– HPS Luncheon
HEAD of the Presidential Secretariat (HPS) Dr. Roger Luncheon said, Wednesday, that the “reception and treatment by the Opposition of the 2012 National Budget would make an important further contribution to Guyanese assessment of the intentions of the Alliance, with regards to the governing People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) Administration.” He was speaking at his weekly post-Cabinet media briefing, at Office of the President, Shiv Chanderpaul Drive, Georgetown, ahead of the presentation, today, by Finance Minister Dr. Ashni Singh in the National Assembly.
“The much heralded Budget Day would arrive and the Minister of Finance will unveil the 2012 estimates,” Luncheon said, adding that expectations are rife about its reception and its treatment by the Opposition alliance.
“What is prophetic is that the Budget reception and its treatment by the Opposition alliance would make an important further contribution to people’s (Guyanese) assessment of the intentions of the alliance, with regards to the Governing PPP/C Administration.
“Suspicions are hardening, understandably so, that those intentions of the alliance are malevolent and, consequently, those intentions once orchestrated, the impact on the inter-party, inter-parliamentary political party dialogue – the impact would reverberate,” he stated.
Asked about the expected Opposition reaction to the budget, Dr. Luncheon said: “The parliamentary alliance of the Opposition parties, by deed, has, essentially, established the basis for those concerns – worse yet by their words.
“I know you are quite prepared to concede that intention is not as good as the act, but, in the conditions that are operative at the current moment, those intentions that are repetitively been brought to the attention of the public by leading spokespersons of both Opposition parties can’t help but colouring and influencing the assessment of their role in parliamentary considerations of any conceivable matter,” Luncheon declared.
He went on: “And, because the Parliamentary Opposition enjoys the one seat majority and because they exploit, they have hallowed the notion of majority control in Parliament. I think it is quite safe and it is quite reasonable for the Guyanese people to be on the lookout, to even anticipate that this is not going to be a passage and a consideration of the Estimates for 2012, that would be treated anyway different than other important matters have been treated in this extremely early phase in the life of the 10th Parliament.”
This will be Minister Singh’s sixth Budget presentation and his first since the November 28, 2011 general elections.