On Monday, the people led by A Partnership For National Unity, mounted a protest for the cash grant promised by President Irfaan Ali in the run up to the September 2025 elections. Then came the disrespect. In a subsequent address President Ali repeated the cash grant promise but added that this would only happen if the people behave themselves. This was an authoritarian leader talking to his subjects.
Ali’s action is reminiscent of another leader in another country who makes similarly disrespectful statements. The difference is that while people in that country depend on the government for financing, such funding is protected by law. What is very disturbing about the Guyana situation is the fact that the country is rich but the poverty level is increasing.
When the People’s Progressive Party returned to office in 2020 the poverty level was thirty-eight percent. Today it is 58 percent.The Inter-American Development Bank said that this is highlighting significant challenges despite oil wealth. It specially affects indigenous groups and hinterland communities, with food poverty also a concern, the IDB stated. Guyana is making more money than ever, but the new era’s promise isn’t reflected in the current conditions. In village after village, residents express frustration that despite record oil revenues, their lives have not improved. This cannot be explained.
When people read about Nigeria and its oil wealth and the rampant poverty, many jumped to the conclusion that they were being fed western propaganda. Today Guyanese are living that reality. People have been forced to cut the number of meals they could have in a day. And this extends to the children who must attend school. If more than half of the population live in poverty with more than one-third living in abject poverty one can only imagine the state of the country.
When Trinidad was producing oil at a rate of 140,000 barrels a day the people of that country enjoyed the benefits. The region proclaimed that Trinidad was rich. There was a rush from other countries to live the Trinidad dream in that country. Guyanese were among the first. Guyana is producing oil at a rate of some 700,000 barrels per day. Yet the people are becoming increasingly poorer. The analysts must explain the more than twenty per cent jump in poverty levels over the past five years.
There have been repeated calls for the government to address the high cost of living. When asked about a plan for national development the government announced that there is no plan. It continued that plans would be developed as the country moves along. The government said that it would focus on infrastructure development. It built roads that deteriorated as soon as they were completed. Guyanese should have been the beneficiaries of these contracts. Instead, foreign companies brought in their own workers.
Guyanese could not find jobs. Those contracts that went to Guyanese hardly ever got off the ground. The contractors simply pocketed the money and ran. Surprisingly, the government hardly ever pursue them to recover the money.
Corruption was the order of the day. At the same time the government wasted billions of dollars on pipe dreams. One pipe dream was that it would resurrect the sugar industry. Another is the gas to energy project. This project is billions of dollars over cost and the cost continues to rise. No one knows when this project would be completed. No one also knows how much money the government is paying for the gas that the oil company is bringing to shore. That is more wasted money.
The education standard is in decline. Secondary school children cannot read or write. The top students come from affluent households for the greater part. It is no surprise that children are not learning. They are going to school hungry, courtesy of the government policy. When they leave school unable to think for themselves they are going to swell the ranks of the criminal underworld. These are the people who are contributing to the pattern of irresponsible road use. They are contributing to the road fatality figures, some even by killing themselves.
Public service salaries are abysmally low to the extent that this country ranks as one of the highest in exporting its brains. A study some time back revealed that eighty percent of university graduates simply pack up and leave. It is no different in the nursing profession. The best nurses have left. And this has happened even as the government is promising to build more hospitals and schools.
Given the level of poverty, the hospitals are needed but the question of who would staff them arises. The 2022 census would have highlighted the shortages in the various sections of the labour force. It would have told the story of people struggling not only to find jobs—the level of unemployment—but also the areas that actually need people. The government is not releasing the census, a crucial tool for budget planning. One must now wonder at the background against which the government presents its budget.
A few weeks back, Health Minister Dr Frank Anthony reported that there is an increase in HIV/AIDS in the country. It does not take an expert to recognise that the largest increases are found among the poor. Social media has highlighted the conditions under which many live. The government boasts about its house lot distribution programme but it cannot boast about the subsequent land occupation.
It can boast about one thing. Every government Minister is a millionaire by any standard.
