Kaieteur News reported last Saturday that "the opposition coalition A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) says that it remains hopeful that consultations with government over the 2014 budget would be reached". The report said "hope is rapidly draining away taking into consideration that it will be presented in March and budget arrangements and submissions by the respective ministries would have been done already while no substantial talks between the opposition and government have commenced".
What is basically being put forward is one hand, the APNU is first indicating that there has been no consultation or talks between the opposition and government and the second sentence it says there has been talks or consultations.
The article further says that Granger is of the view that ‘real face to face consultation has not taken place’. But he later clarifies that ‘there has been some engagement but the concerns of APNU have not been taken on board by the Minister of Finance Dr. Ashni Singh’.
A short moment later, Granger added that the government is playing a very “dangerous game” in denying them the opportunity to contribute meaningfully through the consultative process and feels that the budget which is in its advanced stages of preparation has not incorporated the main concerns of APNU.
Spot the difference in the last two sentences?
* ‘the concerns of APNU have not been taken on board’
* ‘has not incorporated the main concerns of APNU’
What we have established thus far from what the opposition has told us is that the Government has consulted with them, some not all of their recommendations were taken on board (no doubt the ones that were feasible) but they will force Government to implement all of their demands and if not, they will cut the 2014 budget.
However, their excuse for slashing the budget will be that there was no “transparency or the money is not being used for a proper purpose”.