Living on pension is living on the edge
-say old folks
By Nigel Williams
Stabroek News
February 8, 2003
For some old folks the monthly pension of $1820 is their main source of income resulting in an existence of poverty, worry and even hunger.
The Ministry of Human Services and Social Security is currently distributing booklets for 2003 and many pensioners have endured long lines to receive their books.
Stabroek News spoke to a few of them last week as they queued at the Night Shelter for their booklets.
Leoney Gillis of Phase 1, Squatting Area, East Ruimveldt told this newspaper that to support herself and her husband she has to make many credit purchases. “When I get this money is to pay my light bill, which is $2,000, when I finish with that I don’t have anything, in fact the pension itself cannot pay the light bill.”
Both Gillis and her husband Linden are pensioners. She said when they collect their stipends they would normally put it together before spending it. They usually make out a budget at the beginning of a new month, but this most times is cast aside and they end up settling for the essential things. Leoney said usually their expenditure is more than their income and as such she would make a few credit purchases.
The couple budgets for food items such as rice, chicken, vegetables, sugar, tea and other foods. According to Leoney living on the pension is like living on the edge. “We have to spend the little money piece by piece and sometimes it does finish so fast that we don’t have any left for the rest of the month.”
Leoney said at least three days last month they went without food. She said sometimes the Seventh-day-Adventist Church of which she is a member would assist with eatables and sometimes she would receive some assistance from Food for the Poor and other charitable organisations. Leoney is 72 and has two children, one in the USA and the other in Lethem. She said the one in the USA would from time to time send her small sums of money to help with bills. While very grateful for the help, the old woman said she did not receive it very often. She said her son has told her on many occasions that he wanted to return home but the current crime situation was discouraging him.
Leoney added that the government should try to increase the stipend. “Is not everybody get people outside or children to help them, some of us have to depend on this thing. It is really too small and with the (Guyana Power and Light) GPL raising their bills me ain’t know what’s going to happen to us pensioners.”
Ninety-four-year-old Joseph Forester of Meadowbrook said he did not plan too much around the stipend. “Look, I do get me lil NIS pension and my children does send a little thing for me from the States every now and then so that is what keeping me.”
Forester said the stipend could not adequately take care of him. The 94-year-old father of 12 told this newspaper that eight of his children were overseas and the other four would every now and then pay him visits at his home. He said that he would normally use the pension to purchase vegetables and ground provisions.
Forester pointed out that life in Guyana has become so stressful for him that he hardly listens to the news or reads the newspaper. “Is sheer trouble in this place, it is too much for me.” He complained about how he and others were made to wait for their booklets.
“Look all what we have to go through for this lil pittance, this long line, with no food and no proper place to sit all for this lil money.”
The man said he did many jobs in his younger days and had commanded the respect of his supervisors. To Forester being a pensioner is pretty miserable. “I really wished if I was younger, there are many things I would have done, but I am trusting in God, I normally pray three times per day at my window and that would give me the strength to go on.”
Harricharan’s child put him out of her house last year and he is now living at the Night Shelter. He said he does not get a chance to spend his own pension. “You see mi eyes ain’t seeing well and I can’t read and spell so good, so my son who get mi book does do all the collecting of the money.”
According to the man out of the small stipend, his son would give him about $500 and take the rest. While at the Night Shelter he could only stay in the compound during the nights and during the day, Harricharran said he and other friends would beg around the streets for money so that they could purchase lunch. Asked about his views on the pension, Harricharran said, “I can’t really say much on that, since I don’t get me own, but that amount is too small for anybody.”
