Afro-Guyanese deserve answers from IDPADA-G about $468M they received

The International Decade for People of African Descent Assembly – Guyana (IDPADA-G) received a total of $468M since 2018 from the Government of Guyana, to promote the socio-economic and cultural interests of Afro-Guyanese. Afro-Guyanese citizens deserve answers from those who are custodians of those funds. Why would Vincent Alexander and his colleagues who are listed as owners of IDPADA-G, a limited-liability company, not want to be transparent and accountable to the people on whose behalf they received the money?
The Vice President of Guyana, Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo, is absolutely right; he has nothing to apologise for. After all, how many Afro-Guyanese citizens know that this organisation is controlled by people like Vincent Alexander, Dr. Norman Ng-A-Qui and Mark Kirton, and others knew $100M every year since 2018 was given to the organisation to promote the interests of Afro-Guyanese citizens?
This past week, VP Jagdeo revealed that IDPADA-G received $468M to promote the socioeconomic and cultural development of Afro-Guyanese. The Afro-Guyanese citizens, on whose behalf this organisation received the grants from the Government, must ask IDPDA-G where the money went. In their 2020 financial accounts, it shows that of the $100M received in 2020, only $343,000, less than 0.34%, were recorded as grants to Afro-Guyanese citizens. Where did the 99.7% of the money actually end up? Interestingly, while this organisation did not find it feasible to distribute resources to Afro-Guyanese citizens, most of their leaders, like Ng-A-Qui, Alexander, and Kirton, are slated to speak at a forum addressing what they called an emerging apartheid state. The forum was supposed to be held virtually on Sunday, August 21. The forum was postponed to another date.
In 2020, out of the $100M the organisation received for that year, they spent $42M (42%) on salaries and benefits, $4.5M on conference expenses, $2.8M on travelling expenses, $2M on advertisement, $9M on office materials, and $5M on rentals and utilities. This is George Orwell’s Animal Farm all over. IDPADA tells Afro-Guyanese “we are all equal, but some of us are more equal than others”. These people have no moral right to speak on behalf of anyone. Their game is the very epitome of the classical con game. Let them take up the challenge of the VP and tell the Afro-Guyanese citizens whose building they rented, who were the people paid salaries, who were the people who delivered seminars, and how much they were paid. Surely, this cannot be too much to ask for!
Some of the leaders of IDPADA-G are among a small group of loudmouths who claim they speak on and for Afro-Guyanese citizens. Hundreds of Afro-Guyanese citizens received grants for medical attention from the MoH, totalling more than 100 times what IDPADA gave in 2020 to Afro-Guyanese. In 2022, the Government of Guyana started a programme to provide grants to citizens on dialysis. Each person is now qualified to receive $600,000 grant every year for dialysis. The majority of recipients in 2022 are Afro-Guyanese citizens. How is this an apartheid state?
None of these so-called spokespersons for Afro-Guyanese represented the Afro-Guyanese farmers from West Berbice when President David Granger rescinded their leases for agricultural land in 2016. Those farmers had gotten their leases in 2013/2014 when I was Minister of Agriculture. It was Anil Nandlall and the PPP who represented the farmers, and the courts ruled in favour of those farmers. It is the PPP that returned the lands to those Afro-Guyanese citizens in West Berbice. How is this an apartheid state? In the last two years alone, more Afro-Guyanese obtained land than they did in five years under the PNC-led APNU/AFC Government. Indeed, a handful of APNU/AFC officials between 2015 and 2020 obtained more land than Afro-Guyanese citizens combined.
It is an insult that IDPADA’s defence is that giving grants to Afro-Guyanese is not their remit. What is the purpose for the Government to give them $468M so far? They claim they build capacity for enterprise among Afro-Guyanese citizens. How many persons were trained? How many did this organization help to establish businesses? The truth is that more Afro-Guyanese citizens have received grants for small businesses from the PPP Government in the last two years than were given out between 2015 and 2020. Yet, leaders of IDPADA deem the PPP an apartheid Government.
Every single child in school from nursery to high school, public or private, received $30,000 cash grant from the Because We Care initiative, whether that child lives in Regions 1, 2 ,3,4,5,6,7,8,9 or 10; are from Albion or Fyrish; South Georgetown, Mon Repos, Buxton or Enmore, Lethem or Mahdia, Bartica or Linden. What apartheid are the few loudmouth persons who claim they speak for Afro-Guyanese talking about? Let them cite evidence that any Afro-Guyanese child was ruled ineligible to receive the grant. Are there children who missed out when the grants were distributed? Less than 1% did miss out for one or the other reason, but will receive it at a subsequent time.
Whether it is house lots or scholarships, cash grants or part-time jobs, small business grants or loans, IDPADA-G and those who claim to speak on behalf of Afro-Guyanese must present any credible evidence that persons are being discriminated against, that Afro-Guyanese are not benefiting from these programmes. Screaming discrimination until you turn blue is not evidence; present tangible evidence, or shut up.