Greenidge says Government trying to divert attention from accountability, corruption issues

Mar 24, 2012 News

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A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) Shadow Minister of Finance, Carl Greenidge is accusing the PPP/C Government of trying to divert attention from issues of accountability and corruption by besmirching his integrity and challenging his tenure as Minister of Finance.
In a press release yesterday, Greenidge stated while he is not opposed to any scrutiny of his tenure as Finance Minister, he believes that Government has embarked on a campaign to divert attention from important matters by issuing personal attacks on him in the National Assembly.
“The PPP will stop at nothing in its efforts to ensure that either my voice is stilled or my ability to make a contribution to the national conversation on our economic condition is severely curtailed. Let me at this early juncture make it quite clear that I am not opposed to any scrutiny of my tenure as Minister of Finance nor do I apologise for my participation in the policy decisions and implementation during the period I was in charge of the nation’s finances.  Indeed, I welcome such scrutiny.”
According to the APNU parliamentarian, any debates or discussion on that period is welcomed, especially if the objective is to determine what lessons can be learned from this period, so that they can be applied with profit to the future endeavors to bring development.
Greenidge lamented that the “cussing” and personal attacks are not acceptable, since they are unhelpful to national discourse and a barrier to free discussion and an impediment to creative debate.
“I wonder sometimes if my misguided compatriots in the PPP realise the damage that is inflicted on this nation and the political environment when they engage in the kind of ad hominem attacks and the willful attempt at character assassination. Surely, they have learnt a lesson from the last elections that the “cuss down” version of politics has worn thin with the Guyanese people and that it is past time that we engage in a civil dialogue on the issues which are critical to our success as a nation and our mature development as a people,” Greenidge stated.
He elaborated that these attacks by the ruling party have been ongoing for many years, dating back to 1992 when Dr. Cheddi Jagan became President.
He alleged that the then PPP Government, led by Dr. Cheddi Jagan, did its “level best” to stymie his career as an international civil servant.
“My candidature for the position as Deputy Secretary-General of the ACP Secretariat was endorsed by the Caribbean Community in defiance of the PPP/C Administration which had engaged in activities calculated to undermine and perhaps scupper my candidature. Fortunately, the Heads of the Caribbean Community stood firm and my candidature succeeded.”
Greenidge reassured that while he was executing his duties as Secretary General of the ACP he did nothing which could harm the national interests of Guyana.  He said that when he returned to the country he came under the verbal assault of the State owned media, “with President Bharrat Jagdeo leading the pack”.
The press release further stated that he was accused of engaging in partisan politics and was denounced as the worst finance minister the country ever had, who had not produced any audited reports during his tenure.
According to Greenidge, those allegations are not new and cannot bear scrutiny.
He explained that when he became Minister of Finance in 1983, Guyana was still in the grip of the then global economic crisis, which did not spare any state especially a “small, open and vulnerable one like Guyana.”
The APNU parliamentarian continued to say that the PNC government at that time did not “throw up its hands in despair”.
“We got to work and crafted an Economic Recovery Programme (ERP) which had succeeded, by 1991, in generating more than 6 percent growth in the national economy. The success of the ERP is best described in the words of the 1991 Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) report which read that over the past year rice production has increased by 61 percent and sugar by 23 percent …non-traditional exports increased by 81 percent in terms of tonnage…the monetary reserves are not at the level of $112Million dollars and the real growth of the economy is that of 6.1 percent for 1991.”
The release went on to say that as regards to the audited accounts, he (Greenidge) has on several occasions “laid 11 of them in the National Assembly” and at least on one occasion the Minister of Finance acknowledged this.
“But in his attempt to prolong partisan rancor he has shifted the argument to say that I did not present audited reports for the period I was in office but for those of my predecessors. This kind of sophistry is unworthy of Dr Singh. That the reports were in arrears is not in doubt. I could not, in the circumstances, produce reports which did not address the question of those which were outstanding.”
Greenidge added that the true challenge before the country is the current PPP policies, specifically the issues of non-accountability, corruption and petulance in response to the debate on the Fiscal papers and Budget preparation.

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