Shift cash grant qualifying date to Dec 31, 2024 – Former Finance Minister

Last Updated on Thursday, 17 October 2024, 18:12 by Writer

Former Finance Minister, Winston Jordan on Thursday assailed the Guyana government for excluding youths, who would turn 18 years by year end, from receiving the GY$100,000 cash grant per person.

Mr Jordan said government also needed to specify that only Guyanese 18 years and older who are residing in the country would be eligible for the GY$100,000 cash grant. “You have to make it explicit. The cash transfer will target adult Guyanese resident,” he said on KAMS TV. He explained that a resident Guyanese is a Guyanese whose permanent residence is a place in Guyana and living here for at least 183 days each year. Mr Jordan warned that if there is no residency specification, government would expose itself to “serious issues.”

Mr Jordan also objected to the qualifying date of January 1, 2024 for the grant. Instead, he called on President Irfaan Ali to shift the date to December 31, 2024 to widen the number of beneficiaries who had been also feeling the brunt of an increase in cost of living. “It is a whole set of adult youth, if you want to call them, 18 years who are going to be exempted from this cash transfer. And then you say y0u like youths?,” he said.

He also questioned President Irfaan Ali’s position that the adjustment from GY$200,000 per household to GY$100,000 per person would cost more than the originally earmarked GY$60 billion. Mr Jordan observed that the President was “unprepared” to say how much the new proposal would cost beyond saying it would cost more.

Mr Jordan observed that Dr Ali did not say how many adult Guyanese would receive the grant. But, by the Former Finance Minister’s calculation there are roughly 600,000 adult Guyanese residing in Guyana who would receive GY$100,000. “It doesn’t cost a penny more so it’s the same GY$60 billion,” he said.

Mr Jordan used the estimate of about 500,000 persons who voted in the March 2020 elections. He said of that number, there were Commonwealth citizens.

The former Finance Minister flayed the government for not crediting him and the opposition for first suggesting that the grant should have been distributed to adult Guyanese rather than households.