The widening gap between the rich and the poor

Dec 31, 2022 Letters

Dear Editor,

A very powerful letter, titled Poverty reduction is possible through good education was published in Friday’s Stabroek News, December 30, 2022, written by Dr. Tara Singh, glorifying the wonderful work being done by the Minister and the Ministry of Education.

It painted an impressive picture of the present and future of education. It implied that education could provide the opportunity for a level playing field suggesting that this can be an opportunity to reduce the gap between the haves and the haves not.

Of course, Dr. Singh in her opening salvo wrote how much money is being spent, what she didn’t tell us is who were the persons benefiting from the construction of buildings, etc. They say the proof of the pudding is in the eating. Sometime ago, persons in this community drew to the Ministry’s attention the fact that at least two schools in the South of the City, South Georgetown Secondary and East Ruimveldt Secondary Schools, children, mostly from poor families who can ill afford daily transportation much less to pay for extra lessons, have been forced to attend school only two days a week. (Form 2) due to the shortage of furniture.

To date, we had no comments from either the Minister or Ministry. How Dr. Singh could explain for the public, if with all this money available, you could find neither space nor furniture to accommodate poor children. What we see here beyond the fine words of Dr. Singh is widening the gap between the rich and the poor.

Regards,

Nigel Bacchus