Uneven development in our country continues to pose a clear and present threat to national development, peaceful coexistence, and harmony. There is not a day that goes by when you do not see images or hear stories that suggest a deliberate effort to leave significant sections of this society out of benefiting from the nation’s wealth.
We are told, repeatedly, that the nation is growing—that we are the fastest-growing economy in the world. Few doubt that. But many doubt that there is any benefit in this economy for them.
The World Bank has reported that Guyana’s economy is expected to grow by 17% this year. That figure, I am sure, will not correspond to any measurable improvement in the standard of living for many Guyanese—more so our workers, the vulnerable, and our young people. The wealth continues to flow to a few elites who have consolidated themselves into a cabal, ensuring that they alone benefit, while the masses go hungry and there is pervasive want and poverty.
What we are witnessing is not development; it is exclusion. We are looking at a society where there is no sustained effort, no coherent policy, no programme backed by law to ensure that all benefit—that there is equity, justice, and equality. We cannot continue to live like this.
The framers of our Constitution believed in the inherent goodness of ourselves as fellow human beings, forged in shared struggles against oppression at every stage of our history.
The colonisers first tried to enslave the Amerindians. When that failed, they turned to the chattel enslavement of Africans, who were brought to these shores and fought at every stage against captivity and dehumanisation. Then came indentureship—Africans, East Indians, Portuguese, Chinese, and some Europeans bound into another system of exploitation. After that came colonial domination in its various forms.
History shows that at every step of the way, our foreparents resisted oppression and discrimination.
Out of that common struggle emerged a collective vision that created the foundation for Independence and Republican status. Our founding mothers and fathers—Hubert Nathaniel Critchlow, Forbes Burnham, Cheddi Jagan, Janet Jagan, Jane Phillips Gay, and many others known and unknown, including our own parents—fought for these not so that a few would prosper, but so that all would share in the nation’s wealth.
They did not fight for a Guyana where wealth is hoarded by a cabal. They fought for a Guyana where all would participate in the nation’s bounty.
I continue to repeat—some may say ad nauseam—the importance of implementing and giving real meaning to Article 13 of the Constitution. That Article calls for the involvement of the people and their representatives in the management and decision-making processes of the state that impact their well-being.
The same Constitution, in Articles 38, 147 and 149C, specifically outlines a role for labour. Yet we see no effort to create a new wage band. No serious move towards livable wages—real wages. No structured engagement with the trade union movement, despite repeated calls.
In every society there will be disagreement. There will be conflict. But that must never be branded as anti-national or anti-government. Advocacy is not hostility; it is the legitimate demand for what is just and fair. The people’s voice must be part and parcel of the national conversation, accepted by both Government and Opposition in good faith and with well-meaning intent.
Instead, we ignore these principles as we move every day closer to the precipice of self-implosion.
People will not forever tolerate marginalisation. They will not forever accept being shut out from the benefits of this society. We have to work—and we must work diligently—to change course.
And so I call on everyone: Stand up for our rights. We cannot give up the fight.
In a nation blessed with unprecedented wealth—wealth we have never seen before—the reality of pervasive poverty, corruption, marginalisation, and intolerance is suffocating.
We want to breathe.
And we deserve to breathe.
