Georgetown: The 10th sitting of the National Assembly saw Prime Minister Moses Nagamootoo moving a motion to have the days for the budget considerations reduced to three, as opposed to the seven days conventionally allowed for this exercise.
This has sparked uproar in the National Assembly, with the PPP/C declaring that democracy is under threat. The Party pointed out that this reduction is a denial to the right of Guyanese to scrutinise the budget – the largest budget Guyana has ever seen amounting to $221 billion.
Ignoring the protestation from the other side of the House, Prime Minister Nagamootoo contended that the move is constitutional, alluding to the fact that the request is in line with the Standing Orders.
But PPP/C Chief Whip Gail Teixeira argued that this goes against established conventions and principles, asserting that the Government is scared of being held answerable to the public for the projects laid down in the Budget 2015.
Teixeira highlighted that there are numerous items in the Budget that demand answers and three days is not enough time for the Government to provide the necessary clarifications on pressing issues and concerns the public may have.
Nonetheless, Speaker of the House Barton Scotland allowed the motion, holding out that there is no fault as it is in line with the Standing Orders.
It was then put to a vote but the results remained the same as 32 voted for the motion to be allowed while 28 voted against it.
Leader of the Opposition Bharrat Jagdeo, in a subsequent interview with media operatives, asserted that the Government is hell-bent on railroading every practice that has been respected since Guyana gained its independence, alluding to the limit to the time allowed for the Opposition Leader to speak, the placement of the Opposition Leader’s speech and now the restriction to the time allowed for the considerations.
“I know because I was here in this past and I sat here on the other side and saw the Leader of the Opposition Desmond Hoyte speak for two hours; in fact, his time expired several times and we voted on the other side to allow him to continue until he finished his speech.
They are not only seeking to limit my speech to 45 minutes but also to move away from the tradition where Leader of the Opposition is the second to last speaker,” Jagdeo related.
He went on to say that the Government is clearly afraid that several elements of the budget which are not consistent with progress will be exposed; given their haste to reduce the time allowed for considerations.
“This is a bigger budget than the actual 2014 Budget. It also has several new features where Ministries were reorganised so the line items would have changed. If anything, I thought they would have given us more time to consider the estimates. How can you justify reducing the consideration of the estimates from seven days to three days if you are not afraid of greater scrutiny of these estimates,” the former President argued.
Condemnations continued to be mounted as PPP/C Member of Parliament, Dr Vindhya Persaud, during her budget presentation, expressed her extremely disappointment in the Government for requesting this reduction.
She reminded the APNU/AFC coalition that in the 10th Parliament, they both requested for additional time (more than seven days) for the consideration of the estimates, challenging them to give a rational explanation for the decision to reduce the days to three.
But the fight did not stop there, during the one-hour recess period, the PPP/C held a snap press conference to express their dissatisfaction with the move.
The PPP/C Chief Whip, during the presser, highlighted that to the scrutinising of the estimates is a crucial function of the parliament as it gives some form of reassurance to accountability and transparency.
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