Dear Editor,
• If our division was not race it would probably be religion or class or the hue of skin within a race or some other quotient. We humans have a propensity to create/embrace unnecessary barriers that hinder our progress.
• Money is such an attraction to our senses; we tend to see it as a cure-all, thus the relentless drive to acquire more relative to what our neighbour or our competitor has; even though what we have is often enough to allow us a comfortable life. Seneca claimed the gap between what we have, and the wealth of our neighbour is often used to measure our poverty.
• Our political parties are not unique, far from that, they practice and promote what in the main, takes place globally; where the party comes first and is always right, the political party invariably represents a cult where the leader is an earthly god.
• ExxonMobil/Exxon’s Esso/ Guyana has an immeasurable amount of oil that will exceed 10 billion barrels by 2021; comprising of the lightest sweetest crude oil on the planet; yet we are still sidelining and quibbling over current increases and decreases in economic industry indicators; instead of fixing an abominable contract.
• With a population of less than 800,000, we likely have the richest population based on the value of oil discovered in Guyana’s offshore, yet we are unable to see the big picture, and bury ourselves, by verbally and legislatively attacking each other.
• It is probable that we have more Guyanese living outside Guyana than in Guyana; and most of the Guyanese abroad are fearful to visit Guyana because of the robberies, killings, and criminalized environment in Guyana; with the Chinese being the most targeted group.
• What would you choose to be: a rich servant or a poor master?
• Nine congressmen from the richest country in the world visited Guyana and Guyanese have no idea why…I doubt whether the congressmen were invited… the spoils of conquest.
• On the horizon we have our national elections, set for 2020, our efforts would be better spent renegotiating royalties to some normalcy, for the ever-increasing amount of oil being discovered in Guyana’s offshore.
• Hindsight: with more than 10 billion barrels of known oil in Guyana’s offshore; would our representatives have accepted Exxon’s Esso’s 2%?
• Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) instead of The Audit Office of Guyana has been identified as the Agency to Audit Exxon’s Esso outrageous pre-contract costs, these costs supposedly inflicted from the Production Sharing Agreement between the Government of Guyana and Exxon’s Esso, Hess and China National Offshore Oil Corporation represented by Nexen. Why not use the same absurdity and justify that GRA audit all Public Agencies, maybe the ridiculousness can be extended to GRA auditing large public and private corporations…
• Political leadership and unity are so critical, in a country where the public sector is the main driver of the economy, especially where our private institutions having little influence to bring about any meaningful change.
• Many have said the darkest hour is the one before dawn; Rodney laid the groundings for courage as an example for all Guyanese; instead we have politicians and businessmen flaunting their complicity in glorifying the despotic 2% contract, with a so called 50/50 profit sharing and other mirrors and shiny ornaments that are fungible and paltry.
• Advice to Ministers of Business, Education and Social Protection; take the Mark Twain position: “If you have nothing to say, say nothing”.
• It strikes me that Exxon knew before the first oil find was announced that Guyana’s offshore had in excess of 10 billion barrels of recoverable oil.
• All the oil discoveries, from Liza to Hammerhead, are pronouncements from ExxonMobil, and the Guyanese that are the owners of the oil resource, have no input on the find, location, or quantity…
• Guyana, Guyana, this great land of ours has…
Rewording some observations from Obama’s eulogy at McCain’s funeral service; Obama noted that some principles transcend politics, some values transcend party; and political expediency and party orthodoxy should not replace the National Good for Guyana.
There are some things worth risking everything for; with great blessings comes great responsibility. Let us find the National Courage to renegotiate this repressive Production Sharing Agreement with Exxon’s Esso.
Yours faithfully,
Nigel Hinds
