Finance Minister, Dr. Ashni Singh, closed the 2025 budget debate on Thursday night in a fiery speech that went on for more than two hours, heaping criticism on the Opposition for its opposition to the $1.3 Trillion budget.
In defending his budget, the Finance Minister compared his party’s record in Government to that of the Opposition. He said the PPP has been bringing change to all the people of Guyana.
Dr. Singh said the measures in the 2025 budget represents a continuation of a foundation that the Government has laid.
“We have justifiably proud about what we have delivered to the Guyanese people over the last five years, we did not make the biggest promises in 2020, we sat down and consulted with everybody, there was a massive consultation at Providence with every stakeholder, brought everybody in the room, we listen we wrote a manifesto and we said if you elect us back into government this is what we will deliver and guess what Mr. Speaker, we have delivered,” the Finance Minister said to loud thumping from his Parliamentary colleagues.
The Finance Minister said the Government has delivered in less time and has promised more. He cautioned that this is an election year and there will be lofty promises from the Opposition.
But he said the measures the Opposition has proposed will cost the country more money than it has to spend.
“Mr. Speaker, our estimate and I challenge them to say these things will cost differently from what we have estimated, those measures alone will cost—the incremental impact would cost $799B almost a billion. The fictitious, imaginary measures that they have announced, the whimsical and fanciful dreams that they have been painting and the delusion that they have been painting,” the Finance Minister said.
The Finance Minister said Guyanese have a choice this year to examine the promises made by both parties and make an informed decision about which set of the promises are more feasible.
“The reality is Mr. Speaker, is that they hold the Guyanese people in grave contempt, they believe up to now they can come and spin anything and make any promise and believe that the Guyanese people will believe it and go and vote for them but guess what, they may have been able to pull that off in 2015 because there was a whole generation of Guyanese people who would have forgotten them, but they gave the Guyanese people a reminder of their true nature,” the Finance Minister said.
The allocations and measures in the budget are now being examined by the Committee of Supply.
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