National budget vs family budget

Feb 08, 2026 Features / Columnists, The GHK Lall Column

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(Kaieteur News) – The PPP Govt says one thing.  The 2026 budget is big, bright, beautiful; a bonanza for battered Guyanese.  The opposition parties-PNC, WIN, FGM-say the opposite: the 2026 budget is straight from the devil’s workshop, a diabolical brew (a la Rev. Jim Jones) for down-on-their-luck, down-in-the-gutter Guyanese.  In sum, the PPP budget is a sharp, steel-tipped boot into the kidneys of already dejected, and serially unhappy citizens.  Who speaks to truth, who’s closer to the raw, poignant realities experienced by shorthanded, shortchanged Guyanese?  There’s a simple solution to the squabbles between govt and opposition.  I dare the PPP Govt, and grandmaster Ashni Singh’s Frankenstein budget.  Put it to the test.

Let the people speak; a referendum on the 2026 budget.  Helpful or not helpful.  Hurting or not.  Disappointing; or grand in its shining, blinding presence and promise.  It is much and it is rich.  Or, it is skinny for poor people, which means more of the famished, undernourished skeletal.  Let there be honest comparison, reconciliation.  From the lips of the people.  About where they stand on the so-called creamy national budget and their own cramping, shattering, personal budget.

I nominate SN’s program that focuses on cost-of-living in Guyana to add a few budget-driven questions to wherever it visits in the upcoming weeks.  The program is credible, reliable.  Should reveal whether Guyanese find their times and environment livable or not livable.

What does the budget mean to you, how much confidence it gathers in you?  Second, do you feel counted?  Third, official statisticians have their tables and charts; what does your table look like?  Fourth, if you were to draw/chart your existence (food, bills, wear-and-tear, and upkeep) what story would it tell: a happy one, or one of saddening financial agony?  Those who live it can tell it: the joy or nonstop jabs that life has become.  I put neither ideas nor words in any Guyanese head.  They speak on their own re the budget and its impact on them.  Long-awaited relief or continuing suffering and disillusionment?  Guyanese that stare speechlessly at their children are the best judges of this year’s big budget bonanza.  Whether plates are still bare, clothes worn, and their bills enough to scare the light out of a man, imprison him in gloom.  Let SN’s feature ask the question(s), relay the responses, check the closeness or distance of this crude budget reconciliation.  Either way, the mathematics, statistics, and logic should be irrefutable.

How good is the budget?  Nothing from me.  Not one commentary.  Let the people speak.  Hard truths are what’s required; the only standard that is acceptable.  And what does the chart carved out by the fragile hands and drained energies of poor, weak, vulnerable Guyanese say, swear?

Protein availability and intake-high or low.  Meat and fish are solid, not mirages.  Carb counts on the bright or light side.  The latter helps if one is a diabetic.  Fats contribute to frail condition, excess weight.  Too little; or too much.  There’s money for milk and cheese; or not.  What does the people’s chart on the wall reports about vegetables: heavy or scanty?  Remember that sweet potato sells for $200 or $300 per pound, depending on the day.  Building blocks from the family food chart of those folks facing SN’s microphones, cameras.  Or, they don’t.  In circumstances where there’s a $1.5 trillion budget (the 0.558 is a gift from me to those who have plans for it), Guyanese either breathe, or can’t.  Can or can’t buy channa or banana.  Or sufficient quantities of all food groups.  There’s the story of table and chart, with narratives that bludgeon the brain.  When the brain loses feeling, its sense of balance, the stomach starts crying in agony.

Some insist that the 2026 budget is a beauty, a fatted beast for those with the least.  Reality on the ground speak for or against.  What is gnawing.  Piercing.  Mind-bending and screaming.  Humiliating also in a country now hailed as Midas territory.  Or just utterly, sparklingly lovely.  Let the people bridge the national budget and family budget.  How the former excites the rich; whether the latter is a malignant tumor or multivitamins in the throats of ordinary, man-in-the-street Guyanese.  Let the people tell their story; share their pain, shout their joy.  A great budget, or one that gores, due to its paltriness and grimness for nose-to-the-grindstone Guyanese.  Poor people story either will support or shame politicians’ budget quarreling and brawling.

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

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• family budget, GHK Lall, National Budget, PPP

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