Dear Editor,
Guyana has become a shockingly unequal society: the top 5 per cent enjoy an income equal to the whole of the bottom 60 per cent.
As a country we have the highest proportion of children living in poverty in the Western Hemisphere bar Haiti. The link between poverty and poor health, family breakdown and indifferent life chances is inescapable. At 66.3 years in 2009 we have the third lowest life expectancy in Latin America and the Caribbean, which falls below the global average of 67.9 years but better than Haiti which has 60.9.
In the Economist Intelligence Unit’s quality of life Index, Guyana ranks 101out of 160 countries scoring 5.26 out of 10 for 2009. Apparently Guyana’s quality of life has scarcely improved over the last 18 years. Nevertheless, within the Caribbean Guyana scores better than only Haiti.
There are many ways to interpret these disparaging statistics but it is clear that in many aspects of national performance we are being left behind by our Caribbean neighbours who came out of the independence starting blocks at the same time that we did. So too did Malaysia after 400 years of colonialism, and look what they have accomplished.
At independence Malaysia was one of the world’s poorest countries. Its GDP in purchasing power parity terms was comparable to that of Haiti. Now Malaysia’s income is roughly 15 to 20 times that of Haiti. In world growth rate figures, Malaysia is now in the top tier, along with China, Taiwan, South Korea and Thailand. More importantly the benefits of this formidable growth have been shared. This very year Malaysia is set to eradicate hardcore poverty with its overall poverty rate falling to 2.8%.
Interestingly Malaysia has managed to significantly reduce the income divides that made it an unequal society like ours, not by bringing their top 5% down, but by bringing the bottom up.
This remarkable success in reducing poverty was possible because of strong job creation. While unemployment is a major problem in this country Malaysia has been importing labour. In the 53 odd years since Malaysian independence, 8 million jobs have been created, equal roughly to 30 times our total working population.
It begs the question: what does Malaysia have that Guyana does not? The answer has to be a competent, enabling government which adopted sound macro-economic policies, invested heavily in education and technology, pushed a high savings rate and enacted a strong and effective affirmative action plan. It also had a head of state who consulted and listened to his private sector, treating them always as the ‘engine of growth’ rather than merely saying so.
One billionaire entrepreneur Dr Mahathir listened to and kept close was Tan Sri Dato’ Vincent Tan Chee Yioun who invested here in 1994. Fifteen years and G$5B later we wantonly destroyed his investments and sent him packing with a flea in his ear. Today Tan, still a dollar billionaire, is US$25M lighter for having invested in Guyana while Guyana remains a shockingly unequal and lamentably poor country.
Yours faithfully,
F Hamley Case
