Delroy Chuck, Contributor
HURRICANE IVAN has further exposed the weaknesses and failures of the Jamaican economy. There is no money, full stop. The government lacks the resources to respond with alacrity to the thousands of farmers, householders and ordinary Jamaicans who cry out for assistance and relief from the ravages of wind damage, flooding and pile-up of debris. The government is broke, the country is broke and hundreds of thousands of vulnerable Jamaicans cannot help themselves and look helplessly to government and others for support.
After the finance minister, Dr. Omar Davies, allowed the election campaign to 'run wid it', he is now carefully taking the country through the raindrops, tightening spending, eliminating capital expenditure, borrowing wherever money is available and desperately keeping the budget within designated fiscal targets. My concern is that there is no end in sight.
We may well keep our fiscal targets, but after all the belt-tightening and sacrifices, will there be even more of the same, or, miraculously, prosperity will come? Let us face some simple realities - a country cannot be productive unless its people are productive; a country cannot be rich and prosperous, unless its people are rich and prosperous; and, a country cannot grow, expand and achieve international recognition, unless its people take it to those dizzying heights. This country will never achieve economic progress if we continue to depend on others when it must be through our own effort and creativity that we develop and produce our way out of the impending bankruptcy.
IN DISAGREEMENT
I disagree with Minister KD Knight who urged the international community, in his recent speech at the United Nations, that the world needs a more equitable distribution of earth's resources - it won't happen. I disagree with pastors who preach every Sunday that the rich are obliged to help the poor, which only contribute to the continuing mendicancy of the poor instead of actually alleviating their poverty. I believe that grants, loans and remittances, which are mainly used for consumption, are of no long-term benefits and are major obstacles to our progress and self-sufficiency.
While I truly believe that the rich nations, institutions and individuals should extend charity and assistance to those in need, and many do, it is absurd to think that it is their burden to close the gap between the haves and the have-nots. Rich and prosperous nations and institutions will always get richer and more prosperous because they want to, and economic improvement is considered one of their main measures of progress. Countries are poor, and will remain poor, for the simple reason that they lack the strength and commitment of purpose to extricate their people from poverty - they look to others to do so.
Sadly, Jamaica falls into this latter category and, even now, the main reason for our fiscal targets is simply to satisfy our creditors and the money-lenders abroad to extend further credit and loans to our increasingly insolvent nation. I stand accused in asserting, again, that nothing worthwhile and sustainable can be achieved unless we get the economy right, where it is more profitable to produce and export than to import and trade or buy government paper and bonds. I assert that unless we get the economy right virtually every sector of the society will fall out of sync, for the inescapable fact that, ultimately, it takes money to pursue and maintain any worthwhile endeavour.
MURDER RATE
When crime erupts everywhere, the murder rate spirals out of control and the police lack the resources to respond, it is the poverty-stricken communities that feel the brunt of the suffering, injuries and injustices. When university students are deregistered, the police stations fall apart and police officers cannot get their full quota of uniforms and support, the hospitals are unable to access medicine, the roads cannot be maintained and fixed, and every government department and agency is devoid of sufficient budgetary support, we must acknowledge that the government policies are misguided and wrong, and the main cause for our shortage of money and resources.
How do we explain to anyone with good economic sense that in a 328-billion dollar budget, 228 billion will be used to service debt, of which 98 billion will simply be for interest payments? Yet, the government is unable to comprehend that the present policies are taking us into further financial chaos, in which the shortage of money and resources will become even more acute. It is really time to appreciate that we cannot build a country on grants, remittances and charity. It is time we wake up to the simple reality that businessmen and entrepreneurs are inspired primarily by profits and need policies that make it profitable for them to produce and export, which is the only way by which we can reduce and eliminate the continuing shortage of resources that threaten to bring our country to even further ruin.
Delroy Chuck is an attorney-at-law and Opposition Member of Parliament. He can be contacted by e mail at Delchuck@Hotmail.Com.
