The public bureaucracy is a drain on the public purse

Sep 28, 2019 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

There is a story about a secretary of the chief executive of a government corporation. This was in the early 1980’s. The government was broke and it was forced into dismissing thousands of workers whom it had stacked into the public service in the preceding years.
The government found names for these mass dismissals. They called it “retrenchment”, not dismissal.
The secretary felt important. She was the one who had to type the names of those to be dismissed. The workers were anxious and kept asking her if she got the list as yet.
She felt special. She walked around with an air of superiority because she would know beforehand who would be going home. She was “Miss Important”. She was rude to the staff telling them that they would know their fate when they received their letters.
About midday, the chief executive passed to her the list of those to be retrenched. He asked her to type it up and place it on the Notice Board. At the time, there were some workers near her desk. She ordered them out of the room, saying that she had to do important and confidential work.
She began to type up the list, slowly but methodically, smiling all along when she noticed that the names of some of the workers she disliked were due to be sent home. She took her time.
Suddenly, there was loud crashing sound. The people in the outer office rushed into find that the secretary had collapsed on the floor. There in bold letters, on the list, was her name.
People in positions must be careful what they wish for others because it can come back to haunt them. Do not wish bad for people because you never know when your time will come.
Retrenchment brought great suffering to persons. Tens of thousands were placed on the breadline because the state sector had become bloated and inefficient and the country’s taxes could no longer support their employment.
Not many roads or buildings were being constructed because most of the money was going to pay debts and to sustain the large bureaucracy.
There are a lot of persons who feel that oil production will make them wealthy. Oil money is not going into their pockets. It is going into the coffers of the government. And the government has a monstrous bureaucracy which is sucking public revenues like a vacuum cleaner.
It takes more than $500M per day to keep this bureaucracy going, monies which could have been better utilized is going to pay a whole set of persons, not all of whom are productive.
Persons have been employed in the public service, at present, on the basis of their family and political connections to government Ministers. We have friends, including female friends, of some ministers being employed. There are persons who are sitting at their desks all day doing very little work and receiving fat cheques at the end of the month while others are finding it hard to obtain jobs.
There are persons undertaking political work on Government time and being paid to do so. There are persons who are working and being offered jobs while those without jobs are left on the breadline.
The public service has been politicized. A few nights ago, on television, there were scenes of some persons being taught how to cook at a government agency. They were all bedecked in green shirts, the color of the ruling APNU.
The promised oil wealth is going to feed a fat bureaucracy which benefits the favored. It is going to benefit the University of Guyana, which less than 0.1% of the population attends. It is going to go contractors who will be provided with contracts to build roads and all manner of infrastructure.
The public bureaucracy is a drain on the public pursue. It needs to be trimmed. But we know that the very opposite will happen. It is going to be expanded and this will mean less money for the poor.
And then one day when oil prices crash, some secretary will receive a list of persons who have to be sent packing. And she too will faint when she sees her name on the list.

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