Dear Editor,
What is the point of an editorial in a local newspaper which does not give a prospective analysis from the point of view of Guyana and the potential development of Guyana?
Your editorials, ‘Are we ready for oil’ and ‘Déjà vu all over again’ are immersed in doom and gloom, and I do not see that when I consider Guyana’s untapped natural resources, geographic positioning and potential.
These editorials are filled with half-truths, complete untruths, flawed analysis and negativity.
The global market place, economy and politics are complicated webs to unwind, but there are potential Guyanese investors and intellectuals who have the know-how to navigate and compete.
There are Guyanese players in all the major institutions and organizations which dictate and manipulate world trade.
Simply put, there are products which can be found in Bourda market, outside the GPO and on Main Street that can attract markets in the US without worrying about subsidies.
Guyana can become a very prosperous place, but the old mindset and the new dependence on drug assets have to change. Our decision-makers are still trapped in the socialist mode and protectionist politics.
These are the obstacles to Guyana’s acquiring its true potential that SN should be vehemently addressing. So far your editorials indicate parallax views through a liberal lens.
While noting that SN is deliberately not publishing my opposing views, notably my comments about ‘Are we ready for oil,’ I think that SN editorials should point at what government and Guyana can do to develop the country in this challenging global market place and economy. There are quite a lot, which Guyana and Guyanese can do, but the mindset has to change.
SN is filled with letters which point to positive strategies. Most recently there are letters about the vast potential of rail and road connections with Brazil.
Brazil, now a totally self sufficient nation, producing its own food, vehicles, oil and bio-fuels, is being adopted by many in the US as the perfect role model in the light of the US dependency on foreign oil, and rising food and oil prices.
It must be noted that when Brazil was implementing its developmental programme that country did not let environmentalists prevent the cutting of a great amount of their forest for the purpose of agriculture and housing. Now imagine being branded by the US as a ‘role model.’
The problem with Guyana and any place where there is restrictive growth and poverty is socialism and liberalism. SN should be denouncing those concepts in Guyana before we can see development.
Yours faithfully,
F Skinner
Editor’s note
We do not deliberately refuse to publish “opposing views”; in fact we routinely publish opinions critical of positions expressed in our editorials. While we are unable to trace the letter Mr Skinner cites, there are many possible reasons why, if we received it, it may not have been published, including that it had already appeared in another newspaper.
