Dear Editor,
Bill is back and found himself reverting to type at the International Energy Conference jamboree. What a fest of oil money there at $500US a crack per ticket. The good, the bad and the not so good were all there seeking a drop out of the ocean. Serious people and plenty chancers.
First the good. Bill filmed the Marriot being built by the Chinese a decade ago. Glad to see they finished this job anyway. It could be anywhere in the world – Georgetown, Georgia or Guandong. That’s why the oilmen (and they are) like it so much. Smooth operators. The opening was a spectacle with MC Alex Graham – who gets three stars for his performance all day – introducing heads of state as though they were rock stars. The audience had to keep standing up and sitting down for each one. Bill felt like a cuckoo clock. The big boys themselves were a mixed bag. The two foreign presidents of Ghana and Suriname delivered plenty rhetorical flourish, which frankly, washed over me. Our home grown Pressie Irfaan always thinks he is on the stump. He delivers his speeches with gusto. Too much of it. Plenty hand gestures, plenty intonations and cadences. Do they get in the way of what he has to say? Informa-tion overload, too. Stats coming out of his ears. He almost needed Powerpoint. Kwame and Kit might tutor Irfaan in the way Margaret Thatcher was bashed into shape as a softer speaker. It worked for over a decade. The real star of the show was the Big Girl. Prime Minister Mia Mottley of Barbados. Beyond rhetoric. Thoughtful, personal, full of ideas and carefully delivered. A true orator. A mistress of the art among the journey statesmen. Well done Mia. On timing, who will have the courage to tell world leaders that fifteen minutes means fifteen, not thirty or thirty five. Bill was struggling with his autism on some of them. Short, sharp and sweet. Always best.
The Guymedia were out in force. Penned into a room from a very early hour. The Guypolice wanted to do security. By the way, Bill’s bag was not searched once in the whole day. They got a video feed from the main hall, complete with on-screen chat for remote speakers and some just mute, thanks to the NCN techno whizzes. Hmm. A lucky few were guided into the hall after signing a classroom register. Main Street came back to me. Then herded like cattle and put into two sets of seats for the written, pre-determined spots for cameras. Grow some cojones Guymedia. You are not sheep. Get out there and talk to real people and real leaders. (Pity the poor functionary who told Bill he was in the wrong seat next to his Wednesday Ramblings compadre. He went away with a big flea in his ear.).The Guymedia product all looks alike because the eccentrics and individualists that make good journalism don’t seem to want to break away from the pack. Real stories not formulaic pieces. Journalism 101.Hi ho. Highlight as ever in the Guymedia pen was feeding time. They got whole chicken legs, the paying delegates got pieces only. But full tums equals happy hacks. Bill was out and about flogging his new book, ’Oil Dorado; Guyana’s Black Gold.’ Third edition as you ask. Available at Guyana’s one go-to bookshop – Austin’s. The oilmen looked a bit askance at the title. Which company has the El Dorado oil field? Their booth city guaranteed a fly past apart from a visit to the Palm Court tent and a swift quarter with my old friend, Dr. Dookie.
To sum up – plenty of people, all in suits, mainly white, mainly men. Who were the two who had borrowed Arab gear to add diversity? Where from? Bill will be back there for Day Two and, as ever, his eyes open and pen in hand. Pip! Pip! (As they used to say)
Sincerely,
John ‘Bill Cotton/Reform’ Mair