OROPOUCHE West MP Davendranath Tancoo and Mayaro MP Rushton Paray are calling on citizens to forget about “airy fairy” political rhetoric and open their eyes to see the facts that TT is in dire straits.
The MPs were responding to statements made by several speakers at a PNM public meeting on Tuesday that TT's GDP (Gross Domestic Product) had grown by $5b in 2021.
“Forget the 'airy fairy' conversation. How do you feel,” Paray asked.
“Do you feel safer? Are you comfortable with the quality of healthcare? Your roads, are you happy with their condition? Politicians and government ministers speak all sorts of nice things, and they have a job to do, but our function is to bring them back to reality so they could understand what the ordinary man is facing.”
“The (Finance) minister said that they are doing a great job, if what you are feeling is indicative of a great job then let’s hope that the job doesn’t get worse.”
On Tuesday, Finance Minister Colm Imbert said the Central Statistical Office submitted information to the ministry which reflected that for the third quarter of 2021, economic production went up by $5 billion and that the quarterly (GDP) went up by $10 billion.
[caption id="attachment_948701" align="alignnone" width="273"] Mayaro MP Rushton Paray. - ...[/caption]
But Tancoo said the information was trumped-up statistics from an outdated CSO.
“That announcement that we had a sudden boom was timed so that the government could build a momentum; so we could get to the mid-year review now and the government could now approve more money to be spent in election gimmicks and political expenditure as they did in the Tobago situation where there was a scandalous wastage of funds.”
Paray predicted a “perfect storm” of financial difficulty with global shocks driving up prices of food and freight worldwide and said for the past six months opposition has been asking the state to review the taxing regime, that which government has control over.
“That may result in a $10 or $20 saving that would put about $50 in your hand but for the man who has to hustle coconuts and fishing in Tobago, $50 is a world to him.”
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