Former Deputy Commissioner of Police Dr. Paul Williams has delivered a sharp critique of Guyana’s failure to equip its youth with technical skills, blaming this oversight for both widespread youth unemployment and the dominance of foreign workers in skilled sectors.
Speaking at a recent community engagement in Bagostville, West Bank Demerara, Williams said that Guyana’s lack of investment in vocational training has created a vacuum that foreign labour now fills. He opined that Guyanese youths were never trained alluding to the fact that most of the technical jobs, especially the ones that are well compensated, are taken up by foreigners.
He argued that the country had not positioned its citizens to take advantage of emerging opportunities in construction, engineering, and other skilled trades, which are now in high demand amid national development projects. As a result, foreign workers continue to fill those gaps, while young Guyanese remain jobless and underprepared.
“I have looked at a report from US. From 2023, they placed a lot of emphasis on vocational skills and the emphasis was placed they realized that one, in the vocational skills area… they are dominated by foreigners ,” Williams said. “In the community high schools there were hybrids, you could have focused on academics and at the same time you could have learned a skill.”
Williams linked this training gap to the increase in youth involvement in crime, saying that when young people feel excluded from the workforce and lack meaningful opportunities, many turn to illegal activity. He also stressed that if the APNU is returned to government, it will focus on building structured, practical training programmes for young people, particularly in communities most affected by crime and poverty.
“They have turned the community high schools into secondary schools. And what happens is that those children who have challenges as it relates to performing academically are not given the opportunity to utilize their brains or their hands,” Williams said.
His comments have added weight to growing concerns about the disconnect between Guyana’s development and its domestic workforce, with several voices now calling for a national push toward technical and vocational education as a foundation for long-term growth.
