–Dr. Jagdeo grills media entities for ‘major distortion’ of President Ali’s press conference

WHILE there is a pressing need for credible reporting of Guyana’s development, personal arrogance has flouted and consumed the media landscape, People’s Progressive Party (PPP) General Secretary, Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo has said.
During a press conference at the party’s headquarters on Thursday, Dr. Jagdeo grilled those sections of the media that ignored the positives and thorough dissemination of information by President, Dr. Irfaan Ali.
While many, especially PPP critics, have constantly called on Dr. Ali to speak, the General Secretary highlighted that when the President spoke, there was the circulation of insignificant issues by some individuals and sections of the media.
“You can’t run a country by, every day, stirring the same issue; it’s a braindead sort of environment,” the PPP General Secretary firmly said.

He related: “I’m so disappointed that instead of focusing on the substantive issues that he addressed, that an entire section of the media has just been focused on a few issues of a personal nature rather than reporting on the important things for the country.”
For the benefit of the Guyanese people, the PPP General Secretary said that he hoped there would have been an analysis of important issues which were linked to the development of the nation.
“So we had the media, particularly sections of the media talking about first of all, how long the President’s press conference must be and how much time he should speak for. Now that is arrogance on the part of these media houses,” he said.
Jagdeo then related: “…With the era of social media, whenever the President speaks or anyone for that matter, there is a whole slew of people out there who can directly hear what the President or the presenter, the person who is convening the press conference is saying. And this is important today, in this era, particularly when you have sections of the media that will never intermediate truthfully what is being said at these press conferences.”

He further said that if it was not for social media where persons can directly tune in, then those sections of the media would have fed the populace a “major distortion” of what was said.
Despite attempts to paint the President in an unflattering light, the PPP General Secretary dismantled this perception that is being pushed by well-known critics of the PPP.
The PPP General Secretary said that on numerous occasions, Dr. Ali has answered the question of how his administration has boosted disposable income and more so, even he, Dr. Jagdeo, had provided statistics showing that it was actually the PPP/C Government that prioritised the well-being of persons in the public service with significant increases since 2020.

He had previously told reporters: “We looked at the wages and it’s self-explanatory, the wages between 2014 and 2019, the APNU period, it was a 56 per cent increase, and from 2020 to 2024 it is 66.1 per cent increase.”
Looking at the nominal value, he highlighted that the public sector wage increased by $83 billion more under the PPP/C administration.
“Increase in 2014 to 2019 was $43 billion so when they started in 2014, by 2019 the wage bill for these three areas had gone up by $43 billion. From 2020 to 2024, the increase has been $83 billion, more than 100 per cent of what APNU gave for the five years,” he said.