Coronavirus: Algerian Government To Launch Tougher Measures

President of the Republic, Abdelmadjid Tebboune, will chair on Sunday a cabinet meeting to approve the complementary finance bill to liberalize the government’s initiative and enable it to legal mechanisms to implement its plan of action that includes the president’s program. The council will also address two files that match the complementary finance bill in terms of importance and it concerns the oil market situation and the Coronavirus that threatens the world.

On Sunday, the President of the Republic will meet members of the executive branch at a cabinet meeting, which comes in the wake of two meetings which he held last week with the ministries of the sectors concerned to implement the scheme to confront the Coronavirus and the regular cabinet meeting comes three days after the government’s approval of the complementary finance bill will come this year in two versions, the first version will be discussed and approved by the cabinet today, while at the end of the current semester of 2020will start preparing for the second complementary financial bill.

According to a statement that was issued by the Presidency of theRepublic, the agenda of this meeting includes several points, including the approval of the preliminary draft of the complementary finance law for the current year, and two presentations, the first on the status and prospects of the international oil market, and the second related to the work plan for digitizing the administration, and the cabinet will also hear a presentation on the Coronavirus spread in the country and an assessment of measures that should be taken to stem its spread, the statement adds.

The cabinet meeting will decide today, once and for all, about the amendment proposals, which, although related to many sectors, are designed to give the flexibility that economic operators demand, especially those who hold investment projects, especially in the field of small and emerging institutions.

Governmental sources told Echorouk that the complementary draft finance law relied on sectoral offers that formed points within the agendas of previous councils of ministers that listened to the problems that prevent many of the productive sectors from achieving the desired results, such as the issue of bank account localization and movement of funds and fiscal pressure, whether related to tax duties or customs rights.

The complementary finance bill includes, according to Echorouk sources, measures that aimed at relieving fiscal pressure, whether on economic dealers or families, as income owners who are less than DZD 30,000 will be exempted from income tax, and the draft law deals with proposals related to dropping the fee for the professional activity that the government has already indicated in its plan that it will work to bring it down to reduce the prices of goods and services.

The complementary finance bill that the government rushed to discuss to face political and financial conditions, and it has no responsibility for the contents of the ongoing finance law that will be provided by the government before the end of the first six months of 2020, by preparing a second complimentary financial law, which will be devoted to arbitrations and financial amendments, i.e. everything related to the financial impact.

The second complementary finance law would also allow, along with the finance bill for the year 2021, to undertake all the incentive measures related to the implementation of sectoral policies that are detailed in the government’s business plan, and the oil price file in international markets will be present after its collapse caused a loss of Algeria’s income at the borders of one billion dollars in a period that does not exceed two weeks.

The file of combating the spread of the Coronavirus will be present for the second time in cabinet meetings, although the danger this epidemic has made Algeria, like the rest of the world, declare a state of emergency to limit its spread, it is known that the President of the Republic had imposed, last Thursday, a set of precautionary measures that will start from today, including the ban on the movement of mass transportation, and the demobilization of 50% of public office employees.

In his speech, the President confirmed that he would step up measures if the epidemic reaches the third degree.