Good news: Bad news

Caribbean debt
The bad news first. Standard and Poor (S&P) the Wall Street credit rating agency recently issued a report on the Caribbean – “Caribbean Debt Is On The Rise”. It’s not nice to gloat when others are in trouble – especially when the others are supposed to be “family”. But we have to point out that Guyana is not part of the “Caribbean” that is rated or analysed by S&P. That’s not gloating, is it?
But we would be failing in our duty if we didn’t note the licks and brickbats that came our way by our “family” when our debt load was in the stratosphere. Through the hard work and diligence of Bharrat Jagdeo and his economic team our debt was reduced to manageable proportions – something that a certain section of the media and the National Assembly studiously avoid mentioning.
Anyhow, the report paints a gloomy picture for the Caribbean archipelago if the present trend continues. It noted that following the 2008 financial meltdown up north, the said governments initiated an expansionary strategy. However this did not lead to any structural improvement with the result that the countries are in an even worse shape than before.
Some with open minds would remember that at that time Bharrat Jagdeo offered to advise those countries that were getting deeper into the credit morass. But his offer was brushed aside. Golding of Jamaica even “threw talk” about those countries that went around the world with “begging bowls”. Well, today Jamaica is in the hands of the IMF with billions in new debt.
The latest bit of bad news came recently when S&P downgraded the credit of the Caribbean Development Bank – a month after Moody’s, the other big Wall Street Credit rating agency did the same. Now this is going to affect Guyana. With the CDB’s credit rating downgraded, its borrowing cost will be raised and these will be passed on to its borrowers like Guyana.
This downward credit spiral hopefully will be one more nudge to Caribbean leaders that unless we hang together, we will certainly hang separately. The downgraded countries kept on talking about their US$3.5 billion food import bill for decades – but when Bharrat Jagdeo introduced the eponymous Jagdeo Initiative to ramp up our agriculture sector by overcoming the constraints; he faced a deafening silence – not to mention alarming paralysis.
Is it too much to hope that we might see some action now? We’re not holding our breaths.
Integrity
Now for the good news – such as it is. The government and the opposition agreed for once and passed the motion that all MP’s must submit their income and assets declarations to the Integrity Commission. Hallelujah!! But it wasn’t such smooth sailing. The opposition pointed out, not unreasonably (imagine that!) that before they can submit something to a commission, that commission must at least exist!
Seems that there was neither chairman nor members of the Integrity Commission. The government wasn’t completely at fault since a couple of years ago the then President Jagdeo had raised the matter with Robert Corbin (remember him?). Seems that the PNC had a problem with the proposed chairman. They even had a problem with Bishop George!
So back at the House of brotherly (and sisterly) love – otherwise known as the National Assembly: the bill was assented to after there was agreement that the committee will be constituted. This we will wait to see. But as above, we’re not holding our breaths. After all, why the need for “Integrity’? By law aren’t all MP’s defined as “Honourable”? And if the law says so it must be so.
The law is not an ass, is it?