Pull Quote: ‘And now during this Lethem Flood Disaster, PNCR’s ‘newly-anointed-by-the-few’ presidential candidate, Mr. David Granger is regurgitating the same 2005 PNCR script, derisively holding out a hand to government, while at the same time engaging in foolhardy politicking amid human wretchedness, and describing the government’s response as shoddy. The people are watching this waning opposition mouth its unpleasant rhetoric without any articulate plan for Guyana’s future.’
THE GUYANESE people will recall the Great Flood of 2005, a disaster by any standards. Recorded data of rainfall from January 1 through January 20, 2005 was 34.3 inches, outstripping all records since 1888. That disaster carried all the ingredients of a deepening catastrophe. Nevertheless, the PPP/C Government’s immediate response made a momentous difference to a calamitous situation. Make no mistake about the fact that it was President Bharrat Jagdeo’s front-line leadership, amid scurrilous PNCR remarks, that brought manageability to that disaster, for real output was expected to fall by 5.4% in 2005, but through prudent economic management, that decline was only 3%.
And now the Jagdeo Administration’s swift response to combating and controlling the current Lethem Floods of 2011 is not only different; it is by all rational calculations even better. Government immediately responded to Lethem residents: providing shelters, with food supplies, bed nets, potable water, water purifiers, medical supplies, and health surveillance to be followed later by planting materials, veterinary supplies, agricultural chemicals, etc. The President made $50M relief package available, and has indicated his government’s involvement for the long haul.
During the Great Flood of 2005, in a People’s National Congress (PNC) Nation Watch programme, the PNCR attempted contemptuously to throw its support behind the government of the day, while simultaneously moaning and groaning about the government’s total flood relief effort.
And now during this Lethem Flood Disaster, PNCR’s ‘newly-anointed-by-the-few’ presidential candidate, Mr. David Granger is regurgitating the same 2005 PNCR script, derisively holding out a hand to the government, while at the same time engaging in foolhardy politicking amid human wretchedness, and describing the government’s response as shoddy. The people are watching this waning opposition mouth its unpleasant rhetoric without any articulate plan for Guyana’s future.
Sound bites are no real surrogates for any Party’s platform for Guyana’s future in its pursuit of political governance. And what the AFC refers to as a plan, is not a plan; it is more akin to a ‘wish-list’, and incidentally, the AFC should note that the PPP/C government has already implemented a tax-free threshold of $480,000 per year, and in this ‘wish list’, too, the AFC is unable to determine a new VAT rate, or even a range; more to come!
This year’s budget debate witnessed the opposition’s new-found fancy for fiscal austerity, aggressively criticizing the government deficit spending modus operandi. Nonetheless, Granger and his team, plus their sidekick the AFC, have no comprehensive platform for addressing their spanking new nemesis: Deficit spending. And there has to be clarity on their approach to reducing both current and capital account deficit within the context of short and long-term development.
With the government’s economic plan, the current account deficit in 2010 declined in the First Quarter from $7.7 billion to $254.1 million in the Fourth Quarter; and as the economy improves, the current account deficit would further decline.
And then there is the other half of this traditional opposition, the new opposition that loves to avoid political obscurity, and will do or say anything that sustains its public lampoonery. In fact, not all the insubstantial criticisms that so-called commentators make in their daily/weekly drivel will alter the progressive course of development in this country.
A cursory glance at sample developments over the last few years will show that the new opposition’s daily/weekly foolishness remains an insult to the Guyanese people’s intelligence to assimilate things for what they are. The people of Guyana will only have to present a few developmental items on their shopping list to demonstrate the opposition’s idiocy.
Such items would include: Increasing growth of sector Gross Domestic product (GDP)contribution; steady real economic growth rate; rising per capita income; increased tax-free threshold; stable export revenues; growing foreign investment; strong macroeconomic fundamentals; agricultural diversification to improve food supply, product base, and marketing facilitation and support; improved infant and under-five mortality rate; high child immunization rate; more trained teachers; more CXC successes; an improved National School Feeding Program; broadened scope of technical vocational education; great strides in Amerindian development in water and land transport, creation of village offices, land demarcation; reduced poverty rate; and the spectacular successes in housing. These are transparent and verifiable developments.
For these reasons, what the Guyanese people have at the 2011 national elections is the PPP/C with no competition, but ‘also-ran’ groupings. The choice for the Guyanese people is clear: They will continue with the PPP/C progress and prosperity for the future.