The Marshall Islands Cabinet has approved more than two million US dollars to buy fuel for the country's power utility company.
A shipment of more than two million gallons of diesel to the Marshalls Energy Company was expected to depart South Korea this week.
The Marshalls Energy Company, which over the past two months has been paying instalment on the more than four million dollars due two weeks ago, still owed about half of the cost for the shipment, and government officials had been scrambling to come up with the cash.
The company's energy manager, Steve Wakefield, says Cabinet's funding matches the amount that Ebeye Island's power utility owes to it.
Ebeye's power company has not paid the Marshalls Energy Company for fuel delivered this year and now owes 2.2 million dollars.
Government officials says to ensure that fuel continues being delivered to Ebeye by the Marshall Islands Energy Company, assurances were made earlier in the year that government would clear the debt to the Majuro utility.
The government action comes as the country faces a 1.8 million dollar deficit as tax revenues for 2009 keep shrinking.