Dear Editor
I write to make the case that Privatisation Unit (PU)/NICIL has been good for people and country. I would be failing in my duty if I were not to. I put myself on record also, that I have known and worked closely with CEO Winston Brassington and DCEO Marcia Nadir-Sharma, weekly and often daily throughout the years and have found them to be knowledgeable, able, diligent, hardworking and earnestly committed to advancing people and country. It is said that every person is liable to some moment(s) of failure, nonetheless I put myself on record as standing at the side of colleagues who earned my greatest respect and appreciation for their work. And I am not doing so recklessly, flying in the face of evidence. What evidence is there? In all that I have seen and heard I have not sensed any criminal act; there is no indication of any money flowing to any of their pockets. The CEO’s crime (and that of PU/NICIL as an institution along with all its employees) seems to have been that he did his able best to carry out the policies and programmes of our PPP/C administration, accepting them and pursuing them rather than taking his cue from the then opposition.
Just recall the complaints related to Amaila, the Berbice Bridge, the Marriott Hotel, particularly the Marriott, what have they been other than means to discredit those projects and deny our PPP/C administration opportunities to bring good to people and country and win favourable consideration? Those projects made manifest our policies, outlook, worldview, our ideas of our stage of development and the next steps that we should take. Those were essentially political choices and the attacks should be launched against us, the political leaders of the PPP/C, not the administrators.
Let me acknowledge that in the competitive and perhaps inevitably adversarial politics in democracies, even more so in our historical demographics, and especially so after our 2011 elections when on the basis of provisions in our constitution we set up as a minority government, an opposition is likely to doubt, question and disparage all that the government says and does, and see deception and corruption in every place; but this should only go so far.
We of the PPP/C then in opposition, were not ourselves free from such inclinations in the run-up to the 1992 elections, but we have always been a responsible group even though we had real reason to be bitter. Yes, we criticized the Barama, CRL/Clico and Omai agreements, earnestly and responsibly, arguing mostly that the PNC had no mandate then to enter into those agreements. Thus, when we came into office Dr Jagan could have had the agreements reviewed by persons in whom he had great trust (amongst whom was Dr Maurice Odle, then with an international agency).We could and did accept that the agreements were fundamentally standard international agreements. We laid them in Parliament and with a few adjustments they have been our standard documents throughout our years in office.
The APNU+AFC went so far in demonizing us of the PPP/C that more than six months after our elections they cannot start pulling back, expending valuable money and time, and delaying the re-establishment of some degree of political accord.
PU/NICIL has been at the centre of APNU+AFC demonizing because it was able to complete the Marriott Hotel, despite their efforts to stop it midway. The PU (which we set up formally), NICIL (National Industrial and Commercial Investments Limited, set up by the PNC after they retreated from state ownership of more than 80% of the economic activity in Guyana) and the later merged PU/NICIL have been important elements in our integrated approach to the overall growth and development of people and country, and we grew noticeably. This is not the forum but now may well be the time to talk extensively about the bringing of people and country from where we were in October 1992 to where we were in May 2015.
Managing the ongoing refashioning of the bauxite sector and communities within the commitments of the outgoing PNC to the international bodies, gave rise up to about 2006, to a large part of the work of PU, NICIL and later PU/NICIL as we sought to turn people and assets no longer required by the core, to new activities and to attract new international bauxite and other companies to those communities. Other sectors for which I was responsible – other mining, electricity, energy, telecommunications – also gave rise to much work for PU/NICIL. So, I was much involved with PU/NICIL. In time I urged the merger of PU and NICIL. It was a natural and sensible thing to do, to utilize remnant and other available state assets to facilitate and enable new investments, particularly those that bring increased diversification in our economy.
PU/NICIL’s focus was directed not just on the large and foreign but also on the smaller and local. Take for example the tourism and hospitality sector. We gave the go-ahead to direct negotiation for purchase of adjacent property so that Duke Lodge could expand. There was some notice and comments about that, but we had PU/NICIL do similarly for the elegant expansion of Herdmanston.
I was Chairman of the Board of PU/NICIL for a period, thus, I am obliged to and I can speak up for PU/NICIL and shoulder what we the politicians, not the officers, should.
What should the Guyanese public make of the claimed unearthing of billions of dollars in the accounts of PU/NICIL and its subsidiaries, and of other autonomous and semi-autonomous bodies now being sent to the Consolidated Fund (CF)? First, those accounts were not unknown, not hidden, not secret, not unlawful. Second, the fact that there are billions in these accounts should raise questions about whether there was any stealing at all. Third, it is an achievement of note that there are surplus funds in bodies which before drew from the CF. Fourth, the records would show that without fanfare, billions of dollars had been transferred steadily, from time to time over the years to the CF from these accounts including the accounts of PU/NICIL.
And yes, particularly in the earlier years we needed to and did use such accounts for what is known internationally as ‘off-budget financing’. In our first years, Guyana’s economic position was so bad and the international strictures on various budget ratios so tight, we had to have the GGMC fund maintenance of the air corps of our GDF, as prepayments for servicing greater monitoring of mining across our hinterland. Again, with a good reason in hand I had the GGMC fund the extension of the MMC minibus-grade trail into Mahdia, transforming the outlook and prospects for that community. Whatever the wrongdoing in such actions, I and members of the cabinet then, are ready and willing to pay the price.
Having now transferred these billions of dollars to the CF what can we expect? The danger is that it would be used to raise recurring current expenditure to unsustainable (at this time) levels, putting us at risk of again getting on a path to a downward inflationary spiral such as we got on soon after Independence and only very painfully began working ourselves out of in the late 1980s. Additionally, more immediately, the stated intention to withdraw all these billions in accounts in the banks would reduce the ability of the banks to lend and further constrain our economy.
We of the PPP/C, citizens of Guyana, no more so or less so than others, hope that those dangers would be avoided. No one would want a return to the 1970s and 1980s.
Time will tell.
Yours faithfully,
Samuel A A Hinds
