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High poverty and low paying jobs
Editorial…
Kaieteur News- If there is anything that the PPPC Government loves to broadcast, it is jobs. President Ali gets excited when he talks about jobs created by his government, and so does Vice President Jagdeo. We at this paper have had questions about the true number of new jobs and the kind of jobs that are created by Guyana’s booming business climate. Into this picture, the US Government weighed in about the lack of high paying jobs, and the presence of high poverty in Guyana, and how both contribute to the local illegal drug trade. True to form, the PPPC Government took offense, which doesn’t help the situation, only smooths it over a little, if at all.
“The economic appeal of the drug trade in Guyana, with its high poverty rate and low paying public sector jobs, leads individuals to become involved in illicit activities and hinders efforts to curb trafficking.” We zeroed in on that extract from the 2025 United States International Narcotics Control Strategy Report on Guyana. High poverty rate and low paying jobs, the US report said it, not this paper. When the few Guyanese who summon the courage to state that reality, the government and its leaders, Ali and Jagdeo, engage in one of their usual foot stomping tantrums. Guyanese are denounced, and now the Guyana Government can denounce the US narcotics report, and see how far it gets.
We agree that more jobs have been created, but they are mainly the kind of jobs that normally fall under the category of low level and low paying, and more often than not menial. It is true that there are more jobs, but few are the Guyanese who run forward to work for between $3,000 to $5,000 a day in the public sector. What the US reports has substance, because there is the lure of the drug trade, where those involved don’t have to labor eight hours a day, five (or seven) days a week for a pittance. A successful engagement in the drug trade pays multiples of what both low paying public and private sector jobs offer. The wage and reward arithmetic are as simple as that, and just as irresistible. The government can protest all that it wants, but that is human calculation and local reality.
Regarding high poverty, as identified by the US, as fueling involvement in the drug trade, this is a bone in the throat of PPPC Government leaders. Their preference is to highlight the growing evidence of buildings going up in the Guyana skyline, and the surrounding infrastructure works racing ahead at ground level. Amidst signs of increasing prosperity, there’s stark poverty. There is no question that prosperity for the connected and fat cats has spiralled, but there’s that ugly Guyana secret that the government prefers to remain hidden. It is poverty in an oil-rich country, and the alarmingly high rate of it, notwithstanding all the leadership’s boasts, or their ignoring the issue in the hope that it goes away.
It is not going away, and poverty-stricken Guyanese are finding relief by going into the direction of the rich drug trade. Where there is money, men will flock and take a chance with the odds of not being caught. According to the US report, the odds are low due to the depths of corruption in Guyana. It is a pay and play environment that sucks in society’s bottom feeders, and the public sector agencies that have oversight responsibilities for the drug trade. Corruption is like a virus that strikes all who come within its shadow. The US report, which didn’t mince words, also pointed to “nepotism in the public sector and political entities” and how that handcuffs drug-fighting efforts. The Guyana Government just took a hard hit when “political entities” were mentioned by the US Government.
The PPPC Government’s leadership likes to claim how clean it is, and how transparent it has been, in defiance of the record. It now has its job cut out for it, with this latest US Report on narcotics in Guyana. The corruption footprint is everywhere, and it is a big one. It is too big to hide, and so broad that many in the government are besmirched.
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