Indar, Fernandes clash over infrastructure budget
-opposition MP says foreign exchange earnings declined last year in key sectors compared to 2019
While public infrastructure is important, Shadow Minister of Finance Juretha Fernandes on Monday
urged the government to strike a balance and invest more in the economic development and sustainability of Guyanese.
However, Minister in the Ministry of Public Works, Deodat Indar defended the government’s allocating of $204 billion in the 2024 budget for roads and bridges across Guyana.
“In 2015, The APNU +AFC government put $39.4 billion on capital expenditure to build hospitals, schools, roads, and bridges and this was for all the infrastructure in the respective ministries, is this the good life they are talking about?”, the Minister asked the opposition.
“The PPP/C built over 4,000 roads since 2020, we care for our communities, we care for the children who walked in the mud just to go to school Mr Speaker, what did they do, tell me what they do for the children in those communities, we are building this country, while they destroyed it, five years they had and what did they do?”, Indar asked vehemently.
Opposition Member of Parliament Ganesh Mahipaul then interjected and said “Guyanese cannot eat roads, many of them are hungry what is your government doing to address the high cost of living?”
Fernandes told the National Assembly that during the period 2015 to 2019, the APNU+AFC coalition government spent a total of $1.26 trillion.
She said that based on her calculations after the budgetary period comes to an end; the government would have spent $3.25 trillion in the period 2020 to 2024.
“A difference of roughly $2 trillion Guyana dollars. And that’s excluding the many supplementary financial papers which we all know will be coming. One can’t help but wonder what this increased spending could have achieved if the PPP was not here to mismanage it”, she quipped.
According to the Shadow Finance Minister, 2 trillion dollars breaks down to over $9.5 million per Guyanese family.
“It doesn’t take a degree in economics to know that $9.5 million would have been life-changing for an average Guyanese family, and even more so for those struggling with the indignity of poverty”.
“$9.5 million per family could have provided free higher education or skill training for every family, a new car and a decent home for families that are struggling to meet the cost of rentals in this country”, she said.
ernandes said that the ruling PPP/C does not understand the dynamics of prioritization and being peoplecentred. She argued that the budget 2024 was not peoplecentred as it focused heavily on public works as it did in 2023.
But Indar said that Fernandes cannot lecture his government on how to manage the country’s resources as the APNU+AFC did a terrible job.
“Mr Speaker, they don’t know about managing an economy, they spent money in the wrong places. They spent on recurrent expenditure, nothing on capital formation spending and that is why they will continue to remain in opposition”, he remarked.
Indar continued “Mr Speaker you know the opposition thinks that Guyanese suffer from memory loss and they don’t know what development is well let me say this to Miss Fernandes Guyana is named to be the fastest (growing) economy in the world. Now, how is that mismanagement? That is to show that we are doing well because of good governance which they the opposition failed to deliver during their five years in office”.
Fernandes sought to compare the management of the economy under the APNU+AFC administration versus the PPP/C administration.
“Let us examine six sectors, sugar, timber, shrimp,
Ministry of Public Works, Deodat Indar
bauxite, rice and gold and the foreign earnings they each brought in under each government”, she challenged the government side of the house.
Fernades recapped that the sugar growing sector was estimated to have grown by 28% in 2023.
“Sounds good right? In 2019 the foreign earnings from sugar were US$27.7 million while in 2023 the foreign earning from sugar was US$24.9 million. US$2.8 million less was received in 2023 under the PPP than in 2019 under the APNU+AFC coalition”, she said.
Timber
“The forestry sector is reported to have expanded by 5.4 per cent in 2023. Yet in 2023 the foreign earnings from timber were US$20.5 million compared to US$33.7 million in 2019. The PPP administration managed to decrease the foreign earnings for timber by US$13.9 million from 2019 to 2023”.
Shrimp
“Shrimp production was reported to have expanded by 61.1% in 2023, anyone listening to this report from Ashni Singh would think that the shrimp sector is doing better under the PPP than it was under the APNU+AFC. But again, far from accurate, in 2023, the foreign earnings from shrimp were US$61.7 million and in 2019 it was US$76.3 million. Under the PPP in 2023 the foreign earnings from shrimp were US$14.6 million less than it was
Bauxite
“It was reported that the bauxite mining industry has contracted by 20.4% in 2023. In 2023 the bauxite mining industry’s foreign earnings were US$79.6 million, but when compared to the 2019 foreign earnings of US$127.1 million you would see that the sector declined by US$47.5 million under the PPP”.
Rice
“During the budget presentation, we learned that the rice sector expanded by 8.3%. Let us examine the foreign earnings from rice; in 2023 the foreign earnings from rice were US$211.7 million while in 2019 the foreign earnings from rice were US$222.9 million. The foreign earnings from rice in 2023 was US$11.2 million less than it was in 2019 under the APNU+AFC coalition” according to Shadow Finance Minister.
Gold
“The gold mining industry reported a contraction of 11.2% in 2023 resulting in the foreign earnings from gold being US$808.6 million. In 2019 the foreign earnings from gold were US$876.6 million. So, in short, the PPP is reporting that under their stewardship, the gold mining industry brought in US$68 million less than under the APNU+AFC coalition in 2019”, she declared.