Grey areas
Editorial
The less precise and detailed information that is readily available in a society the more grey areas there are where no one really knows the true position and there is room for speculation, informed or malicious, guess-work or sheer propaganda or rumour mongering. If, for example, we had an up to date census we would have a very good idea of exactly what our ethnic breakdown was and if it was sophisticated enough we might even have an idea of the breakdown of the `mixed' category. If we had scientific polls, like those conducted by the late Dr Carl Stone in Jamaica, we would have a very good idea of the electoral support the political parties actually enjoy and there would be little room for wild speculation. The lack of information allows poses to be struck with no regard for facts and is conducive to a low level of political culture in which there is little respect for reality. Even the valuable information available is not widely used. For example the Household Income and Expenditure Survey carried out in l992 showed average monthly household consumption expenditure as follows: East Indian $22,732, African $22,072, Amerindian $l5,302, Mixed $22,350, Portuguese $27,635 and Chinese $35,730. Even if these figures are roughly accurate they go some way to destroying certain pervasive ethnic myths that can fuel envy and hatred. A society that is well informed or in which the decision makers have access to reliable data is likely to benefit from better policies in every field. How many teenagers get pregnant every year, did they have access to contraceptive methods, what effect did it have on their school career, what happens to school dropouts, how many people are unemployed, what jobs are available in what areas, how many Guyanese are emigrating every year? Without this quality of information available much political debate is inadequately informed, priorities can't be set, and anecdotes or gossip readily take the place of hard analysis. A society with a seriously deficient information base tends to spawn a kind of slackness in which any kind of allegation may or may not be true and few propositions can be rigorously tested or subjected to detailed criticism. Accountability, in the financial and other senses, is one of the first casualties in a decaying society. There was a time in recent memory when the national accounts had not been audited for nearly a decade, making any kind of transparency impossible to assess. In such a case the grey areas take over completely, anything goes. One sign of a return to accountability was the virtual rebirth of the Auditor General's Department under Mr Anand Goolsaran. Credit for this must be given to then President Hoyte as part of his effort to restore some kind of normality after the depredations of the Burnham era. Regrettably, the Department is still underfunded and understaffed, though it has done vital work. Moreover, this rebirth and rebuilding did not take place in many other vital areas ranging from the accounting departments in some ministries and agencies to the central tender board. There is so much still to be done. Without credible data in some vital areas the road remains open to conmen and propagandists.
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