In a pointed closing to the parliamentary debate on the proposed National Development Bank (NDB), Prime Minister Godwin Friday says the Opposition’s resistance to the project is a direct strike against the economic aspirations of ordinary Vincentians, specifically fisherfolk and small business owners.
The Prime Minister did not mince words, describing the Opposition’s stance as displaying a “stunning lack of imagination” and a refusal to look toward a “fresh approach” for the country’s future,. He argued that the Opposition’s focus on past institutional failures prevents them from supporting a “re-engineered” financial strategy designed to put the people first.
“Let the people of St. Vincent and the Grenadines register this,” Friday stated. “The opposition opposes the National Development Bank, an institution that is there to give small business people, ordinary people, fisher folk access to capital and to guidance so that they could build themselves up”.
Responding to the Opposition Leader’s argument that a new bank would be redundant given existing entities like the Farmer Support Company (FSC) and the PRIME grant program, Friday stated that consolidation is key to better governance. He countered the Opposition’s defense of current systems by highlighting their inefficiencies, specifically noting that 75% of loans at the Farmer Support Company are currently not being repaid.
The Prime Minister maintained that the government’s plan is to “do things better” by bringing various separate functions under one efficient roof. He dismissed the Opposition’s preference for maintaining “eight institutions” as inefficient, stating that the NDB is the vehicle required to provide the strategic financing and entrepreneurship support that conventional lending institutions currently overlook.
Friday said the NDB would be a central pillar of a broader effort to modernize the national economy and said he will take no financial advice from the Opposition leader.
Mean while, acknowledging the “poetic utterances” of election campaigns regarding economic growth, the Opposition Leader urged the government to face the “real world” of financial management and pointed out that the current banking system already possesses high liquidity and that rather than creating a new, costly bureaucracy, the government should focus on refashioning and streamlining existing instruments to better serve the public
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“You may well end up with your National Development Bank where the funding is just not available at rates of interest and on terms to make it viable,” he concluded, stating he could not support the motion as presented.