In Summary:
- The Mayor of Paynesville City claimed that US$500,000 was allotted to the City for the clean city project while US$1.5 was allotted to the Monrovia City in the 2024 national budget
- We have reviewed both the 2024 approved and recast budgets
- We found that the Paynesville Mayor is incorrect about the allocation to the city but he is mostly correct about the amount allocated to the City of Monrovia
On November 14, Paynesville City Mayor Robert Bestman claimed during a live interview on Kool FM that the 2024 national budget allotted about US$500,000 to Paynesville City Corporation (PCC) for the Clean City Project, while US$1.5 million was allocated to the Monrovia City Corporation (MCC) for the same project
Mayor Bestman made the comparison of the allocations while stressing the land size and population of Paynesville as justification for an increased budgetary allocation for the Paynesville City Corporation – the city government.
The Claim
Mayor Bestman’s stated: “Last year we had about 500,000 for the clean city project and our major city; the capitol city had 1.5m.”
Listen to the Claim here:
Rating Justification
To fact-check this claim, we reviewed the 2024 national budget. Page #113 in the FY2024 approved budget shows that PCC got an allotment of over US$1.1 million under the “Clean City Project” and not 500,000 as claimed by Mayor Bestman.
However, it is important to note that the US$1.1 million allotted to PCC under the clean city project was later reduced in the FY2024 recast budget to US$705,000. This information can be found on page #20 of the recast budget.
Despite this reduction, the amount is more than the figure (US$500,000) mentioned by the Paynesville City Mayor.
Meanwhile, in the same year, USD$1.9 million was allotted to Monrovia City Corporation (MCC) for the clean city project. This information can be found on page # 110 of the 2024 approved national budget.
This amount was later reduced to a little over US$1 million in FY2024 recast budget, which can be seen on page #20. as
Conclusion
Based on our review of the 2024 budget, we conclude that Mayor Bestman’s claim that “about US$500,000 was allotted to Paynesville in the 2024 national budget is incorrect.
The amount allotted for the clean city projects in 2024 was US$ 1.1 million but was later reduced to US$ 705,000 in the recast budget.
However, he is mostly correct that US$1.5m was allotted to the Monrovia City Corporation for the same project. In the National budget, MCC was initially allotted US$1.9 million but was later reduced to US$1 million in the FY2024 recast budget.
