If you listened to JAMAICA’S Finance Minister Peter Phillips” speech Tuesday during his address to the nation and you just happened to have been in a Coma , or maybe too young to know, you would certainly come away believing that the PNP was an innocent observer to the last 40 years.
Phillips told the Nation .…
“Funds were not available at affordable interest rates. Even grant resources were denied us,” Phillips said. “Our reserves were dwindling and investor confidence was declining.” He said the most telling sign of “our near bankruptcy, as a country, was the high level of public debt which stood at approximately 145 per cent of Gross Domestic Product by March 2013, without any multilateral support, and had become a millstone around the neck of every Jamaican”. The finance minister said to service this debt, in the 2010 fiscal year, it took 60 cents out of every dollar of the budget.“In addition, to pay public service wages, it took another 21 cents of every dollar,” Phillips explained. “This meant that 81 cents of every dollar spent by the Government went to servicing the debt, and paying the wages of public sector workers.” He said these obligations left the Government with only 19 cents out of every dollar to fix roads, improve health service, build schools, provide water and housing, meet national security costs and clean drains, among other things.
What Peter Phillips omitted is the fact that his Party, the PNP was in charge of the economy for all but 12 of the last 40 years. Phillips said the telling sign of “our near bankruptcy”, as a country, was the high level of public debt which stood at approximately 145 per cent of Gross Domestic Product by March 2013, without any multilateral support, and had become a millstone around the neck of every Jamaican”.
Simply put, the Country was spending roughly 50% more that it was earning.
Despite the caustic nature of Jamaican Politics, Phillips could not lay blame at the feet of the Opposition Labor Party. This was rather telling as Jamaica inches toward National elections due in about a year.
National Polls not yet released are reported to show the Jamaica Labor Party increasing it’s lead over the PNP to a whopping 20 point deficit. Additionally the Election Commission is telling the Nation that Local Government Elections will be pushed back.
Minister Phillips despite his impassioned arguments that his Government have pulled the country back from the brink of bankruptcy ‚never took responsibility for his party’s terrible mishandling of the country’s affairs.
Additional the Minister said there would be no money to offer public sector workers increases beyond the 7% already offered by the Administration.
It will be interesting to note the reaction of the massive public sector workforce come election time.
In the end Phillips took no responsibility for his party’s four-decade long mangling of our country’s financial affairs. He
merely chronicled the near-miss of total economic collapse. There was no I’m sorry, can we have another chance to do it right. Omar Davies was merely shuffled to another portfolio after presiding over the most catastrophic and incompetent handling of our nation’s economy in history.
The People’s National Party has no solution for Jamaica beyond the plans laid out by the International Monetary Fund. Of course the Funds plan balances the books on the backs of the nations people to the extent bankruptcy is averted and they receive massive returns on their funds in excess of that loaned to us.
The Government celebrates meeting the Fund’s targets as a sign they are on the right path. It’s about time the people wake up and realize passing IMF tests means bad news for for them.
The ruling PNP is simply engaged now in shuffling and reorganizing the deck-chairs on the sinking Titanic.