Are your tax payments being made to good use or squandered by the Government?

Are your tax payments being made to good use or squandered by the Government?

On Sunday March 15, the Sunday Gleaner made a report on the billions of dollars the Government allocated to erect various infrastructures across the island. At the present moment, most are incomplete. The billions of dollars have been allocated through tax payments and loan funds over the span of 30 years to start numerous developments. With the report that most are incomplete to this day, the question is, are your tax payments being made to good use or squandered by the Government?

Do you ever travel into your neck of the woods and notice numerous incomplete buildings and roads? Do you ever listen to politicians over the years on campaigns complain about bad roads and infrastructures in the island and claim to “pretty” them up if they were elected as Prime Minister? How much of that “pretty” up have you seen since? Everyday we hear about the demand for new schools, community centers, hospitals, better roads; we look to the government for an answer and in response they stick their chest out a little and say, “It will be done!” I find that funny. I understand that we are not the richest island in the world, but why does the Government put themselves out there like the Messiah and in the end fall flat? Everyday a new tax is formed to make improvements on the land and generate revenue, and we have to pay it, if we don’t we suffer penalties. So why can’t we see it to a real good use?

Instances where developments were not fully erected include, and I quote from the Gleaner article:

“A secondary school being built for residents of the inner city community of Seaview Gardens and surrounding the community in St. Andrew has been unoccupied for nearly 30 years after construction first began. The building lacks fixtures, such as toilets, doors, and windows. Sitting idly for years, it is now covered with bushes and provides a haven for criminals. This is while the education ministry continues to clamour for thousands more school spaces.

The construction of the school was part of a three-school project being developed for the community with funding from a World Bank loan. The primary and basic schools, which were also part of the infrastructural project, were opened during the 1990s – nearly two decades after construction first began. But the secondary school remains empty.

“What was happening at that school is that they (criminals) were taking girls in there and raping them and hanging them,” recounts Roman Catholic cleric, Monsignor Richard Albert.

An unofficial word could not be made from the Ministry of Education as to why the school remains unoccupied, but Mr. Albert says he was told that the Government did not have the money to complete the school.”

Other instances of incomplete projects are flooded all over the island are:

The Oxford Mall Market (downtown Kingston)…Started in the 1980s, needed JA$30 Million to complete.

Springfield Technology Park (Morant Bay, St. Thomas)…Started in the 1990s, cost JA$153 Million, remains unoccupied.

There are many more like these, however they are too many to mention.

This situation is like saving your money to buy to a house, but instead buying a car. The Government sets their eyes on various projects over the years, determined to complete them, but instead their focus becomes wayward and things become undone. We have reached a position presently where the people are getting, “the bad end of the stick” because of the Global money crisis. Everyone is pinching their pockets, jobs are lost, people suffer, and if the Government was just set on doing things precisely then maybe we would be doing well at this time. Money would be saved, funding would be possible for bailouts, not a lot of borrowing from other countries would be necessary I guess, but I could be wrong.

In the end, the Government is seen as wasting away billions of dollars every year to start projects that they cannot finish. Sure we don’t want bad roads and lack of certain infrastructures, but the Government should stop acting like super heroes when they in fact can’t save the day thus frustrating the people. Rome wasn’t built in a day and if things were handled slowly but surely, we would be better off. I’m glad we aren’t living like in the olden days where if the King wasn’t doing his job, he would be executed…think about that.

Much Love,

Swade86

Comments? Questions? If you think I was talking gibberish? Drop me a line…

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