Patricia Etnel, assembly member of the National Party Suriname (NPS) does not agree with the annual speech that President Chan Santokhi gave in the National Assembly. Santokhi continues to promise growth, peace and stability, but the people are finding it increasingly difficult.
According to the assembly member, an annual speech should indicate what needed to be improved in the coming year. Little or nothing has been implemented in 2022 that was presented in last year’s annual speech.
Santokhi had also promised the people growth, peace and stability in 2022. Etnel said that we are towards the end of 2022 and have not seen any changes whatsoever. When we look at life from the Surinamese citizens standpoint we can see how difficult things, has become.
In the years 2023 Annual Address, President Santokhi spoke about the flaws and inefficiency of the government. Etnel noticed that it has been said many times that every year work will be done on a strong government apparatus, but what we notice is that the government apparatus and the institutions are getting weaker. As a result, the things we want to change cannot change,
Purchasing power enhancement is also constantly mentioned, but nothing is noticed, society has to pay more every day especially for basic goods. The government is always talking about reorganizing the government apparatus, but when you look at the operational expenditure compared to the year 2022, nothing much has actually increased.
The government said that it would spend SRD 27 billion on projects compared to last fiscal year where billions would also be spent on projects. However, according to Etnel, very little has been done in the sense of entrepreneurship and this is one of the things she misses.
The government is allocating many billions to projects to make society self-reliant, but nothing is being of it in the community. Assembly member said that social policy must be one where we know exactly where and how we will involve target groups more.
An annual speech gives a general picture. Etnel said that she has been there since 2015 and all the presented annual speeches are very nice, sometimes too good to be true, when we look at the actual implementation of the annual speech.
Etnel said that it is a completely different picture. Let’s no longer work on formulating winged sentences in an annual speech, but let’s work on winged and realistic sentences that are substantive and can be seen in the development of the country.
