\u201cWhen it starts tightening up, we will start lightening up,\u201d said Alliance for Change (AFC) Leader, Khemraj Ramjattan, of the Government, when he offered his passionate contribution to the penultimate session of the final day of debating the 2013 national budget.<\/p>\n
Speaking of proposed plans to cut various segments of the budget, Ramjattan asserted that \u201cwe have to do what we have to do to ensure that that Government across the floor comes to its senses.\u201d
\nIn his lengthy presentation, the AFC Leader pointed out that the impression is often given of the opposition that \u201cwe are the dragons\u2026as if we are the \u201cBad Johns\u201d in the place,\u201d but according to him, moves to make alterations and amendments to the $208.8 billion national budget, which was recently presented by Finance Minister, Dr Ashni Singh, are in fact a reflection of the fact that \u201cwe are thinking of the people out there.\u201d
\n\u201cBut no says the other side, absolutely no. They say that we want to do damage to the workers of this country. That is the last intent we would have ever had, but it is not part and parcel of it at all, but the reconfiguration of a budget that could have occurred during a more sincere dialogue process is now not there.\u201d
\nHowever, Ramjattan did commend the crafting of the budget by the Finance Minister and his team, at a time when there are challenges internationally, locally, as well as regionally. He however pointed out that the AFC is convinced that the budget could have been a better one, had the Finance Minister sought to incorporate points that were presented to him weeks ahead of the budget presentation. He even alluded to the tripartite consultation process which was introduced last year, through which a couple of points were highlighted for inclusion in the budget but were not.
\nTurning his attention to the presentation of PPP member, Reverend Kwame Gilbert, who underscored that \u201cwe are where we are and it is better than where we were,\u201d Ramjattan noted that the statement is in indeed a fact, but countered by noting that \u201cincorporating what the opposition had, we could have been far better than where we are.\u201d
\nTaking the spotlight immediately after the AFC Leader, Prime Minister Samuel Hinds, insisted that Government has remained committed to the task of preserving a policy environment that is conducive to economic growth and social development. Moreover, he insisted that \u201cit doesn\u2019t just happen, it needs the right circumstances to bring it about and the result was a seventh consecutive year of rear growth in our economy, associated strong macroeconomic performance\u2026and visible improvements not perfection\u2026in our regulatory and institutional environment.\u201d<\/p>\n
As such, Hinds insisted that every Guyanese citizen should feel some level of satisfaction or sense of reward in that \u201cour work has brought us a seventh successive year of real growth\u2026 not that we have not had years of growth before\u2026but we had been fluctuating.\u201d
\n\u201cSeven consecutive years of growth amidst what is happening globally, in our region and even locally, should grab our attention, as it says that we have been doing some things right and some things good, and we might very well be on track to realising the dreams of our present and past generations,\u201d the Prime Minister added.
\nHe alluded to Government\u2019s efforts to bring into place the Amaila Falls Hydro Project, which is aimed at alleviating the challenges currently faced by the Guyana Power and Light Incorporated (GPL) while at the same time lowering the cost of electricity. This development, he said, will seek to slash generation cost by half \u2013 indicative of a drop of from 26 cents to about 12 cents an hour per kilowatt.
\nThere are also moves, according to the Prime Minister, to upgrade the transmission system, even as he announced that by the end of the year the Berbice and Demerara interconnected systems should be in place, with several new substations being realised.
\n\u201cThese will greatly improve the provision of electricity to our customers\u2026\u201d said the Prime Minister who was on a mission to extensively share his views on the various development projects that have been engaged by the Government to ensure that all citizens could benefit<\/p>\n
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\u201cWhen it starts tightening up, we will start lightening up,\u201d said Alliance for Change (AFC) Leader, Khemraj Ramjattan, of the Government, when he offered his passionate contribution to the penultimate session of the final day of debating the 2013 national budget. Speaking of proposed plans to cut various segments of the budget, Ramjattan asserted that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7134,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4490","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latestnews"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/image001-2.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4F7T1-1aq","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4490","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4490"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4490\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4491,"href":"http:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4490\/revisions\/4491"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7134"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4490"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4490"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4490"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}