President Irfaan Ali on Friday recommitted to his previously stated plans to ensure Guyanese benefit from free education at the University of Guyana and tackling wasteful government spending.
This, he said, would contribute to ensuring Guyana’s public and private sectors become productive and efficient. The Head-of-State was at the time delivering remarks at the virtual 29th Annual General Meeting (AGM) of the Private Sector Commission (PSC).
Speaking on the issue of free university education, which the governing PPP/C has committed to providing by 2025, Dr Ali said this is proof that the government is not only interested in a vibrant economy but also the vibrancy of the pool of human resource across the country.
“We need the most talented, skilled, trained and qualified human resource to take this country forward.
“This will rebound to tremendous benefits to businesses because a more skilled human resource means a higher level of productivity and efficiency and greater levels of service is expected,” he added.
Dr Ali told the PSC AGM that all of this is part of the government’s plans to ensuring sustainability and stability.
Likewise, Dr Ali assured that serious management of government resources will also be realised. He said already there are systems being put in place which offer enhanced revenue administration.
“We have to ensure wasteful spending is removed from public expenditure. This will allow us to have more money directed to the creation of wealth, more to the empowerment of our human resource, more money for expansion of the economy,” he said.
The President called on the PSC to support the government’s transformative agenda which he explained drives the realization of these opportunities.
This support, he said, requires the private sector to be transformative and aggressive. The President touched on a range of other issues including sound macroeconomics, building capacity to meet future demands, security and local content.
“These are all thing that we have to fix and we will be fixing it, but importantly, we will be fixing it with the partnership of the private sector,” the President said.
On the issue of local content, he said the government was also aggressively looking to ensure the policy is completed soon which offers clear directions on how this is to be achieved.
Friday’s virtual session was attended by other government officials, members of the diplomatic community and a range of private sector actors. It included the laying of the PSC annual report and a message from outgoing Chairman, Nicholas Boyer.