AFC condemns indignity heaped on teachers, others in $100k cash grant distribution

The Alliance for Change (AFC) is expressing strong displeasure with the manner in which some recipients of the $100,00 cash grant are being treated. The party in a statement issued Saturday, December 28, 2024, said the nation on December 23, viewed, in absolute shock and horror, the ghastly sight of hundreds of teachers crushed together, and waiting to be “gifted” their $100,000 grant.”

The one-off payment is being made to persons 18-years and older, following shifting criterion. Persons were packed in herd-like fashion in lines, some using umbrellas to ward off the sweltering heat.  “There was everything wrong with those images, and they should be shocking to every Guyanese man, woman and child. This is 2024, and not 1834,” the party charged.

Condemning government’s poor handling of the disbursement, the AFC reminded that teachers, who are all already on the government’s electronic payroll system, could easily have received this grant in the same manner as they receive their salaries and benefits.

The party said, instead, in what can only be described as a decision that was calculated to present the very image of supplicant, needy, desperate, and humiliated persons, teachers, and mostly women, these Guyanese citizens were made to present themselves, in herd-like fashion, crammed against each other in a most disrespectful and undignified manner.

Warning of the potential of the situation could escalate the AFC expressed concern, shortly, other categories of persons, including pensioners, will be subjected to the same humiliating experience as they are expected to similarly gather to receive their pay-out.

The question, the Party said that should be asked, is whether receiving $1000,000 of taxpayers’ money is worth the humiliation and indignity one must experience.

Drawing a contrast, the AFC said these images with others, also deliberately promoted, of other government workers happily and calmly receiving their grants in the presence of smiling ministers and senior government officials. “This is a clear message that “friends, favourites and families” of the PPP are held to a different and supposedly “better” standard. There is no ‘One Guyana’.”

Response to mounting criticism on the mishandling of the teachers’ disbursement, government is being forced to put better distribution system in place.

The AFC warns that these social and political games and experiments that the PPP is engaging in will have a boomerang effect. Going further, the party said instead of subjugating and making pliant those who are perceived to be non-supporters, it will breed deep resentment and receive condign rejection.

In closing the party said no one should have their dignity trampled upon like that, as it calls on citizens to wake up, organise and be ready to remove this repressive regime from office in 2025. “Dignity must be restored, better must come!”