Dear Editor,
I was pleased to see that a very large delegation of Brazilians were entertained by a similarly large delegation from Guyana to discuss the building of a deep water harbour, a hydroelectric dam and the road from Brazil to the Guyana coast. The hydropower dam which will cost us nothing since it will be built for Guyana and Brazil on our land and will be approximately 900-1500 megawatts since the Brazilians not only want hydropower to power Manaus, a city of 2.2 million people, but they also want to smelt their bauxite ore into aluminium, which means that Guyana will also benefit from this since we will have enough cheap power to produce aluminium. The dam they propose will have a catchment of nearly 900 square kilometres in the mountainous Mazaruni area, which also has a very high rainfall and is therefore a very unique location on the planet, perfect for hydropower generation − and it is ours; we will never be able to develop it but with the help of Brazil, the 4th biggest economy in the world.
This country badly needs a deep water harbour. Everything we buy for our daily food and clothing needs or anything we export has to be transferred in Trinidad or Suriname to smaller vessels coming in, and larger vessels going out since the large ocean going Panamax vessels cannot cross the shallow silted up 15 ft deep Demerara bar; they need at least 30 ft draft. As a result everything we buy from abroad costs an estimated 30% more in transportation costs, and everything we export − rice, sugar, bauxite − also costs more, leaving less foreign exchange for the national purse. The PPP doesn’t have time to address these important national projects; they are too busy building a Marriott Hotel, a Hopeless Canal and a stadium, since these give the Guyanese people a false sense of achievement, when in fact they are just ways to put money into corrupt pockets.
I however hold no delusions that this initiative by the Brazilians will bear fruit, and at the end of the process Guyana will be left out and the Brazilians, fed up of begging us for all of the 20 years the PPP has been in office to help them get badly needed access to the Atlantic, will take their business and development to Suriname, and Guyana would have lost once more. We have been given an ultimatum; if by June we don’t agree to this path to certain development, the Brazilians will take their business to Suriname.
I have spoken and written about this before. These are very large development projects, and the Brazilians are proposing to spend their dollars in partnership with Guyana for the mutual benefit of both countries. It’s not like the Chinese who are lending us money to do non-productive national projects which are riddled with corruption.
After thinking on the matter for some time, I am convinced that the PPP government does not want these developments with Brazil since they will be partnerships, and clearly the Brazilians will not just give the Guyana government the money to do these projects, but they will want to do them themselves, with Guyana providing the land and Brazil providing the money and the infrastructure as equal partners. The Brazilians need this development badly, so we would have the upper hand in these negotiations.
If this were to happen there will be no money to be made on corrupt contracts. With the money which is lent to us by China there is very little accountability. In the meantime corrupt officials are the only ones benefiting from all of this. So we will continue without the Brazilians as usual, and Guyanese will be left poor and backward as usual, whilst the Brazilians take their business to Suriname enriching that country and its people.
How long will we have to tolerate this unquenchable greed which is destroying our country?
How long will the Guyanese people look on, without protest, as the PPP sells us down the drain?
How long will the Guyana voters take to realise that Guyana is being led down a path of poverty just to enrich a few.
Yours faithfully,
Tony Vieira
