Silence on fresh NSO GDP revisions

Gerald Fenech

A strange silence has settled over the financial community with regard to new figures published by the National Statistics Office on Friday where yet another revision to the Gross Domestic Product was published for the eight years from 1995 to 2003.
This contrasts markedly to the ferocious assault on the then NSO Director General Gordon Cordina, last January when similar revisions where announced to GDP figures. The well respected economist was subjected to an attack by the opposition that eventually led to his calling a press conference to explain the adjustments and his eventual resignation.
According to sources who spoke to this newspaper on condition of anonymity, the revisions to the figures in question contain much more substantial adjustments to those that were made public in January 2007 and which eventually led to the resignation of Cordina. Contacted for his comments yesterday, Cordina told Business Today that he had nothing to add as ‘the figures speak for themselves’. A number of economists where also contacted by this newspaper to give their views on the revisions but all claimed to require more time to analyze these figures more thoroughly. Some did not even respond to emails sent.
Labour Deputy leader and spokesperson on economic and financial affairs Charles Mangion who had been at the forefront of the attack on Cordina also told Business Today that he needed more time to analyze the figures.