Overseas-based Guyanese can benefit from $100K cash grant – VP Jagdeo

– App being developed for registration, age eligibility revised to Jan. 2025

The Guyana Government has announced that overseas-based Guyanese would also benefit from the $100,000 one-off cash grant initiative, provided that they are in the country at the time of the distribution, and have the necessary documentation to prove their citizenship.
This was revealed by Vice President Dr Bharrat Jagdeo during a press conference on Thursday, when he explained that the Government has removed the residency requirement as an eligibility criterion for receipt of the cash grant. Consequently, Guyanese living abroad who are in possession of a Guyana-issued Identification (ID) Card or Passport could now benefit from the initiative.
However, overseas-based persons would first have to undergo a registration process, Jagdeo added, while noting that the money would strictly be paid in Guyana.
“The [cash] grant will not be paid overseas. We have no intention of going to New York or Toronto to register people there. They will have to be in Guyana and register here; and they’re eligible as Guyanese, providing that they have the requisite documents to prove such, then they can then receive the cash grant. This enormously simplifies things for us. And it does not discriminate against our people based on residency,” the Vice President pointed out.
Moreover, Jagdeo noted that there will be no provisions for persons overseas to use proxies to cash in on the initiative. “We’re not tolerating proxies. Next thing, a man goes around Brooklyn or Queens and gets 1000 proxies – everybody signs up. We’re not dealing with that. If you come here and you have your passport and demonstrate you’re Guyanese, you’re eligible [and will get the money],” he added.
In addition to expanding the beneficiaries, another eligibility criterion that the Government has expanded for the cash grant is the cutoff date for the age requirement. Initially, that cutoff age was set at January 2024. But now, Guyanese who are 18 years and older by January 2025 are qualified to receive the one-off payment.
According to Jagdeo, Government, through the Finance Ministry and in collaboration with other state agencies, has developed a mobile application for persons to register for the much-anticipated one-off cash grant. As at Thursday, that app was being tested by a technical team that has been set up to oversee the implementation of the cash grant exercise.
“The app would have some compulsory fields people would have to fill up before the cheque is processed. So, name, address, phone number, passport/ID number. They’re building a geolocator in the app so you can know where people are. Once people’s names are processed through that app and verified, then the cheques will be cut,” he explained.
“We want to make sure it’s working well before it’s launched formally, but these are done by the technical people. We want the system to be built so that we have secure databases, secure ways of cutting the cheques, verification systems and all of that; so that only eligible people receive it, which is Guyanese who are over 18 years old,” he stated.
The Vice President further explained that the team is also ironing out a robust system that would allow for seamless processing of the cheques so that there is accountability and transparency in the exercise.
While most of the payments will be made via cheques, special arrangements would have to be made for beneficiaries in remote hinterland and riverine communities to get cash, since they do not have easy access to commercial banks.
As had obtained in the school cash grant disbursement exercise, these 100,000 one-off payments will be carried out under the scrutiny of the Office of the Auditor General.
“We have made it clear that we need about five months to roll out the entire initiative. We’re not gonna rush to do it and then end up with a lot of corruption, or it going to people who are not eligible. We will take enough time to build a robust system that it could be done in a manner that is open and transparent, and every eligible Guyanese will receive it; and that’s what we’re working on,” Jagdeo declared.
Meanwhile, the Vice President went on to address some concerns of public servants, who were worried whether this one-off cash grant would replace their highly anticipated retroactive year-end bonus. Jagdeo assured the public sector employees that they could still look forward to the retroactive salary increase in the coming months.
He also clarified during Thursday’s press conference that the Government has not decided as yet whether to use the $7 billion that was allocated in Budget 2024 for cost-of-living relief measures to fund this $100,000 one-off cash grant initiative, which will amount to more than $60 billion.