A recent comment from Trinidad and Tobago’s (T&T) Prime Minister, Dr. Keith Rowley, on the status of the $US1 billion Dragon Deal between the twin-island Republic and Venezuela – an agreement under which T&T is supposed to develop the field estimated to have the capacity to produce approximately 150 million standard cubic feet of gas per day – has set political tongues wagging in Port-of-Spain regarding the lengthy delay in the commencement of the project. While both Port of Spain and Caracas are eyeing the start of the project as a precursor to the flow of new, lucrative revenue streams for both countries, Washington, with its sanctions against inflows of revenue from Venezuela’s energy sector into the country’s coffers still in effect, remains the proverbial fly in the ointment. While the US has green-lighted the recovery of gas from the Dragon Field it refuses to agree to have earnings from the project accrue to the Maduro administration.
With both Port of Spain and Caracas keen to draw down on the collectables from the Dragon Deal, a recent comment from Dr. Rowley reportedly to the effect that the Dragon Deal is ‘not dead’ would appear to have set tongues wagging in the T&T capital. A recent media report out of Port-of-Spain quotes the country’s former Energy Minister, Kevin Ramnarine, as saying that he supports Dr. Rowley’s perspective on the issue. The Stabroek has been reporting on the recent ‘comings and goings’ of Trinidad and Tobago’s current Energy Minister, Stuart Young, between Port-of-Spain and Caracas in an effort to secure a deal that will allow the project to go ahead. Caracas, reportedly, has declined to enter into an agreement that will not allow the proceeds from the gas recovery and refining project to accrue to the Maduro administration. “The Venezuelans have not accepted the terms laid down by the Americans. That is the long and short of it,” is what Dr. Rowley is quoted as saying recently during an appearance on a media programme recently.
In January this year, Washington had granted Port-of-Spain a special license to access the Dragon Gas Field in Venezuelan waters, though the ‘green light’ came with the telling caveat that the Maduro Administration could not be paid sums accruing to Venezuela for the deal. Trinidad and Tobago has spared no pains to engage an unyielding Washington in an effort to break the logjam though observers have made the point that intervention to cause the United States to ‘ease up’ on Caracas is, in foreign policy terms, above Port-of-Spain’s ‘pay grade.’ “We fought very hard to get the Americans to give us a carve out, which is to allow us to treat with PDVSA without breaking the sanctions.
We eventually won that battle but they put a condition on it which the Venezuelans, as of now, have not accepted,” Dr. Rowley was quoted as saying recently.
