Dear Editor,
Guyanese have been the recipients of a national treat for many years. It is more than an annual national treat, more accurate to call the Budget Focus analysis that Ram & McRae has done for 32 years in SN a national institution. Clearly, it has become one that is much anticipated for a long, careful visit, to obtain ideas of what are Government’s plans and priorities for the nation, and the provisions for funding those, including the sources of such funding, among other things. This year, I am doing what I’ve never done before: I salute the contributors to and author(s) of Budget Focus 2022 for a masterful job, even as I appreciate that the sum of its contents is sure to generate ire in the usual circles.
Budget Focus has everything this year, which I must confess to reading in its entirety for the first time. There is a sweeping but tight introduction, and a powerful conclusion. I am impressed by the numbers, the supporting graphics, the broadness of the scope, and the comprehensive nature of the analysis itself, which are all done in standard business language, but with some significant differences. The first is that the choice of syntax is not dry and boring, as review documents such as these tend to be. Instead, it was warm and vibrant, as if the narratives had flesh and bones to them, came alive and leapt out of each succeeding line. It was straightforward and unflinching when it had to be, but also nuanced and smoothly clinical, as the area under scrutiny required. I can see great care went into the construction of the final document presented in SN.
As said earlier, I am most impressed, and thank the Guyanese who put in time and energy to deliver this resonant public service document before citizens. Still further, there was steady familiarity with the laws of Guyana, those ones involving petroleum, taxes, and the NRF, which all play pivotal parts in this year’s gigantic budget, Guyana’s first oil budget. The same can be said of accounting conventions. Notwithstanding what I articulate today relative to Ram & McRae’s Budget Focus 2022, I still think that more than a handful of Guyanese are going to take serious objection to some of its pronouncements, the tough postures. This would not be the Guyana I know, if it were not so.
While the Government’s defenders and cheerleaders will not be the same stalwart people with a love for democracy, if they were not to find fault with it, and for the simple reason that it is critical to the many things in the many areas that the government put forward as part of its 2022 program. Some good Guyanese simply exist for such contrarian postures, no matters the merits on display. I like this Budget Focus 2022, which has so many embedded messages, so much keen insight and fair commentary inside. If it were a song, it would be a symphony.
Sincerely,
GHK Lall
