14,000 more adults will be eligible for cash grants

Last Updated on Monday, 9 February 2026, 23:17 by Writer

Prime Minister Mark Phillips on Monday said at least 14,000 more persons, who have turned 18 years, would now be eligible for the GY$100,000 cash grant.

He told the National Assembly, sitting as the Committee of Supply to consider the GY$1.558 trillion dollar national budget, that already has just over 600,000 persons registered for the first cash grant that was paid out more than one year ago.

Mr Phillips said while that database would have to be scrubbed of the names of deceased persons, government estimated that another 14,000 Guyanese, who turned 18 years, would have to be added to the list of beneficiaries.

It is now estimated that 716,000 Guyanese 18 years and older would be eligible for the payout slated to commence shortly after the budget is approved.

The Prime Minister dodged questions by A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) MP, Vinceroy Jordan about what analysis was done to arrive at a figure of GY$100,000 per person.

“Taking into consideration the high cost of living currently in the country and also the poverty rate, I asked the Honourable Prime Minister what measures or what analysis was done to bring them to the point that $100,000 is still sufficient for Guyanese in 2026,” Mr Jordan said.

But the Prime Minister, in his second response to the almost identical question, skirted responding with specifics.

Instead, he referred to finance minister Dr Ashni Singh’s more than six-hour long budget speech.

Mr Phillips said Dr Singh “elaborated on all the measures” in the budget to bring relief to all Guyanese.

“This is just one aspect of the measures and I particularly said this one here is shared prosperity. Kindly go back and listen to the tape. There are several other measures that if I were to mention all it would take the rest of the hour,” the Prime Minister said.

Mr Jordan restated his question a third time to which the Prime Minister replied: “He talks about sufficiency. The simple answer here is sufficiency is $100,000 plus all the other measures in the budget.”