Vice President and General Secretary of the People’s Progressive Party (PPP), Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo, has dismissed promises floated by Leader of the People’s National Congress/ Reform (PNCR), Aubrey Norton as unrealistic; outlining that it would require twice the amount of oil revenues in the 2025 budget to make them a reality.
Speaking at a press conference on Thursday, Jagdeo criticized Norton’s pledge to raise the income tax threshold from $130,000 to $400,000 and build between 160,000 to 200,000 homes on a rent-to-own basis.
“Anybody who says they can build in five years, 160,000 to 200,000 homes gotta be crazy…Norton and the others are known for calling numbers,” Jagdeo stated.
He added that an analysis done by the PPP showed that financing even a portion of Norton’s proposals would call for a lot of the country’s available resources.
“Norton had made some of the promises at the budget time. So we took all of the promises and we costed them and we demonstrated that to fund those promises alone, and they didn’t include any infrastructure development, but just handouts to people and things like threshold etcetera… that it will cost twice the amount of oil money that we receive now in the 2025, budget,” the Vice President explained.
Notably, the sum of US$2.4 billion was approved by the National Assembly to support the budget which totals US$6.6 billion budget. Notably, the US$2.4 billion was withdrawn from the Natural Resources Fund and the maximum amount was taken. It therefore means that a Norton-led regime would have to change the withdrawal rules for the Fund to take out double the amount to deliver on his promises.
