A report on the PPP’s seven months in office

Mar 04, 2021 Letters

Dear Editor,

Seven months into the new PPP government, I share how I think it has done. I speak of the good, while I pinpoint slippages. Measured I will be.

A timely budget encouraged, with relief for the smaller people, and many public areas benefitting from increased allocations; once honesty used, much good could be done. I have doubts. I understand that coronavirus hit hard (nationally), much time was squandered (elections), more money plundered (coalition), and that massive amounts were needed to revitalize struggling sectors. My thinking is: too much too early. Indications are that borrowings will be part of the funding. I think it is too much, too burdensome. I sense additional borrowings in future budgets, be they annual, supplementary, or emergency. This is concerning.

The government identified several high-profile projects for launching. I applaud some: roads, bridges, schools, and in the health sector. Misgivings flourish over airport monies and continued Chinese involvement; get somebody else, more delays, more overruns, more non delivery looks likely. I have doubts about the gas-to-shore project, which is not helped by the PPP’s objections to transparency over Wales. It will cost much now, cost more after. Regarding oil on the whole, I believe that the two senior PPP leaders could have been more forthright, more upright, less uptight. The negligible thrives.

I hesitate on corruption since it is not a drop-dead issue for Guyanese anymore, other than for rankled opposition loyalists. Tabling corruption nowadays wastes time; no budging from government or supporters. Present it is, and with many more budgeted billions, opportunity abounds for the adventurous and protected. The pre-May 2015 political operators are still present and more powerful today. Who and what is there to stop them? Think cat with fish and dog with meat; there are no vegetarians. The top dog does the screening, the favoured passed to cronies, whose loaded language goes like this. ‘Plenty business around, with something for everyone, once played a certain way.’

His Excellency is a study in contrasts: all the smooth sound bites. Supporting actions are too scarce. His talk of transparency and unity die natural deaths. Political witches only survive so long and so, too, must be the partisan hunting. I would refuse a life-saving vaccine from such, if my dignity has been assailed (firings, disparagements, and blockages), with words and postures, that brings recoiling. The president divides; the Vice President rules. Even currency oversight must be monopolized, and I wonder where that leads ultimately. The next tier down – governor and minister – spreads the wealth around. Perhaps, that spreading is the hang up. It is alarming, since it is so laden with potential.

Conversations and tone must be less heated, less of looking back, more forward focused. By accident, I overheard the Health Minister on the Berbice maternal matter, and I thought he was campaigning. Time to start governing. Better can be done throughout; and I think it can be done. If the PPP delivers comprehensively, Guyana is better. When it doesn’t, all Guyanese suffer.

Yours truly,
GHK Lall

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