runway onto highway reporter travelling on the plane told the broadcaster against Israel to that the aircraft’s “back wheel had broken off, as we KUWAIT: Criminal detectives arrested a curren- saw it was left on the runway” and said the plane had cy forger with KD 8,960 in forged KD 20 notes. TEHRAN: An Iranian passenger plane overshot a run- been moving with no wheels before it ground to a halt. nix Trump plan Jleeb detectives were tipped off about a person way as it landed yesterday in the southwestern city of Iran’s aviation authority said “the cause of the incident who forged KD 20 notes and released them in the Bandar-e Mahshahr, barrelling into an adjacent high- is being investigated”. BEIRUT: The Islamic State group vowed to shift its market. After investigations, an undercover source way without causing casualties, state TV reported. The Islamic republic had been planning to upgrade focus from the remnants of its “caliphate” towards was sent to buy the forged currency, and the sus- “Arriving at Mahshahr airport, the pilot landed the air- its decrepit fleet after long-standing US sanctions were Israel, in its first audio statement since confirming the pect was arrested with KD 1,300 in forged KD 20 craft too late and this caused him to miss the runway,” lifted following the 2015 nuclear deal between Tehran death of Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi. In a purported audio notes. The suspect confessed to forging ban- the broadcaster quoted the head of Khuzestan and world powers. But when US President Donald message by its spokesman Abu Hamza Al-Quraishi, the knotes and told them he had more in his car, province’s aviation authority as saying. This “caused the Trump pulled out of the accord in 2018 and reimposed organization called for sabotaging a so-called peace where they found amounts of KD 3,180 and KD aircraft to overshoot the runway and stop in a boule- crippling economic sanctions, the treasury department plan US President Donald Trump is due to unveil. The 4,480, in addition to blank paper in the size of KD vard” next to the airport, Mohammadreza Rezaeia said. revoked licenses for Boeing and Airbus to sell passen- spokesman said IS leader Abu Ibrahim Al-Hashimi Al- 20 notes. — Hanan Al-Saadoun The McDonnell Douglas jet, belonging to Iran’s ger jets to Iran. — AFP Quraishi encourages the group’s fighters to launch “a new phase” and vowed major operations against Israel. “The eyes of the soldiers of the caliphate, wherever Maid’s ‘killers’ jailed they are, are still on Jerusalem,” the spokesman said in the 37-minute message. “And in the coming days, God KUWAIT: An informed source said prosecutor willing, you will see what harms you and what will make general Dherar Al-Asousi ordered a Kuwaiti you forget the horrors you have seen,” Abu Hamza Al- man and his wife - accused of killing their Quraishi said, apparently threatening attacks of Filipino maid - be sent to the central prison, unprecedented scope. AFP could not immediately with a decision to jail them for 21 days after authenticate the message but the recording was pub- they were charged with premeditated murder. lished via the group’s usual social media channels. Asousi decided to refer them to the criminal The organization once administered a sprawling court and demanded the strictest sentence for self-proclaimed “caliphate” straddling big parts of the crime, which may reach capital punishment.