Georgetown, Guyana (August 22, 2022): Vice-
President Bharrat Jagdeo’s tirade on the International
Decade of People of African Descent Assembly-Guyana
(IDPADA-G), at his press conference dated August 19,
2022, is but another attempt to discredit IDPADA-G and
vilify its leadership.
At recent forum of African Guyanese attended by him,
he posed the question: ‘What has Alexander done with
the G$100M given to him on behalf of the People of
African Descent?’ Cuffy 250’s annual forum and its
provocative topic: The Emerging Apartheid State, is
but another occasion for him to continue his
mischievous crusade of misinformation, lies and
defamation. We are here today to expose him and his
mal-intent.
In the first instance, he sought to single out the founders
of IDPADA-G Inc. as the beneficiaries of some private
company. IDPADA-G is a not-for-profit company, whose
directors were the executive members of IDPADA-G at
the time of the founding of the company. They are
volunteers. They are not in receipt of any material
benefits from IDPADA-G. Some are here today to refute
the impression that Jagdeo sought to convey of them as
being beneficiaries of IDPADA-G Inc.
As a professional outfit, IDPADA-G has a secretariat and
paid staff. Any reference to salaries, is to their
remuneration. The ratio of their salaries to the overall
budget is in the range of the public sector entities’
salaries to current expenditure ratio.
Mr. Jagdeo also sought to convey the impression that
their annual salary of approximately G$42M for 2020
was paid to them in the circumstance where all that they
were doing was disbursing to the African Guyanese
community $343,000.00 in grants. This is where Mr.
Jagdeo tries to pull off his biggest three card trick on the
Guyanese public.
Firstly, IDPADA-G is not generally funded to provide
grants. However, in late 2018, a sum of G$10M was
specifically provided, by the Ministry of Finance for
grants to African Guyanese, the bulk of which was
disbursed in 2018 and 2019. A residual sum of
approximately G$343,000.00 was disbursed in 2020.
To suggest that of a subvention of G$100M in 2020, the
community was merely the beneficiaries of grants to the
tune of $343,000.00 is either malicious or gross
incompetence in relation to the understanding of the
financial situation of IDPADA-G, although the relevant
financial documents were requested and obtained from
IDPADA-G on the morning of Mr. Jagdeo’s press
conference. Such was IDPADA-G’s openness and
efficiency in providing documents, only for them to be
misused by the Vice-President.
Regarding what the staff is paid to do, IDPADA-G staff is
in the first instance paid to give service to the African
Guyanese community. Members of the public can walk-
in and be given services such as the preparation of
business plans, project and grant request proposals for
government and donor funding. The sum that Mr.
Jagdeo did not mention goes towards projects in the
sphere of education and training, disaster response,
public education, entrepreneurial facilitation, and youth
development, to mention a few. Examples including the
G$5M exercise to register persons for flood relief, due to
their omission by state operatives, will be provided on
the work of IDAPADA-G, by the next presenter. A more
comprehensive fact sheet will be made available to
you. Mr. Jagdeo, therefore, grossly misrepresented the
work that is done by IDPADA-G, and how its subvention
is spent on its engagements with the Guyanese of
African descent.
Every cent of IDPADA-G’s subvention or other revenue
is spent in service to the African Guyanese community,
indirectly as in the case of salaries or directly through
programmes, projects, engagements, and financial
assistance.
