LETTER: A Nation Abandoned in the Budget Debate

Letter to the Editor: A Nation Abandoned in the Budget Debate

Our government is not serious. Seven MPs and six Ministers abandoned their duty to present on the 2025 Budget — a budget that defines how the nation’s money will be spent and what direction we will take as a country. Instead, they left the people with silence, empty seats, and unanswered questions. How do you justify this level of negligence? It’s as if they all decided to “skud” on exam day, leaving the classroom empty while the people they claim to serve wait outside for answers.

The Opposition’s role is to ask tough questions, to challenge, and to demand accountability. But how can they do that when entire ministries failed to submit business plans? What exactly would the Opposition be responding to? A summary filled with fluff and vague commitments? This is not governance — it’s a staged performance with missing actors. Imagine a championship cricket match where half the team never shows up to play. Worse yet, imagine showing up to find there’s only one wicket on the field. That’s what this feels like — a rigged game where only the spectators lose.

The bigger question is this: Does this government think it is above accountability? When Ministers decide that presenting their budget proposals is optional, it signals something far more sinister — that they believe they owe the people nothing. Are we to accept this as the new normal? Will the Prime Minister now declare that his team no longer needs to account for how public funds are spent? Will they decide that transparency and good governance are mere suggestions, not obligations?

A budget is NOT a side project. It’s NOT a casual memo tossed around in a WhatsApp group. It is the financial backbone of our future. Ministers who fail to present their plans are signaling to us that they have none. It’s baffling, bewildering, and downright insulting. It shows a blatant disregard for the people who elected them. They don’t even have the decency to pretend to care.

This government’s approach to leadership has become a masterclass in blame-shifting and evasion. Every failure is someone else’s fault. Remember Antigua Airways? Remember the “ground fakings”? The Prime Minister was “duped,” he says, as if being tricked is now a badge of honor. He behaves like a child who didn’t have toys growing up — and now, with the whole toy store at his disposal, he spends his time playing games with the nation’s future.

This is not leadership. This is recklessness. Antiguans and Barbudans deserve better. Wake up. Rise up. Demand better. Our democracy can only survive if the people hold leaders accountable. If we accept this brazen disrespect, we may one day wake up to find that we have no accountability left at all.

I amA Disappointed Citizen.

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