Dear Editor,
The APNU+AFC regime has been propagating the lie to say that they inherited a bankrupt economy. I dealt with that and proved that it is totally untrue in an earlier letter. What is important now is to see what this government has been doing with the substantial resources that they got from the PPP/C government. In the first place they have hugely increased the size of the bureaucracy. In addition, one of the first acts of the regime was to increase their own salaries by a hefty fifty per cent. This was after they added eleven new ministers and four vice-presidents to the establishment which the PPP/C administration functioned with. This was a double whammy on the treasury. Immediately one could see that the increase in the number of ministers entailed increasing staff, finding accommodation to house more people and in some cases providing housing for ministers and the more senior personnel in the government.
The regime has also increased the hiring of persons on contract tremendously. Quite a few of these new contracted employees were retirees imported from abroad. They are being paid super salaries. In many cases persons who were discriminated against and sent on administrative leave have been replaced by persons who lack the experience and qualifications of those whom they succeeded.
The administrative costs of government have mounted in many ways all of which are difficult to uncover. Huge amounts are paid in travelling both internally and abroad. The bill is sky-rocketing daily. We must also add that the vehicle population of the regime has increased greatly. Recently, Dr Rupert Roopnaraine was removed as the Minister of Education. He has now been given a department which must be staffed and provided with vehicles and other amenities all of which are a cost to the taxpayers.
Moreover, there is some lack of confidence in the competence of the new substantive Minister of Education and her technical staff. That is why they are creating another department in the Ministry of the Presidency to manage the Minister and the ministry.
At the same time, the number of advisors has shot up greatly. The President has an army of advisors, and almost every minister has one or more advisors. The Attorney General alone has four such persons. Ministers also have legal advisors and public relations advisors.
Added to this is how the government functions. They are using Commissions of Inquiry a lot, which prove to be useless. The regime itself often ignores the recommendations coming out of these Commissions of Inquiry. An example that immediately comes to mind is the Commission of Inquiry which was established to look at GuySuCo. The regime spent more than $80 million on this exercise and then ignored the recommendations. The reports of many of the Commissions of Inquiry are yet to be examined by the public. This is a callous use and misuse of taxpayers’ money.
It is also apposite to note that costs have gone up astronomically in the public corporations and the semi-autonomous agencies. Board of Directors’ fees have gone through the roof. These are non-executive directors but are collecting fees equivalent to senior personnel salaries. Chairpersons have to have executive vehicles and be provided with perks. It is astonishing to see what is going on. Without doubt this bureaucratic capitalist elite is growing greatly at the expense of the productive workers of our country.
It is instructive to note that while this seemingly unconcerned spending is taking place, the regime has done very little to improve income generation. Indeed, what it is doing is sucking resources from the productive sector to bolster the elite. Value Added Tax has been added on education materials and school fees. Many of the essential items that people use every day, such as foodstuff, etc, are now attracting VAT. VAT is also now placed on electricity and water. Pensioners who used to benefit from some amount of free electricity and water charges have found that those concessions have been removed.
Very early, the regime withdrew the subsidy that the PPP/C government was giving to parents who had children in schools ‒ the $10,000 ‘Because We Care’ scheme. That was to encourage parents to keep their children in school. The end of the year bonuses that were given to personnel in the security forces have also been removed.
The regime has instituted some two hundred new tax measures on the population, including on businesses, which is having a debilitating effect on economic life of the country. The taxes are also sucking up money from the population. Imagine persons with kitchen gardens being pressed to pay taxes. People with more than two dogs are targeted. Many small, self-employed persons with a roadside Bar-B-Que or other small enterprise are now having to pay taxes. Many of these persons are single parents hustling to put food on the table.
As a result, the purchasing power of the population has drastically fallen. This is having a serious impact on the commercial sector and is leading to more and more dismissals of workers.
The new elite in government after just about two years is oblivious to the harm their actions are causing. They keep shouting slogans about ‘green economy’ and prosperity without understanding much of what they are mouthing.
Yours faithfully,
Donald Ramotar
Former President
