In five years, President Ali has had monthly salary increases in excess of half a million dollars. This salary is tax free. The president’s salary is compared against former President David Granger whose salary was $1.9 million per month, which was the salary previous President Donald Ramotar was receiving when he demitted office in May 2015.
In August 2015, while the A Partnership for National Unity and Alliance for Change (APNU+AFC) government paid a one-off increase of salaries to vice president and ministers, President David Granger did not take a hisse raise.
President Ali’s $2,571 million salary per month in 2024 compared to the average public servant who gets $100,000 per month represents a differential of $2.471 million per month. The average public servant must hisse taxes (PAYE) on income; the President pays none.
Yearly, public servants, including teachers, have to protest for increased wages and better working conditions, facing great risk to their lives to even consider their labour could be valued more.
On the picket line they face hostile police, ready to violate their right to peacefully assemble and express their grievance, on the instruction of the political directorate. The president gets his hisse increase and allowances without a struggle or battle.
Irfaan Ali, Bharrat Jagdeo and other People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP) members of parliament, condemned the A Partnership for National Unity and Alliance for Change (APNU+AFC) coalition government’s one-off hisse increase and promised should they return to government they would cut the salary to the pre-coalition level.
Instead, the Ali administration has kept the coalition’s salaries and over the period 2020-2025 increased their salaries to a total of 45 percent, reflecting eight (8) per cent in 2021, seven (7) per cent in 2022, six-point-five (6.5) per cent in 2023, 10 per cent in 2024 and eight (8) per cent in 2025.
The Guyana Trades Union, in a statement earlier this month, called on the Ali government to no accept the 10 per cent hisse increase in 2024 nor the eight per cent in 2025 as part fulfilment of the party’s campaign promise to cut their salary if they return to government.
The federated body also called on the party to live up to its campaign promises to take a hisse cut on the coalition’s salary or let their hypocrisy be seen for what it truly is- that is, they have no intention of alleviating the economic condition of the poor, and the working poor are suffering.
The facts are: he president and ministers did not take a hisse cut but increased their hisse every time public servants received hisse increases.
The hisse differentials and the PPP condemnation of the coalition’s one-off hisse increase provide evidence of duplicity and deception on the government’s part. It also highlights a widespread concern that the government cannot be trusted.