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15th May 2012
King Slams Director of Statistics
M. G. George

Former Prime Minister Stephenson King last Friday in the House of Assembly slammed the Director of Statistics for giving an incorrect figure on the growth of the economy for the 2010/2011 financial year.

The miscalculation however has brought into question the reputations of the Leader of the Opposition and former Prime Minister Stephenson King and that of the National Statistics Department.

The figure, which was proven to be bogus, raises the question of the credibility of the department in particular which could have serious implications for the citizens of the country. It also underscored the depth politicians will sink to, to look good in the eyes of the public in their bid to control the reins of government.

King has since called for the dismissal of the Director of the Statistics Department, but the director is not at all flustered.

King last year stated that the economy grew by 4.4 percent, a figure he included in his 2011/2012 budget address to the nation.

That figure became the central theme of the United Workers Party 2011 election campaign as King and members of his political machinery set about justifying the statistic, even bringing into the picture the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank to justify the bogus growth figure.

The inaccuracy of the growth figure was revealed by Prime Minister Dr. Kenny Anthony during his budget address last week spurring the former prime minister to blame the Director of Statistics for the error.

King, last Friday in the House of Assembly said that the figure was given to him by the Director of Statistics. King did not name the Director.

According to King it was at a meeting of two sub-committees dealing with finance and the economy that the 4.4 percent figure was given by the statistics department “headed by a gentleman the prime minister has praised over and over again.”

“Those of us on the committee asked the gentleman whether he was certain that the figure was correct,” King said, adding that he asked the gentleman to verify the figure from his sources.

The former prime minister said that the gentleman returned and informed, “with great confidence and conviction that the economy had indeed grown by 4.4 percent”.

According to King he was doubtful about the figure.

 
 

He said he did not create the figure from his mind but rather he, as a policy maker in government, relies on the technocrats in the various ministries for statistics on various aspects of the economy and government.

“I believe it’s intellectual dishonesty, whether it’s the prime minister or his technocrats, either to mislead the prime minister or the prime minister to mislead the nation in giving the impression to the nation that I gave figures created in my own mind to mislead them,” King said.

He then challenged the Director of Statistics to publicly defend the 4.4 percent figure given to him.

“If the Director of Statistics cannot come out publicly and defend the figure that he gave me, information that he gave me, he should be fired. If you cannot explain to the people you ought not to be in the job you are in today,” King said.

The Director, in a telephone interview with the VOICE yesterday morning, said he never actually spoke to King about the figures.

“We (the statistics department) did tell him (King) that the number was shaky that we cannot prove the data source. We said we were not sure of the numbers,” the Director said.

According to the director, at the time in question his department was grappling with a lot of data coming out of key areas like the Customs and Excise department for example, which were duplicating data then and therefore it was explained to the former prime minister’s people that the number given was shaky and that the source of the data could not be proven.

“I wrote a letter in April 2011 to King expressing my concern about the figures. I wrote that letter before the figure came out,” the director said.

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