COLA Blasts G.O.B. for Fiscal Irresponsibility

Geovanni Brackett

The IMF Report has been out over a month, but government has yet to respond to what seem to be areas of real economic concern. G.O.B. may not have provided full details, but other entities have weighed in, including the business sector and the Opposition People’s United Party.  Today, they were joined by COLA which sent out a strong release condemning government for irresponsible financial management and for its silence. President Geovanni Brackett told News Five that the organization had been taking a backseat, so to speak, in order to reorganize and re-strategize – but now they’re back and are taking on government.

Geovanni Brackett, COLA President

“It is very clear that indeed our economy is slowing down. You see the agriculture sector taking a massive hit, whether it’s in the banana industry, the citrus industry – we’ve just had to ask consumers to bite a huge increase in percentage of sugar earlier this year just so that we could stabilize the industry. I think that the government has been making a lot of wrong moves as it relates to the economy, whether it’s the wild spending of the Petrocaribe that the IMF warned them about from a few years ago or the huge takeover of BTL and BEL. The IMF report really is a damning one and it’s one that should cause concern because we’re rocketing up a debt. The debt is going up but the country is not producing anything new to make up the hole that is being created in the economic realm. I think the fact that the media has been talking about this IMF report and it’s been almost a month that we haven’t heard from the Ministry of Finance and the Prime Minister is very alarming. The silence is deafening and we have to question what we’ll be hearing because I think that while the government has been doing an excellent job of spinning away the negativity, I think at some point all those lies and cover-ups will come tumbling down. It’s very important for COLA to educate and to raise awareness in the people of Belie that your economy is in a much worse state. Just look at the banking situation which is still fragile and can actually cave it at any time. It’s very worrisome and we have been told to not take the IMF Report lightly.”