Antigua and Barbuda: Antigua and Barbuda Labour Party examined the deceitful promises and pledges made by the UPP in the manifesto launched for January 18 general elections.
Examination of the deceitful UPP promises and pledges:
Before we go any further in recounting the many ways in which the ABLP administration has successfully expanded and improved the economic and social conditions of Antigua and Barbuda and all its inhabitants, it is worth examining the empty promises and false pledges that the UPP has made in the efforts of its leadership to get power.
The UPP promises the following immediately upon attaining government:
To pay severance and all outstanding monies to All of the severed LIAT employees. LIAT (1974) Ltd, in liquidation, is a private, limited liability company in which the Government of Antigua and Barbuda is only a 32% shareholder and has no legal obligation to pay severance (even though it has already made available 50% of the demands by way of cash and land to workers in Antigua and Barbuda). The cost of this UPP plan to the Antigua and Barbuda Treasury is one hundred and twenty million dollars ($120,000,000.00)
To pay all debts due to companies and businesses by the Government for goods and services. This cost is four hundred million dollars ($400,000,000.00). Three hundred million of this was credited under the UPP when in government, and the balance of one hundred million was under the present government.
To immediately roll back the price of gasoline and diesel to their original cost, thereby subsidizing the driving habits of all vehicle owners, from the drivers of Mercedes, BMW, and Lexus to those driving the Vitz. This promise will cost the taxpayers EC$5 million per month, or sixty million dollars per year ($60,000,000.00).
To immediately pay the severed Jolly Beach workers, all sums owed to them by a private company in liquidation. This will cost the Treasury another seven million dollars ($7,000,000.00). In any event, the ABLP government which did not owe these workers and had no obligation to pay them, has already dealt with this issue by giving EC$12.9 million to the Liquidator to pay the workers through their Union. Those payments have been made.
To eliminate the unincorporated business tax, which will result in direct revenue loss of $8 million and further revenue loss by undermining the $70 million corporation tax yield through the conversion of taxable corporate profits to non-taxable unincorporated profits.
To pay those persons who declined to be vaccinated against COVID-19. The total sum is approximately two million dollars. These are empty promises and reckless giveaways. If they were to be kept, the UPP would cost the people of Antigua and Barbuda and the National Treasury over $600 million, in the first year in office, or the first 100 days as is the UPP boast, That money does not exist, nor can It be magically pulled out of a hat.
The question has to be asked where ($2,000,000.00) is the six hundred million dollars coming from? The UPP clearly believe that the people of Antigua and Barbuda are uninformed. But any secondary school child can figure out that these are unattainable and false pledges, designed only to secure votes based on deception.
Fortunately, the electorate of Antigua when the government’s wage bill and Barbuda has been educated of four hundred and twenty million by successive ABLP governments dollars ($420,000,000.00) is added, to reason for themselves and to the cost blows up to over one billion calculate figures. dollars, significantly more than the government’s annual revenue.
UPP AND LOVELL LIED BEFORE; THEY ARE LYING AGAIN
In the lead-up to the 2004 elections of work, Increasing taxes, and cutting the UPP promised no new taxes. Yet, within a short time, they imposed personal income tax and other taxes that placed severe strain and suffering on the people of this country.
The UPP also said they would not go to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to borrow money. But they did, accepting all the harsh conditions including, collapsing the economy thereby, forcing people out. People can be fooled once, but the UPP is known by their deeds of mismanagement, incompetence, and failure. They would see Antigua and Barbuda wrecked, if only to rule over its ruins. Personal power not public service is what the UPP wants. That must not happen again, and not at the expense of the people of Antigua and Barbuda.
