Aside from belittling a Kaieteur News reporter at his June 20 press conference, President Ali also conveniently ignored the question that had been asked of him.
Shervin Belgrave had asked, “I just have one question. With elections creeping near next year what is your government plan to increase (the) spending power of its citizens?” to which the President responded, “The government’s plan is to win the next elections by a greater majority and increase the disposable income in the pockets of persons.”
He then referred to the housing programme before asking Mr Belgrave, “How old are you?” to which Mr Belgrave responded, “I am 28 Sir.” The President further went on to ask the reporter about where he lives to which Mr Belgrave gave a response and then he was asked if he owns his own home. Mr Belgrave responded “not as yet.” Mr Ali questioned further, “Applied for a house lot?” and Mr Belgrave responded, “Not as yet.” Then President Ali in a dismissive tone told Mr Belgrave to sit down, remarking, “You are not participating on the enhancement of your own life. Thank you, bye.”
In his New Year’s address on January 1st this year, President Ali had said that cost-of-living interventions would be made to cushion any spikes in prices in the economy.
“We want to put more money into the pockets of people. Our policy making matrix will address this ideal and the idea of putting more money in the pockets of our people.
“Workers will continue to benefit from increases in their wages and salaries, augmenting the other measures, which we will take to enhance household disposable incomes”, the President said in his address.
With half of the year gone there has been little sign of this assistance and the government is still to enter collective bargaining with public servants.
The question of people’s disposable income and the cost of living remain major issues which have not been addressed by President Ali’s administration. For over eighty weeks now Stabroek News has published the cost of living travails of people all across the country. Their responses have been brutally frank and revelatory about the deep pockets of poverty that exist in all parts of the country and which are not being mapped or salved by the government in any systemic way and certainly not by the hoopla that it intermittently creates over handouts which it exploits to the hilt by having a bevy of ministers posing with the grateful.
Having avoided the question at the press conference, President Ali should contemplate the testimonies in the Stabroek News cost of living series and consider with all of the oil money flowing into the country whether it is just for people to be living in this manner and whether his government is failing by not coming up with a plan at ameliorate this level of poverty.
These are testimonies from recent instalments of the series.
Kalawattie Couchman, 56, of Hillfoot Village: “The cost of living is hard on me and my husband because right now he’s not working because he is sickly. We are renting right now and we rely on my two sons to help us pay the rent. They take care of us but the money they work for is not enough to take care of us. Right now, we owe rent. Sometimes when we don’t have transportation to go to Georgetown Public Hospital for my husband’s treatment, a nurse would visit our apartment”.
Gagadai Persaud, 50, of Hillfoot Village: “The cost of living is affecting my family and I very bad because the prices for items are expensive in the supermarket. My husband is the sole breadwinner for my family of three including my granddaughter. Right now, he is sick so whenever he could work, he works; the cost of living is very hard on us. From the little money he gets, I pay the electricity bill and so. The cost for everything gone up in the supermarkets”.
Oveilia Bryan, a pensioner of Farm, East Bank Demerara (EBD): “I don’t know what to say because the cost for everything gone up at the shops and the salary is not raising. What you going to do? You have to try with the cost of living. If you can’t buy a pound of something, buy half pound instead. I’m living alone, downstairs, while my son and his family lives upstairs. I support myself using my monthly pension. Recently, I purchased couple items and my $7,000 finished quickly. I didn’t get much for my money, I bought chowmein, milk, porridge, bag rice, flour and sugar. I didn’t get to buy other items I need”.
Evadney Baird of Farm, EBD: “The cost of living is affecting my family and I very bad because every month you have to go with extra money to buy items from the shop. Everything is expensive. This is suffering; it is like we are going to starve and die. Like I have to buy grass now. I rear cows and the milk is not selling because people don’t have money to buy cow milk. When I credit, the people moved away and don’t pay. This country is getting hard; we are suffering in this place. Some people have children and they are not getting public assistance for them. My son lives with me. He works while I receive NIS pension also. The eggs that I get from the chicken, I would share it to people who comes to buy milk because the eggs hardly sell”.
Agnes Singh, a pensioner of Farm, EBD: “The cost of living is affecting me because the prices for everything is costly now. My son lives with me and he can’t work because he is not in the state to work. So, I just run the home using my monthly pension whilst taking care of my son. I don’t get no kind of big money; my pension finishes within two weeks. I usually will have to borrow money to get by until the next month. The cost of living is really hard now”.
Clyde Hilton, a 47-year-old construction worker of Paradise, East Coast Demerara: “The cost of living is very hard right now because I’m not getting any work while people’s salary is not increasing and our country producing oil. I also have to pay rent. I live alone and would sometimes get support from my mother to cope with the cost of living. I also have my own kitchen garden where I try to cope with the cost of living”.
Fast approaching five years of oil production which continues to rise, these are the testimonies of the working class minus the contracting class and the non-working class who face daily survival quandaries. Someone in the government must take heed.
