BRUCE GOLDING, president of the National Democratic Movement (NDM), yesterday ridiculed Prime Minister P.J. Patterson for blaming Jamaica's economic and social problems on richer nations. Instead, he laid the blame for the lack of economic growth squarely at the feet of the Government.
Jamaica lacks vision "and I think that that is very much the heart of the problem plaguing the country and plaguing the economy," said the NDM president.
Mr. Golding was speaking at the Advertising Agencies Association of Jamaica's (AAAJ) Media of the Year Awards luncheon at the Hilton Kingston Hotel, New Kingston.
He accused the Patterson-led Government of holding on to the outdated view of attacking the rich for the problems of the poor.
"That sort of view went out of fashion a long time ago and not only is it outdated, but it reflects a sad perspective taken by our Prime Minister, in our name and on our behalf, which suggests that after 38 years of independence, the psychology of mendicancy has not left us," he said.
Mr. Golding was speaking with reference to news reports of statements by Prime Minister Patterson at the G-15 Summit in Cairo, Egypt. There, Prime Minister accused the rich of consigning developing countries to the "graveyard of penury".
Mr. Golding pointed out that while the Patterson administration is hitting at rich countries, Jamaica is making future plans to call for them "to pay us twice what they otherwise could purchase our sugar for, and even at that we are losing money on sugar". He said that the same situation applies to bananas.
Jamaica's incremental borrowings of $288 billion in new loans over the last 10 years cannot be blamed on globalisation, said Mr. Golding. He pointed out that only $35 billion of that money went to development projects in such areas as education, health and agriculture.
"The rest of it has been used to pay back people that we've borrowed from before and I don't know how in the face of that, how do we blame globalisation and rich nations," said the NDM president.
He said too that the problems of FINSAC were not brought on by oil price shocks or volatile capital inflows, but that they were "home-grown, (relating to) our own policy decisions made at a time when wiser counsel should have prevailed."
The result is that the island is in the market for a further $17 billion to finance the budget for this year because it cannot secure enough revenue on its own domestic expenditure.
Mr. Golding added that while Jamaica was registering "negligible increase in foreign exchange earnings" and a decline in the economy over the last five years, other countries within the region were taking advantage of the opportunities presented by globalisation. Among them were Honduras and Nicaragua which, he said, had seen their foreign exchange earnings increased by 160 per cent over the last five years while their economies had grown by 21 and 25 per cent respectively. Closer to home was Barbados, which had a 44 per cent increase in foreign exchange and an 18 per cent increase in economic growth.
