Making the audit report more useful and the auditor more accountable
Introduction Even though auditors sell their services, the profession of auditing – certainly of the financial kind rather than the forensic type – is unlikely to feature in the list of top one hundred most sexy professions in the world. Not because auditors themselves are not attractive or because they live boring lives. I am [...]
The biggest budget ever – and more!
Introduction Five months after the passage of the largest budget ever, Minister of Finance Dr Ashni Singh has gone back to the National Assembly for an additional $6.3 billion for spending this year. Some sketchy information for this sum is contained in Financial Papers Nos 1 and 2, the first being a Supplementary Provision to [...]
Amaila: ‘Deals within a deal’
Introduction Mr Hinds’s intervention on the Amaila issue came one day after the press carried a report that hydro-electric “pioneer” Mr Fip Motilall had received approval for the transfer of a licence to Sithe Global, which some time in 2002 he had been awarded under the Hydro-Electricity Act Cap 56:03 to develop a hydroelectric plant [...]
On the Line – Annual Reports of the NIS 2008 and 2009
Introduction As it enters its forty-second year as the workers’ retirement and short-term insurance fund, the National Insurance Scheme is facing one of its most serious crises ever. For several years during the Burnham Administration which set up the Scheme in 1969, its surplus funds were treated it as a source of cheap borrowings by [...]
The plight of the labour movement, through the prism of the teachers deal
Introduction Even as mainly organized labour assemble at their various points today to march in silent resignation, listen to flat speeches from their leaders, numb their plight and pain with music, food and liquor produced by their colleagues for the profits of the investing class, the evidence so overwhelmingly confronting their membership on this Labour [...]
Annual General Meetings generate interest
Introduction As the season for general meetings moves into high gear, members, or as some companies call them shareholders, have been showing some interest in these meetings, although not always for what might be considered the right reasons. One complainant in a letter appearing in the press this week went so far as to make [...]
The Ministry of Culture, Youth and Sport – or the sporting ministry?
Beneficiaries of hundreds of millions in Sports and Arts Development Fund uncertain. Today’s column continues a review of the 2011 budgetary allocations by the National Assembly to some of the principal ministries of government by looking at the Ministry of Culture, Youth and Sport, a ministry with which the Guyana Tennis Association of which I [...]
Audit Office turns a Nelson’s eye to Office of the President
Introduction Today’s column resumes the review of the 2011 budgetary allocations to the principal ministries of government. Some of the ministries covered so far are the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Finance. It focuses on the Office of the President, the budget for which has jumped from $4.274 billion [...]
On the Line: 2010 Annual Report of the Guyana Bank for Trade and Industry Limited
Introduction Last year when the Guyana Bank for Trade and Industry published its annual report for 2009 Business Page interrupted its series on the state-owned Guyana Sugar Corporation. GBTI’s 2010 annual report similarly interrupts a series of articles on the 2011 budget for the principal ministries of the government. Another similarity this year is the [...]
Finance Ministry’s budget relies on Norwegian funds
Today’s column resumes the review of the 2011 budgetary allocations to the principal ministries of government. Two of the ministries covered so far were the Ministry of Education on February 27 and the Ministry of Education on March 6. Today we turn our attention to the Ministry of Finance which in 2011 was allocated $18.3 [...]
The spending on health
An appendix to the budget speech includes some very useful indications about the health of the nation. Here are some of those statistics: These data tell a mixed story with some interesting variations. For example while the number of deaths per 1,000 of the population for infants (under 1 year) has declined significantly since 2006, [...]
The spending on education
Introduction The Budget debate is over and the spending is now in full flow. Contracts are being hastily awarded and colourable initiatives taken with significant budgetary implications. The President’s misnamed One Laptop per Family has begun, and despite the seriousness of the questions and the strength and logic of the criticisms,
Doing Business in Guyana World Bank/IFC Report
Guyana has improved marginally in the World Bank/ International Finance Corporation publication called Doing Business 2011 publication. Of 183 countries included in the report Guyana ranks at 100, compared with 101 in the 2010 survey. Of significance too is the fact that Guyana is listed as having three reform measures in 2010, which is better [...]
Making the Stock Exchange work
Today I continue the discussion on the Guyana Stock Exchange and what we might do to make it work. I believe that a vibrant stock exchange is an important vehicle to promote growth in the economy and to enable the small investor to share in the national economic pie. This discussion on making our stock [...]
Making the Stock Exchange work
Introduction We have not heard much from or about it recently. Passing its offices at High and Robb Streets it is hard to believe that this is the institution that was set up with much hype, expectations and hope that it will make access to capital easier and cheaper, widen shareholder ownership and raise the [...]