PNM accuses Govt of preparing ‘budget of lies’

Gail alexan­der

Se­nior Po­lit­i­cal Re­porter

The Op­po­si­tion is ac­cus­ing the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) Gov­ern­ment of prepar­ing to de­liv­er an­oth­er Bud­get filled with lies and un­ful­filled promis­es, with its se­nior mem­bers warn­ing that to­day’s pre­sen­ta­tion will be an ex­er­cise in de­cep­tion rather than an hon­est ac­count of the coun­try’s eco­nom­ic cir­cum­stances.

Op­po­si­tion Leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les ex­pects the Gov­ern­ment to en­gage in a mas­sive at­tempt to de­ceive the pub­lic, while for­mer en­er­gy min­is­ter Stu­art Young has dis­missed the Prime Min­is­ter’s pre-Bud­get pro­jec­tion of a “bright fu­ture” as hog­wash and lies.

PNM whip Mar­vin Gon­za­les, mean­while, says the Gov­ern­ment will use the set­tle­ment of ne­go­ti­a­tions with Wa­ter and Sew­er­age Au­thor­i­ty (WASA) work­ers as part of what he calls its “promis­es and lies bud­get.”

All three spoke yes­ter­day, on the eve of to­day’s 2027 Bud­get pre­sen­ta­tion.

Beck­les said, “In the same way they de­ceived the coun­try dur­ing their elec­tion cam­paign, and they de­ceived in the 2026 bud­get, I ex­pect no dif­fer­ent on Mon­day (to­day).”

She added, “I an­tic­i­pate this Gov­ern­ment to com­plete­ly side­step the fact that they’ve plunged this coun­try in­to eco­nom­ic de­cline, de­spite pos­i­tive ex­pec­ta­tions when they en­tered Gov­ern­ment.”

Beck­les said she al­so ex­pects the Gov­ern­ment to blame the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) for the UNC’s mis­man­age­ment of the econ­o­my.

“The Fi­nance Min­is­ter will beat his chest and re­peat promis­es he said were al­ready de­liv­ered…I ex­pect a song about brighter days ahead be­cause the cur­rent cir­cum­stances are ter­ri­ble.”

She added, “Their promise of wage in­creas­es and salary ar­rears have sput­tered, with pub­lic ser­vants ex­pe­ri­enc­ing the stark re­al­i­ty that this Gov­ern­ment nev­er in­tend­ed to pay the full ar­rears to be­gin with.

“They’ve ex­hib­it­ed no sense of ac­count­abil­i­ty. If last year’s Bud­get de­bate is any in­di­ca­tor, I ex­pect the Fi­nance Min­is­ter to close off de­bate be­fore we’ve com­plet­ed our scruti­ny.”

Mean­while, Young said, “The da­ta and facts over­whelm­ing­ly and clear­ly show that Kam­la’s Kak­istoc­ra­cy posse is de­stroy­ing the en­er­gy sec­tor and T&T’s econ­o­my. There have been tens of thou­sands of job loss­es – re­tail stores clos­ing, malls emp­ty, bars and restau­rants shut­ting down, small and medi­um-sized busi­ness­es shut­ting down, work­ers in the en­er­gy sec­tor los­ing jobs, they ter­mi­nat­ed work­ers at CEPEP, URP, HDC, Her­itage, NGC, PPG­PL, through­out min­istries, WASA (with more to be sent home soon), T&TEC, etc.”

Slam­ming the UNC’s “gut­ting” of the Of­fice of Pro­cure­ment Reg­u­la­tion and re­it­er­at­ing cor­rup­tion con­cerns, Young added, “They’re in­ter­fer­ing with the man­age­ment of FCB and Re­pub­lic Bank. Ask your­self why? Is it to get hold of what those banks have in them and for their fi­nanciers, fam­i­ly and friends to dip in? Who is win­ning? - not T&T!”

Gon­za­les said, “This Bud­get will be a po­lit­i­cal state­ment packed with lies and promis­es. They’ll an­nounce they set­tled out­stand­ing WASA ne­go­ti­a­tions and make oth­er po­lit­i­cal state­ments that are de­tached from re­al­i­ty or truth.”

“But when the Bud­get is analysed in the Stand­ing Fi­nance Com­mit­tee de­lib­er­a­tions when the Op­po­si­tion ques­tions the Gov­ern­ment on items, the pop­u­la­tion will again wit­ness that the UNC is just up to its usu­al fall­back for­mu­la - tricks, lies and dis­trac­tion.”

Gon­za­les added, “It’s ob­vi­ous Kam­la would boast about ‘jobs com­ing ’-she presided over the loss of thou­sands of jobs since as­sum­ing of­fice! Every­thing she promised in the 2026 Bud­get turned out to be a bag of lies, and she’s send­ing her Fi­nance Min­is­ter to de­liv­er more on Mon­day.”

“And she in­tends to use WASA work­ers in the Par­lia­ment as part of her strat­e­gy of de­ceit.”