APCs economic policy is a killer!
There is a very annoying penchant which appears to be the hallmark of the All People’s Congress (APC) and that is their stubbornness to listen to the cries of the people they represent and tailor or adjust their policies to reflect positively on their aspirations.
This seeming insensitivity of theirs invariably always leads to their creation of unnecessary problems. When one takes a very critical look at the ugly political, social and economic realities on the ground one becomes acutely aware that our predicament is the result of poor policies of Government and a refusal on their part to listen to alternative views and make necessary adjustments where there need.
We honestly cannot make any sense in the decision of this Government to remove subsides on basic items like fuel and rice without cutting down some taxes in order to create a balance; rather it has even stupidly added to the already unnecessary taxes that are killing businesses and the human beings in the country.
In the advanced countries that our Government so loves to compare us with, one always hears of tax rises and tax cuts. This means that taxes are never meant to be constants but they are periodically reviewed and either raised or cut as the economic realities dictate. This is why the economies of these countries always cope and their people continue to live decent lives.
Perhaps Sierra Leone is the only country in the world where taxes are constant and even where they are reviewed they are always raised. One would have thought that if for any reason the Government must remove subsidies and does not want to raise salaries of workers so as not to provoke inflation, then they should have correspondingly cut down say at least thirty percent of our taxes to cushion the effects of the removal of the subsidy.
Sadly, they have continued to stoutly refuse to cut down taxes and have rather chosen to resort to cheap propaganda using all kinds of high flown and bombastic jargons and blaming others for the mess they have put us in.
In the midst of this rigmarole, as if to add insult to injury, they have the nerve to increase the salary of the Chairman of the Anti Corruption Commission (ACC), Mr. Joseph Kamara, to a sinful Le 48 million plus other numerous allowances to make him net about Le 72 million a month, a development that has prompted other sectors of workers to also ask for raises in their salaries and allowances.
In the event that all the employees of Government decide to demand salary increases where will the money come from? And if they decide to withhold their services until their salaries are raised what will happen to the machinery of this country? And if the prices of basic commodities continue to rise because of the removal of subsidies and the ever rise in taxes can you imagine the ramifications this will have on the well-being of the people of this country?
Honestly, this thought always breaks a cold sweat on any critical thinking Sierra Leonean. We shall not gain anything from the face-saving antics of Government any longer. This Government has to do something fast, perhaps even tell the fellows at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) who know nothing about how our economy works stop giving us unworkable conditionality’s which always cripples the economies of Third World countries and all the attendant problems associated with such scenarios. The advice for Government is for them to swallow some pride and do some adjustments immediately before we start cannibalizing each other.
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