06 January 1999, 901 words
There can be no doubt that Brian Kuei Tung is the most immensely self-confident man in Trinidad and Tobago. Indeed, he is the very definition of the word "blasé". Here is a man who, in two consecutive years, got two Budget estimates horribly wrong. Yet he remains completely unworried. I wish I could be that self-assured. And, this Christmas, I discovered how I can be.
It was one of my presents which finally enlightened me as to the secret of Mr. Kuei Tung's phenomenal self-confidence. No, I didn't get a year's supply of Viagra. What I got was a men's shower gel which guarantees "a fresh masculine fragrance for round-the-clock freshness and day-long confidence." Clearly, it is not enough to look confident or to feel confident. You've got to smell confident, too.
Given the stench that surrounds deals like the Maritime takeover of the Winsure portfolio, the airport expansion contracts to Ish, the NFM rice fiasco, and the InnCOGEN deal, I figure Brian's bathroom must be jam-packed with bottles of shower gel. Not, of course, that I am familiar with the inside of Brian Kuei Tung's house, for I am neither a rich man over 50 nor a sexy woman under 30. But what else could it be?
Faced with his track record as Finance Minister, I would probably have resigned in abject shame already. But Mr. Kuei Tung has no doubt been using shower gel with a masculine fragrance much longer than me. For the1998 Budget, he estimated an oil price of about $19, which everyone who wasn't trying to curry favour with the UNC regime felt was too high. The 1998 oil price ended up around $14 a barrel, yet Mr. Kuei Tung still declared a $39 million surplus. Of course, if one discounted the sale of various national assets, which normal accountants don't list as revenue, Trinidad and Tobago actually had a $100 million-plus deficit in 1998. But such trivial details don't worry Mr. Kuei Tung. You've got to admire his cool. Self-assurance like that requires real cojones.
For 1999, Mr. Kuei Tung has already repeated the exact same mistake he made for 1998, and everyone knows it. The 1999 Budget was based on a oil price of $14 a barrel. Oil hovers around $9 to $10 and is not expected to rise. A contraction in the world economy is almost certain. But is Mr. Kuei Tung worried? Not at all. Why should he be? This is the man who put the "con" in "confidence."
As proof, look at what he said in his news conference called two weeks ago to discuss the plummeting oil prices: "I've done a model which suggests if the oil price remains for the whole year at approximately nine dollars as opposed to $14, you're talking about a loss of about $400 million." But who is this model and what are her qualifications to make such a pronouncement? Does she have a degree in Economics or just a really fantastic figure? And what, exactly, does Mr. Kuei Tung mean when he says, "That will probably be the worst possible position we can get"? Is this position bad enough to cause pulled muscles?
Of course, everyone knows that Mr. Kuei Tung likes fantastic figures: his 1998 Budget had some numbers that left accounting firms truly baffled. Indeed, when this was pointed out, Mr. Kuei Tung's response was that, in a Budget, "figures don't matter." But anyone who has seen the women he limes with in Parrot knows that Mr. Kuei Tung does not really believe this. After all, in reference to the possible $400 million deficit, he also said, "I'm saying this with all honesty". Does this mean that he said everything else with some dishonesty? I ask these questions only because I have been using my shower gel for only two weeks now and am not yet a completely confident man.
Mr. Kuei Tung went on to say that a deficit "can be made good by a number of measures we can take." But he didn't specify what those measures might be. But, since this country doesn't have all that many options, we can safely assume that the measures will be exactly the same as those he took in 1998. For instance, Mr. Kuei Tung plans to borrow $3.2 billion in deficit financing. If, given his creative accounting techniques, that money ends up under revenue then Trinidad and Tobago might actually declare a surplus at the end of 1999. True, that money will have to be repaid with interest, but if Mr. Kuei Tung isn't worried, why should we lesser mortals be?
Besides, there are other measures which worked quite well in 1998. For example, in the last Budget planned capital expenditure on Health was $127.3 million, but the Government only spent $14.5 million. Capital expenditure on Utilities in 1998 was supposed to be $209.5 million, but the Government spent only $49.7 million. Capital expenditure on Development in the 1998 Budget was estimated at a whopping $1,079.8 million, but only $479.4 million was actually spent. So it is quite easy to get a Budget surplus, once you eschew capital expenditure on everything. Everything, of course, does not include the $800 million airport expansion project, which many people think stinks to high heaven. But such critics simply underestimate the power of smelling confident.
Copyright ©1999 Kevin Baldeosingh