Cash grant puzzles, tangles

Dec 23, 2025 Editorial, News

(Kaieteur News) – The PPPC Government is trying hard to shake cash grant developments that cling to it like leeches. The harder the government tries, the more tangled it becomes in what is now an embarrassment of itself, and a humiliation for citizens. Different leaders in the government at different times indicated in clear terms that a cash grant was set for this year, with President Ali leading with his first 2025 message to Guyanese.

There will be cash grants, with one to be expected this year. To cut a very fine point on the representations from various leaders in the government, the cash grant has now come down to a matter of semantics, with its timing also featuring.

In the interest of fairness, Vice President Jagdeo is correct. At no time did either President Ali or Prime Minister Phillips said anything about a Christmas cash grant. The president did say, though, that ‘the smile on his face should be taken as confirmation that an “enjoyable holiday’ would be had by Guyanese. Since that was said in August, what holiday could the president be talking about, other than the Christmas holidays?

We don’t think he meant Diwali, or any other national holiday that came after August. Guyanese longing for a cash grant to provide some temporary relief to their cost-of-living woes should not be faulted for interpreting President Ali’s cash grant promise (made repeatedly) as meaning anything other than geared to the December holidays. Jagdeo can try all his usual verbal tricks, but by default a cash grant promise for this year from the president distilled to one with December in mind.

Also, we note how convoluted and intricate Jagdeo can be, when so inclined. He has compiled a long record of such behaviour when the government or the president has egg on the face. Part of his duties is to put up a good fight for the president, cleanup after him. Referring to his party manifesto he admitted that “this is our manifesto here, it speaks to cash grants here but it did say before Christmas and in fact how can you do it before Christmas, it took us five months the last time to get it implemented…” It took five months, as he knows, because there was an ill-planned and chaotically conceived registration process to get eligible citizens in the government’s system. Due to the fact that is now part of the official record, that aspect of cash grants this time doesn’t count, other than for a relatively small number of the newly eligible, i.e. new 18-year old Guyanese.

The payment process, to a considerable degree, was smooth and pain free for those collecting. With the tedious and time-consuming registration process now not a factor, the cash grant payment could have been made if the PPPC Government and leadership were truly serious about doing something about the suffering of Guyanese, and treating them with the respect that they deserve. Not this overnight nonsense, about Guyanese “being good”, which bears a close resemblance to President Ali’s warning about “if you behave yourself….”

Are Guyanese now condemned to being children forever? Has the PPPC of Ali and Jagdeo appointed themselves as stern fathers of wayward Guyanese children? Developments like these are what play a huge role in the collapse of governments to regimes. In any other country that a government dares to make fools of the people, see them as stupid, the people would not take it sitting down. Democracy has made Guyanese so docile that the PPPC Government has made it a business to have Guyanese on a string, as if they are only good to be puppets. The circumstances of countless thousands of Guyanese are paralysing and tragic, yet this is exactly the time that their own government schemes on how to take advantage of their good nature. A cash grant for Christmas would make such a difference in the lives of citizens, but this is when the government decides to begin its games. The people hear that they should work at “being good” and aim for a changed mindset. This is how insult is added to injury, from a PPPC Government that laughs at those who reelected them.

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cash grant, Editorial, PPPC, President Ali, Vice President Jagdeo

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