AFC says at minimum pensioners should receive is $75K to $100K not $28K

The Alliance for Change (AFC) said whilst the party is happy when Government allocates funds from the national coffers to assist the most vulnerable in society it wants it to be made known that these persons deserve substantial increase.  Referring to the Government’s announcement on Thursday pensioners will receive a one-off cash grant of $28,000 before the year end, the party asked if this is “the best they can do for pensioners?”

Chairwoman, Mrs. Cathy Hughes, speaking at the party’s press conference on Friday, drew comparisons of pension payments between the governments of A Partnership for National Unity and Alliance for Change (APNU+AFC) and People’s Progressive Party/Civic. She said it is important to recall at a time when money was scarce in Guyana and the APNU+AFC experienced a challenge balancing the budget they were still able to pay four increases, moving pensions from $13,500 in 2015 to $20,500 in 2019, a 55% increase in four years.

Further, the party said they find “it totally unacceptable that with the windfall Guyana has received from our oil revenues and talk from the Government that we are the next Dubai of the world, that pensioners today receive only $28,000 a little over US$100 to live on for an entire month.”

Last month the Ministry of Finance in a Report announced, “government is now projected to earn US$1.1 billion as revenue from the sale of our share of profit oil, and US$147.7 million in royalties in 2022, subject to the evolution of world market prices.”  This is revenue Guyana never before seen. The International Monetary Fund projected Guyana’s overall economic growth this year to be 57.8 per cent.

Considering the existing revenue stream Hughes said at the minimum pensioners should receive is at least $75,000 to $100,000 per month. With all sectors complaining of the massive price increases citizens face today, how do we expect pensioners, the most vulnerable in our society, to survive, the party pointed out. Calls were reiterated for public servants and teachers to be paid more.

The government was also lambasted for its “subjective, underhand distribution of one-off cash grants that continues to take place, without the guarantee of fair, equal distribution to all deserving and with the requisite checks and balances in place to avoid the corruption we have seen in several of these programmes.”

Responding to a question from New Sources on recommendation(s) how grants should be disbursed, Hughes said a better approach would be to increase the rate, at the base line, not one-off payment.   And with regards to other cash grants, the party wants the use of government apparatus to determine funding, using criteria that are fair and could avoid the discriminatory manner in which these moneys are being paid out.

Calling the cash grants programme “handing out crumbs to the citizens when today’s economy can distribute much more,” the party said the action is reflective of how much the government “care[s],” a reference to the ‘Because We Care’ one-off $30,000 cash grant given to each school-aged child for the new school year.