Jagdeo views development in terms of projects

Mar 15, 2024 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

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Kaieteur News – At his press conference yesterday, this time advertised as speaking in his capacity of Vice President, Bharrat Jagdeo, highlighted the fact that the major projects completed under the APNU+AFC were all ‘legacy’ projects left in the pipeline by the PPP/C government in 2015.  He is correct in this regard.

He is also correct in pointing out that the APNU+AFC did not initiate any major public sector investment projects during its tenure. But as with most things, Jagdeo speaks half and leave out the other half.

He failed to mention that the reason why the APNU+AFC were involved in completing the PPP/C legacy projects such as paving the East Coast Public Road and the road to Parika, is because the PPP/C had failed to finish these projects. The APNU+AFC government was therefore saddled with projects which began under the PPP/C and which should have been completed under the PPP/C but which were not completed.

But the fact is that every government implements projects left in the pipeline of the former administration. The IDB for example had approved a project to improve the country’s energy matrix in 2018 when the APNU+AFC government was in office. Those plans are presently being implemented under the PPP/C.

Jagdeo failed to point out also the mess that the APNU+AFC inherited in terms of failed projects. Mention was made earlier of the calamitous Skeldon Modernization Project. As explained earlier, this threw the sugar industry into a deeper quagmire which led to a rapid downward spiral. During its five-year term, APNU+AFC was forced to divert tens of billions of dollars to the industry, thereby reducing the fiscal space for undertaking major public sector investment projects.

Then there was the bungled fibre-optic cable which proved too expensive to fix.  In 2018, Jagdeo himself was reported as having admitted that all the design parameters of the project were wrong and that the project was a failure, a costly one at that.

The PPP/C also saddled the country with many unpaid and unsettled liabilities, which estimated at around G$7B, including huge judgments such as that for its illegal collection of an environmental tax on CARICOM imports. Another G$5.4 billion had to be found to bail out the National Insurance Scheme because of the reckless investments made in now collapsed CLICO. This too reduced the fiscal space of the APNU+AFC government and pushed it to commit the cardinal error of increasing taxes.

But Jagdeo also has a myopic way of looking at things. For him, development is all about projects. He is judging the APNU+AFC record by virtue of the extent to which it completed major projects. He even critiqued the Green State Development Strategy as not having projects.

Projects, for him, are the litmus test of progress. Ironically, if that test was applied to him, it would give him a fail grade considering the calamitous Skeldon Sugar Factory.

But he fails to appreciate that the APNU+AFC had a different approach to development. Unlike the PPP/C which is obsessed with major infrastructural projects in the hope that there will be ‘trickle-down’ effects, the APNU had a different approach which sought to ensure that the people benefitted directly from government initiatives.

The APNU+AFC established ICT hubs across Guyana, including in hinterland communities. It took steps to reduce piracy and increased narcotics interdictions; access to electricity increased, new water treatment plans were established, the schools’ feeding programme was expanded and the President launched an initiative that provided free transportation to children.  Fewer house lots were distributed but more deserving persons got house lots rather than the Wild West approach, under the PPP/C, known as the one-stop housing drive. The focus of the APNU+AFC was not so much on infrastructure as it was on providing direct benefits to the people.

But there was also a genuine reason why the APNU+AFC could not boast of any new major infrastructural project. There is a gestation period, of at least three years, for any major project. This is the time it takes to plan a project and to secure financing. And therefore by the time, the APNU+AFC got to the stage of financing, the no-confidence motion had been passed and the country became embroiled in a constitutional crisis.

Unlike the PPP/C, the APNU+AFC did not have the resources which the PPP/C presently has at its disposal. The PPP/C therefore now can do more and even probably undertake major projects such as the gas-to-energy projects with or without funding from the EXXIM Bank of the USA.

On the other hand, the APNU+AFC came into office just as oil was discovered, and it left office just as production had commenced. It therefore had to prioritize the development of the institutional capacity to support the new oil and gas sector. It even negotiated a major loan from the World Bank which the PPP/C is now benefitting from and it was its commissioned studies relating to natural gas that are believed to constitute the feasibility study for the gas-too shore project.

But don’t you dare mention this to Jagdeo before he has to devote another press conference to dissecting what the APNU+AFC did, forgetting that it is his government’s record that is under scrutiny. And guess what?: A number of PPP/C’s government projects are behind schedule.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of this newspaper and its affiliates.)

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• APNU+AFC, Bharrat Jagdeo, Development, Projects, Vice President

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