Dear Editor,
I commend attorney and Chartered Accountant, Chris Ram, for his well-researched and revealing piece titled “Exxon has engaged in dodgy accounting going all the way back to Shell transaction” (SN, September 27, 2023). It is a masterpiece of an effort, which emphasizes the kind of partner that Exxon is. When juxtaposed to other more known and suspect activities of this company, I interpret that Guyana lives with a partnership that is a conspiracy between governments of Guyana and America’s Exxon to plunder the wealth of present and future generations of Guyanese. I emphasize so that this registers deeply: this is a partnership that was always an Exxon conspiracy to trick Guyanese out of their inheritance, with one government after another, none excluded. Going all the way back to Cleveland, Indiana and Titusville, Pennsylvania and John D. Rockefeller, I have always harboured hard thoughts about the teetotaler and penny pincher Rockefeller, and his sidekick, Henry D. Flagler. Flagler had a sign on his desk that said this: “do unto others as they would do to you – but do it first.”
It is the story of what the world knows today as Exxon, the cutthroat, brass knuckled, kneecapping oil entity that strides on horseback over Guyana. This is about more than robber barons; it is about how Exxon has terribly wronged the Guyanese people. It is 1999 and Exxon is priming itself for action in Guyana. Mr. Ram’s revelations on what drives this country’s leading lights, and what accrued then to Exxon’s benefit, and do so even more today. The man that was Minister of Finance in 1999 was none other than Mr. (now Dr.) Bharrat Jagdeo. His advice to President Janet Jagan, and his intimate role in oil and with Exxon since that time has been integral and pivotal to the first formal contractual relationship. Out of that twisted beginning comes some of the deficits of nowadays. It should not surprise any Guyanese, therefore, about how their Chief Oil Champion is more of a totally committed champion for Exxon than for his own.
As for Exxon, I think that the company and most of its people here are beyond shame, beyond what is personally embarrassing. In its books and records, relative to transactions with Shell, Exxon has been a tricky partner. In its dealings with the APNU Coalition Government in 2016, Exxon was prickly and slippery (refer to Mr. Newell Denison’s experience in Texas). The facts, as painstakingly laid out by Mr. Ram, are that Exxon has dealt with Guyana on its dirty and shabby terms. From the Farm out Agreement to the 2019 Bridging Deed to the US$460.2 million claimed as expenses versus US$368 million in its own records, Guyanese get the clearest picture to date of the partner (Exxon) that they have.
As Mr. Ram noted, there are some frauds that shriek at high volume. The reality that Guyanese now live with, when their oil patrimony is the issue is that their governments (PPP, PNC, APNU-AFC) have all been turned against them, do verbal jigs at Exxon’s behest. Mr. Ram outdid himself, the best seen.
Sincerely,
GHK Lall
