GEORGETOWN, Guyana, CMC – The Guyana government has successfully tabled legislation increasing the country’s limits of external and public loans allowing the country to access more funds from international markets, bolstering investments in infrastructure, social programs, and economic development.
Senior Minister in the Office of the President with Responsibility for Finance, Dr. Ashni Singh, Thursday tabled the External Loans Order 2023 and the Public Loan Order 2023 to increase the limit of external loans from GUY$650 billion (One Guyana dollar=US$0.004 cents) to GUY$900 billion, and the limit of public loans from GUY$500 billion to GUY$750 billion.
In February 2021, the government increased the external debt ceiling from GUY$ 400 billion to GUY$ 650 billion and the domestic debt ceiling from GUY$ 150 billion to GUY$ 500 billion.
Former housing minister, Annette Ferguson, said that “this is the third Supplemental Paper for the year 2023,” with the government seeking billions of dollars more in addition to what the National Assembly had approved in February.
She said the government is spending lavishly and that the lives of citizens have not improved, noting “poor Infrastructure; poor quality of water through our taps; high cost of living; frequent blackouts; public servants yet to receive a decent increase in their salaries; poor health facilities.”
She said that this type of “lavish” spending is premised on poor planning by the government and a lack of competence, calling on citizens to wake up and ask, where “our oil monies going?”
Her opposition colleague, Ganesh Mahipaul, believed the government should clearly define all the large projects it intends to invest in before hiking the ceiling.
But Singh told legislators the move was necessary given the country’s development and growth needs over the next few years.
“History will record that in 1992, the People’s Progressive Party assumed office in an environment where Guyana was completely bankrupt as a country, where we were uncreditworthy, where the international community was unwilling to lend Guyana… where we were an economic pariah state,” Singh said.
“The proposed adjustment to the debt ceiling that we have brought to this Parliament keeps Guyana firmly within the boundaries of highly sustainable debt position and debt sustainability.
“If you [look at] Guyana’s debt-to-GDP ratio, today we have one of the lowest debt-to-GDP ratios in the entire hemisphere,” Singh said, adding that the debt can benefit a country’s development.
“This motion and the proposed increase in the debt ceiling is not only a debate about complex economic matters… debt sustainability, and the debt-to-GDP ratio,” he said, noting that it is the government “wanting to deliver development to the people of Guyana in the shortest possible time, without compromising our capacity to service the financing that we contract.
“It’s about delivering on our commitment to improving the lives of every single Guyanese person in the shortest possible time,” he said, criticizing the former A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) administration for stymieing the country’s socio-economic growth.
“We on this side of the House are very clear that we will use our current fiscal situation to leverage, in a sustainable manner, debt that we can afford to contract. And we will invest the proceeds of that debt into the things that will earn us even greater income in the future: the infrastructure, the social services, etc.
“Borrow to build, if you like. The APNU+AFC, on the other hand, is trying to convince the people of Guyana that even if they can borrow, they should continue to live in the same House and ride the same bicycle… And that, essentially, is what we are dealing with here.
“What we see today, the APNU, in objecting to this motion, is essentially objecting to delivering services to the people of Guyana. They object to development in Guyana to any initiative that will improve people’s lives. And the People’s Progressive Party, by bringing this motion to this Honourable House, is saying, ‘we are in a hurry to deliver development to the people of Guyana,” Singh said.
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