EU Delegation admits mistake with sugar money figure

Jul 05, 2017 News

The Delegation of the European Union (EU) has apologized for last week’s disclosures that Guyana had received more than $348B to help the country recover from a crippling price cut starting 2006.

EU Ambassador Jernej Videtic

According to EU, at a press conference held at the Delegation office last Thursday, the figure of Euro 166,667,000 was given as the amount granted by the European Union in budget support to the sugar industry in Guyana between 2006 and 2013.

The disclosure was made by Ambassador Jernej Videtic during questions at the press conference.

“While this is the correct figure, the corresponding amount in Guyana dollars was inadvertently given as $348.5 billion, when it should have been approximately GYD$34.85 billion (depending on exchange rate used).”

The Delegation made it clear that therefore, the amount allocated in budget support to sugar by the EU from 2006 to 2013 was Euro166.67 million, or in Guyanese dollars $34.85 billion. The Delegation of the European Union sincerely regrets any confusion caused.”

That figure had raised alarm bells with Minister of State, Joseph Harmon, last Friday, asking the People’s Progressive Party (PPP), which was in power during the period, to explain what it did with the money.

According to the Minister, the $348B is a huge sum of money that clearly did not go where it was needed.

If there was ever an inquiry in the EU billions, Harmon said, “You will find the bulk of the money never went where it was supposed to. And so when the PPP and some of their friends are going to sugar workers and crying out ‘we sorry for you, we sorry for you,’ and so on, they should explain what it is that they did with all this money.”

Specifically, Harmon said, the PPP should be made to answer why it is that the state-owned industry is producing sugar higher than the world market price.

Over the weekend, Opposition Leader, Bharrat Jagdeo, denied that the PPP administration ever benefitted from $348B. In a statement, the party, whose 23-year reign ended in the 2015 general election, said that the figure released by EU was grossly overstated and that Jagdeo would address the matter on his return from New York.

The sugar industry is facing tough times with high debts, aging factories and billions of state bailouts the order of the day.

Wales factory was closed last December and two others- Rose Hall and Enmore are likely to face the same state, as part of the cost-cutting, diversification programme to keep the industry alive.