Chairman of the Coordinating Council of the International Decade for People of African Descent Assembly – Guyana (IDPADA-G), Vincent Alexander said though the Afrocentric not-for-profit company is not a grant agency, but it has disbursed more than $10M in grants, and in keeping with its mandate, it has funded a number of educational, social and economic programmes and projects much to the benefit of thousands of Afro-Guyanese.

Alexander together with IDPADA-G’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Olive Sampson provided a detailed overview of the organisation’s operations during a press conference today, in response to allegations by the country’s Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo that only $343,000 of the $100M government subvention received for 2020 was disbursed in grants for various groups.

While noting that the Vice President’s most recent “tirade” is another attempt to discredit IDPADA-G and its leadership, Alexander clarified that in late 2018, IDPADA-G received $10M from the Ministry of Finance for the issuance of grants. Of that sum, $8.911M was disbursed in 2018; $896,043 was disbursed in 2019, and the remaining $343,773 was disbursed in 2020, benefiting a total of 10 co-op societies and small businesses.

The grant, Alexander made clear, was separate from the subvention IDPADA-G received.  

“To suggest that of a subvention of $100M in 2020, the community was merely the beneficiaries of the grant to the tune 343,000 is either malicious or gross incompetence in relation to the understanding of the financial information of IDPADA-G,” Alexander said.

He said misinformation is being peddled although the Government was furnished with IDPADA-G’s financial records on the morning of the Vice President’ press conference last Friday.

At that press conference, the Vice President had taken issue with the fact that IDPADA-G published an ad by the Cuffy 250 Committee inviting persons to participate in a discussion themed “Resisting the emerging Apartheid state in Guyana.”

Singling out Alexander, and Dr Norman Ng-A-Qui, Mr. Jagdeo contended that IDPADA-G has failed Afro-Guyanese while enriching its leadership.

Mr. Jagdeo pointed out that in 2020, salaries and allowances amounted to $42M. But both Alexander and Dr Ng-A-Qui made it clear that their service to IDPADA-G is free of charge, and as such they do not benefit financially from the company.

Further, Alexander told the press that contrary to the picture painted by the Vice President, IDPADA-G, through its secretariat, provides important services to the Afro-Guyanese community.

“IDPADA-G’s staff is in the first instance paid to give service to the African Guyanese community. Members of the public can walk in and be given services such as the preparation of business plans, projects and grant request proposals for government and donor funding,” he explained.

According to him, approximately 55% of the company’s finance is used to facilitate programmes and projects in the areas of education and training, disaster response, public education, entrepreneur facilitation, and youth development.

“IDPADA-G is a labour-based organisation; man power based organisation and so if somebody comes into IDPADA-G for us to help them to develop a project proposal, that is a salaried person doing the work of service to the community, so we cannot simply see salaries as salaries, separate and apart from the delivery of service because we deliver service through our employees,” he explained.  

Questioning Mr. Jagdeo’s motive, Alexander said it would appear that the Vice President is attempting to prevent IDPADA-G from meeting with President Irfaan Ali as requested by the organisation more than one month ago, and or to drive a wedge through the Afro-Guyanese community. 

“We do have a fear that that may be his agenda…and we do have a fear he might be trying to drive a wedge not only among the African Guyanese organisations, and between IDPADA-G and the community but between IDPADA-G and the President,” Alexander said.   

Sampson added that IDPADA-G has been responsive to the needs of the Afro-Guyanese communities, and has executed initiatives with broad economic impact such as the market day at Mocha.

In 2018, IDPADA-G spent approximately $22.3M on capacity building while another $44.3M was spent in 2019 and in 2020, $11.7M. Additionally, it provided tuition assistance and scholarships to the tune of $1.8M in 2018; approximately $2.0M in 2019 and in 2020 another $1.8M. To the tune of approximately $3M, it also provided financial support to a number of night schools that were closed following 2020.

Additionally, in the area of entrepreneurship, training and development, 77 persons were trained to submit successful bids while 33 small businesses received specialized training on costing, packaging and marketing.

According to Sampson, 4,310 business owners were provided with technical assistance while another 403 food vendors were also trained. Some 1,017 farmers from Regions 2, 3, 6 and 10 also benefitted from capacity training.

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