Dear Editor,
I have taken notice of the headlines in KN of November 6, 2022, “Guyanese Still in the Dark—-: As another Foreign Company boasts of gold fever in Guyana.” A host of strong emotions and feelings are reflected in, and generated as intended, as we read the headlines, and article. The subject at issue is, as it has been for a century or more, the topic of development and “exploitation” of our “potential” natural resources and the actual distribution of the direct and indirect benefits. One can sense from this, and other current articles in our formal and social media, a number of intense contradictions amongst us, Guyanese, about those foreign companies and their shareholders; and at times some contradictions between us Guyanese, no doubt depending on our particular position and intent.
For our success in life and living, we need to be alert to, aware of and keep in focus evident contradictions and potential for conflicts; not just to dwell on them but to ascertain how true and accurate they are and to move on to resolve and reconcile them. I write this letter to present some helpful experience to aid understanding and improve the milieu for resolving and reconciling the contradictions between the many parties and stakeholders in the development and exploitation of our natural resources. I write this letter to temper the suspicions, the mixed feelings, the arguments that Guyana and Guyanese are being kept in the dark. Far from it. Intentions to grant, and the actual grants of any rights for exploring and prospecting are published and reported in our Official Gazette, stage by stage. Few persons have the cause and the time, at the time of publication to notice them. We tend to miss or ignore the first bell when it rings, we have no time.
Understandably, everyone gets excited and “never heard of it before” when something is discovered or reported as discovered. Everyone heard of the petroleum find of the consortium led by Exxon in mid-2015, but who took notice when about 1998 Exxon first obtained the very first Exploration License in the very deep, very far offshore, where no one had ventured before; and the five or so years of marking time as the boundary line at sea between us and Suriname was determined? In many ways, unless we are involved, we hardly ever take notice at the beginning. Exploration is a walk in the dark. In prospecting, you are looking in a hay stack for a needle that may or may not be there. From experience, only one in ten to one in a hundred such ventures find something sufficiently worthwhile. Further, many discoveries come after three or more significant efforts at exploring/prospecting in that location.
The knowledge obtained in previous “unsuccessful” prospecting/exploration provides a larger base upon which the next round of exploration/prospecting proceeds. Turning specifically to the places of gold mentioned in the article, Tassawini and Puruni have been known places of gold for more than a hundred years and the location Harpy, I would bet, would have been known by an earlier name. Most of us would recall that the most successful gold operation yet, at the Omai River in our Guyana, from about 1993 to 2005, began with construction initiated and led by CAMBIOR in about 1988. Many would recall the pictures of old equipment from the earlier not very successful attempts to profitably extract gold from that location – a German group in the 1890s and Anaconda in the 1930s. And one may wonder how well CAMBIOR really did – they collapsed and were bought over by IAMGOLD by about 2008.
Lots of risk-taking, capital, shares acquiring money must be raised for exploration and prospecting. This in many ways may be likened to money spent buying lottery tickets. Companies are allowed to “talk up” the good prospects of their location as long as they include the advisory that their presentations contain “a number of forward-looking statements,” that is, “hoping to win the jackpot,” statements. If you bear in mind that only one out of ten to a hundred “forward looking statements” come to something, you may understand that everyone is in a haze, no one is yet seeing clearly. It might be time to take notice and wonder about joining others in investing any savings you may have. You never know, you may hit the jackpot, and maybe not. Some may recall the On-Energy petroleum explorations, on-shore of the Corentyne coast. It was advertised to Guyanese; it looked very likely but it only added to our information base. It was said that a number of Guyanese had invested a total of about G$800 million in that venture.
Allow me to end saying one thing, which many of us Guyanese may dislike, but is true. We are still young and learning and questioning many of the arrangements that have become common place in exploration and prospecting circles (as I have questioned and learnt in my time). It is this, our learning situation that drives insistence on the strongest “stability clauses” (no changes to the Agreement unless both parties voluntarily and freely agree). Also, whilst we may all like it to be so, we wouldn’t get everything – we need to put ourselves in the other persons’ shoes. Towards the end of our negotiations with the utility from Saskatchewan for the privatization of our electric utility, about 1997, the Saskatchewan media and our Guyanese media seemed to be arm in arm. When the arrangements to settle the key remaining major breaking points were released, the Saskatchewan media seemed to be screaming to Saskatchewans “see what our people are giving away to those Guyanese” and our media seemed to be screaming to us, “See what our Guyanese leaders are giving away to those people from Saskatchewan.”
I found myself filled with the contradictory feelings of amusement and anger. Those negotiations had to be dropped. About two years later when we had to conclude an agreement with another core partner, many were then saying that the Saskatchewan arrangement was better! We have been learning. Yes, the difficult question always are how much to give? Where to draw the line? How are we to know what is reasonable? I have found that we have a good guide, when we think realistically and earnestly about:
(i) Throwing all foreign partners aside and doing it ourselves;
(ii) Who are the other potential partners who may give us a better deal; aware that we all go to the same schools and have learnt to do our sums the same way?
We have a job in learning to find our way in this world of seven and a half billion, fellow humans, in about 190 Foreign Countries. There are lots of people out there who are looking to enrich themselves anyway they could, many innocent and not so innocent carpet baggers trying their hands; and there are I think many more with whom we could partner for our mutual benefit.
Sincerely,
Samuel A.A. Hinds
Ambassador of Guyana to the
United States of
America and the Organization of
American States
