THE National Budget is perhaps the most important economic regulator, it is the main instrument through which governments collect resources from the economy, in a sufficient and appropriate manner; and allocate and use those resources responsively, efficiently and effectively.
It comes as no surprise that the political oppositions (APNU/ AFC) who are now perceivably indistinguishable would engage in misleading the Guyanese people and misrepresenting the details composed in the national budget, “the people’s budget” ($192.8B) presented in Parliament by Finance Minister, Dr Ashni Singh.
The opposition’s intent on killing this year’s budget in an attempt to appeal to their base voters and gain petty political points is absolutely pellucid. But by so doing it would be the political suicide of these two flaccid non entities.

Since the results of the November 28 general and regional elections were tallied and the PPPC declared victors, the APNU/ AFC, such sorry excuses for a political opposition, have played every nasty trick in the book; boycotts, protests, abandoning constitutional proportionality in parliamentary committees, challenging GECOM statement of polls, etc.

But the biggest piece of oratory feces excreted by the opposition, thus far, was malignantly suggesting that any continuity of the previous government’s economic policy would somehow negatively impact the state of the economy imposing additional burden on the people of Guyana.
And as the story unfolds so thus the hilarity of Burnham Bohemians which is more than deserving of a standing ovation probably even an Oscar.
Believe it or not this has been the budgetary rhetoric of the opposition which is crafted to deceive the general public in order to stimulate their outrage leading up to and during the budget debate.

This decade of diabolical distortions can be traced from as far back as the presentation of 2001 national budget and every other budget leading up to 2012 that has been tabled by the PPP government. Please don’t take my word for it just research the online archives and the consistency of the oppositions’ fallacious arguments would become evident, the most popular being and I quote “this budget is a disgrace and it lacks vision”. For the past umpteen years this has been the opposition description of every national budget presented in the National Assembly by the PPP government.

Never mind that for 2012 budget income tax threshold will increase to $600,000 annually or $50,000 monthly, or Public Servants receiving $3 Billion of additional disposable income, never mind 21,000 Guyanese will not be taxed or that there is NO new taxes introduced, never mind the 8% increase to Old Age pension directed to 42,000 senior citizens, or 7% increase in Public Assistances to 9,000 Guyanese. Never mind $4 Billion was allocated to the Sugar industry where 20,000 workers and their families would benefit from the government subsidy, or what about the $6 Billion intervention towards GPL intended to alleviate the burden off 164,803 consumers on its grid.

Lost in translation are these instrumental project initiatives that are not for PPP, APNU or AFC supporters, but these project initiatives are intended for the people of Guyana. But the people must understand that these proposals cost vision, patience, financial investments, and optimism in the government of the day to facilitate these developments. Contrary to what is being peddled by the Greenidges’ and the Ramjattans’, this is not the time for political grandstanding or partisan politics, not when so much is at stake, the elections has long escaped us, let’s remain focused and get the work done for the probity of all Guyanese.