Dear Editor,
Permit me to respond to Mr Ramkarran’s view that I oppose cash grants. I don’t.
The essential theses I postulated in my letter are that the cash grant is inadequate, that unfortunately it is not aimed at giving our children access to education, that there is need for a comprehensive programme of incentives to increase the earning capacity of our people, as I warned that the PPP’s aim is to dominate and control the electorate and that the present cash grant is teeming with potential for corruption.
Clearly, Mr Ramkarran missed the point. If I said in my letter that the cash grant is inadequate to address the key objectives of ensuring children’s access to education then it follows ipso facto that I am saying that there is need for our people to get more money. Nowhere in my letter did I oppose cash grants.
The next point I made is that the present situation as it relates to internet access needs to be addressed if children are to access education in the era of Covid-19. I thought the conclusion to be drawn is that the government should invest in delivering internet access to all communities and that a $19,000 cash grant alone comes nowhere close to solving the problems in education in the era of Covid-19.
I also bemoaned the fact that the PPP is using the internet as a political tool aimed at controlling hinterland communities rather than using it to ensure hinterland communities can access education and training.
I followed that with the view, that in the absence of proper structures and checks and balances, the Cash Grant programme will be another scheme for PPP corruption.
Let me remind Mr. Ramkarran, who I believe is a reasonable man, that like me he had pointed out that the PPP had been a kleptocracy.
Their lack of accountability and corruption in the 2005 Flood Relief Programme and their lack of accountability and absence of checks and balances in the recent Covid-19 Relief distribution confirmed that the leopard hasn’t changed its spots.
The foregoing was followed up with the view that, the cash grant apart, there is a need to develop programmes that will generate independence and allow people to earn honestly. That cannot be construed as averring the view that cash grants will lead to dependency. I can’t follow Mr. Ramkarran’s logic, but I disagree with his erroneous conclusion that I was sprouting some right wing theory of dependency syndrome.
I was at the same time exposing the fact that the PPP’s politics is not to develop a citizenry that is earning honestly with the aim of making them independent. They want our people dependent on the PPP regime. Their programmes are aimed at controlling them so that they can get their vote. In other words, the PPP creates dependency so that they can dominate and control the electorate.
Yours faithfully,
Aubrey C. Norton
