(De Ware Tijd) PARAMARIBO – The banking sector should stay clear of party-politics. Just like a Central Bank, banks need to be purely technical institutions. Management should be separate from party-politics and favouritism with regard to decisions about who get loans and when, says Gillmore Hoefdraad, governor of the Central Bank of Suriname. Hoefdraad warns that banks’ involvement in politics will damage the sector’s credibility. The governor points out that improvement of the quality of managers in the banking sector will improve the quality of economies in the region. “Central banks ought to protect our economies against the calamities that have hit certain countries,” Hoefdraad says. The governor emphasizes that the central banks should play a leading role in order to guarantee that adequate credit remains available for production sectors. Hoefdraad made these calls last week during the annual meeting of the Caribbean Association of Indigenous Banks (CAIB). He also listed some of the actions the Central Bank of Suriname will take soon to support the expansion of Suriname’s banking system. The draft bill on the supervision of the banking and credit sectors, which is currently being debated by Parliament, was mentioned. In the mean time, other legislation for the financial sector is being prepared, such as on insurance, foreign currency, transfers and financial markets. The Central Bank governor also mentioned the establishment of a Sovereign Wealth Fund which is intended, among other things, to help stabilize the government’s finances, and minimize the risks of inflation and monetary and foreign currency exchange rate shocks. Measures to make regulating doing business easier will be taken as well. Besides that, the privatization of state-owned companies, including banks, will be closely monitored.
