Expectations.......

As things go in this here sunny ‘paradise’ (it’s quite sunny today and has been almost all week)…expectations can be either underwhelming or overwhelming depending on who generates or has ownership of them.

And so it has been in the case of the tabling of the national Budget in Guyana’s parliament on Friday, March 30, 2012.

The government is expecting that its gargantuan 4192.8B (GYD) budget will gain overwhelming support from the people and in particular via the members of the National Assembly.

Meanwhile, the people are expecting that the budget will bring them some significant economic relief, to be felt immediately in their pocketbooks, but more importantly, through a development impetus that also brings relief to their weary social existences in the  communities that populate the natyion’s landscape and in which they (the people) live!
On the one hand, the government intends to continue on with its (largely propagandistic0 notions of development for the people and the nation…..though an examination of the last national elections results will show the people’s dis-enchantement with the previous status quo!

On the other hand, the people, who have largely rejected the status quo, delivering for the first time in Guyana’s history, a Minority government in whcih the Combined opposition holds a one seat majority in the national Assembly.

And so we have had a budget presented and the people are all agog (well, at least, most of those who are really interested and who truly understand the process) at the staggering amount which has been announced as the budgetary proposition for 2012. Some wonder whether it is because of various proclamations about the end of the world, that such a figure was arrived at.

Like most budget presentations in Guyana over the past 20 years, there is never any real attempt to inform the nation of HOW revenues are to be accrued to support the budget propositions. This is perhaps, the reason why, over the decades, several requests for Supplementary provisions have had to be made to the national Assembly. (With the new configuration in parliament however, all this ‘ad hockery” is expected to be reigned in if not done away with all together. the people demand it; that’s the word!)

But back to expectations.

The largely ‘economically illiterate’ populace is generally interested in hearing about increases in wages and salaries (none of which has been announced this time)…..the raising of the free-pay ceiling – which usually results in workers taking home a mite more than they did that before the announcement of the budget – The free-pay celing has risen from $40,000 GYD to $50,ooo GYD – many will, no doubt, continue living paycheck to paycheck and perpetually hope for and expect to be bolstered, by remittances from overseas. People generally anticipate some movement toward the alleviation of the economic burden of the elderly via increases in Old Age pensions – such interventions this year are at best laughable even as it is rumored that the National Insurance Scheme could run out of money to service claims as early as within the next five years! The people also expect to hear about increased government spending in education and health and also in infrastructure development. The people desperately expect to hear that the path to the Good Life has begun. While their ears wait, they prepare their feet for an exodus!

The word is out……it’s a big budget, but there ain’t much for the people to expect, except that the flowery words they hear should be enough to quell their worried souls.

And so, it is, in this here sunny paradise, that, with another sun about to set, expectations continue to linger in people’s minds as they gear up for coonut ckoka, bighan and dhall wid nuff peppa dn a cold drinks….or a nice cow heel soup wid obstacles an lil greens, or maybe a Chinee and a cold coke. The expectations linger, but de people know that they still have to work like slaves and ask God, however they believe him to Be, to make it right for them through the next day and the next one and the one after that……The expectations never die, even though the people die every day!