Dear Editor,
Guyana’s 2024 Budget’s theme: ‘Staying the Course: Building Prosperity for All’ undeniably reflects the primary goals and objectives of the PPP/C Government who hit the road running since assuming office in August 2020, never pausing for a moment but relentlessly pursuing and ensuring that the socio-economic development keep progressing at break-neck speed and the lives of the Guyanese people gets better on a daily basis. The 2024 Budget was not crafted in a vacuum oblivious of the needs of the various sectors and the needs of every stratum of Guyanese, be it pensioners, students, and the common man. The President, the Vice President, the Ministers and all government officials are always on the ground responding to these needs and have been assiduously working to satisfy these.
This is unlike when the Coalition mismanaged the country from 2015. They had boasted about providing the ‘good life’ for the Guyanese people but only provided that life for themselves, families and cronies. Every year and with each budget presented by the Coalition the lives of Guyanese got worse, they were taxed to the hilt, thousands lost their jobs, infrastructures kept falling apart and every sector was devastated whilst the treasury was raided until it became empty and reserves disappeared. Now the same Coalition which has become the most inept and visionless Opposition globally, is bent on nit-picking and pettifogging in a vain and malicious effort to condemn this 2024 Budget which aptly reflects the visionary policies of the Government geared to maintain the progressive trajectory and provide prosperity for every Guyanese.
The 2024 Budget should not be looked at in isolation. The Opposition always misses the forest for the trees and has never sought to understand the larger situation. I recalled a famous quote from the late Bruce Lee who had wisely said that, ’It is like a finger pointing away to the moon – don’t concentrate on the finger or you will miss all that heavenly glory’. Here is a Budget that has given so much to Guyanese, yet the Opposition, bereft of ideas and without a proper analysis is condemning it, mainly hitting at the increase to old age pension and public assistance, the budgetary allocation to GuySuCo, free university education thereby appealing to the emotions of the ordinary people and misguide them while subtly bringing race into the equation with reference to allocations to GuySuCo.
It would appear that the Opposition suffers from selective amnesia when it comes to electricity subsidies given to the bauxite industry. The Opposition knows that some people will never look beyond their pockets but they will never highlight the innumerable positives in the Budget. There are lots of benefits for the poor people and there are numerous measures to put more disposable income into everyone’s pockets. The Budget Debate will surely bring these out and expose the Opposition for what they are. The 2024 Budget projects an increase in real GDP to 34.4% while it strikes a much needed balance between the needs of the people and crucial and critical capital investments. It must be recalled that in the 2023 Budget, the real GDP was expected to grow by 25.1 percent but 33.3 percent was achieved (the Non-Oil Sector was projected to grow by 7.9 percent but this was surpassed and 11.7 percent was achieved). This testifies to the hardworking PPP/C Government who always works hard to achieve more than planned.
The Opposition was never good at crafting macro and micro economic policies and they could never understand how budget preparation should be done to ensure that these policies are achieved. Definitely figures present a severe challenge to them compounded by the lack of visionary ideas. The 2024 Budget was crafted so that the recurrent expenditures are sustainable. The oil revenue should not be used to splurge and squander but to lay the foundation for the prosperity of this and future generations. The capital expenditure is aimed at building and boosting the productive capacity of the non-oil sector which in turn will generate more revenues away from oil revenue. This will create less dependency on oil in the future.
For instance, capital investments in agriculture and other non-oil sectors will guarantee future streams of revenue. This means also that going along this route the country will not suffer from the oil curse which has greatly devastated other countries. This government’s Budget has always propelled this country in an upward progressive trajectory while the Opposition holds the unenviable record for presenting budgets, year after year, which were only capable of plunging this nation into steep socio-economic degradation and retrogression. They have no moral standing to debate this perfectly crafted budget, and they fully well know it.
Sincerely,
Haseef Yusuf
