Shuman’s LJP presents ‘futuristic’ five-year plan

The Liberty and Justice Party (LJP), led by pilot Lenox Shuman, will this Friday release its manifesto for the upcoming general elections, presenting it as a “futuristic” five-year-plan to ensure political stability, safety and security, inclusive economic growth and development, and prosperity for all.

Some of the key plans include:

• HOUSING: Establish Housing Departments in each region to plan and implement housing developments; all new developments to include green spaces and parks, safe recreational spaces, including playing fields, walking tracks, bicycle paths, and gym facilities
• EDUCATION: Build a free but voluntary universal early education and childcare service for all children. Enforcing outdoor education and physical activities. Free transportation. Free nutritious lunches, with children being involved in growing, preparing and cooking food. Implement a bursary for every child from birth to eighteen years of age.
• HEALTH: Create Guyana Health Service. Build and appropriately equip a hospital to cater for the medical needs of children and adolescents. Treat drug addiction as a health problem rather than a crime. Provide accessible, local community health centres that provide a wide range of services, including out-of-hours care. Streamline and mainline non-traditional, herbal, and indigenous medicine and practitioners
• PENSION: Providing an increase in pension to a living wage (minimum wage)
• GEORGETOWN: Revamp Georgetown’s infrastructure completely and transform it into green, smart capital city of the 21st century
• YOUTHS: Create a National “First Job” Programme for youth between 16 and 25 years old to gain a Government-subsidised placement at a business in their field of interest
• PUBLIC SERVANTS: Review, with a view to improving, the terms and conditions of public officers, including police and fire officers, teachers, nurses, customs and immigration officers, as well as those in the general service.
• SECURITY: Equip Police force officers with smartphones and body-cams; outfitting police cars with tablet computers, GPS’s, and dash-cams and expanding the use of CCTV cameras. Digitise all Police services. Increase the size of the Guyana Police Force (GPF) by appointing administrative staff to perform non-policing functions to allow Police officers to focus maintaining law and order and the protection of citizens. Improving payscales and other benefits.
• ECONOMY: Create a major Research & Technology (R&T) park in the outskirts of Georgetown to encourage the formation and growth of the commercial and industry sectors. Create Special Economic Zones close to the proposed Guyana Deep-Water Ports to serve as hub of economic activity within CARICOM and connect South America with North America and Europe. Develop waterways to international standards and integrate them to connect interior with the rest of the country and beyond – embracing blue economy.
• ENERGY: Form Guyana National Oil Company (GNOC) that will also be entrusted with setting up a state-of-the-art petroleum refinery to supply all Guyana’s needs of petroleum products, and export as well. GNOC would also be able to produce methanol required for biodiesel production.
• AGRICULTURE: Establish an Allotment Programme to bring lands into production by providing small leaseholdings and incentives for growing food. Allocating unused Government lands to bona fide landless farmers to support the production of vegetables, fruits, tree crops, hemp, cannabis-sativa, and livestock. Incentivising the use of green-houses, hydroponics and new, efficient technologies low in water use for crop production, to ensure food security. Revitalise cane sugar industry.
• ENVIRONMENT: Title Indigenous Lands with urgency to protect the forest and the identity of forest peoples. Hold National Clean-Up Days every quarter, to encourage Guyanese to participate in community clean-up program Formulate national waterfront development policy to beautify waterfronts in all the regions as a safe habitat for biodiversity, a place of beauty, art, culture, recreation and low impact entertainment

“With the Liberty & Justice Party, we’ll rebuild our nation, that means, a seismic shift in the way we do business, how we educate our future nation builders, how we build our infrastructure and how we keep our people and our environment safe,” the party said in a statement.

The party said it has taken the lead in releasing its manifesto “to give our brothers and sisters, our mothers and fathers, our uncles and aunties, our grannies, our cousins, our supporters and our challengers time you all deserve to read and react and to our road map to prosperity.”

The manifesto includes a Six-Month Plan if the party is elected.

“The LJP is of the firm belief that the future of our nation can only be secured by providing a society that fosters inclusive democracy, Article of law, economic and social stability, equality, equal opportunity and justice for all,” Shuman states in the manifesto.