President Irfaan Ali on Friday took a swipe at former president, Donald Ramotar who was reported to have said recently that he supported a renegotiating of Guyana’s much criticised Production Sharing Agreement with ExxonMobil.
The President was speaking at a Canada – Guyana Chamber of Commerce ceremony at the Marriott Hotel.
Ramotar had made the statement on a Globespan programme and was reported in the Kaieteur News on October 6th as saying that he would have renegotiated the contract with ExxonMobil. The newspaper quoted the former head of state as saying, “I am one of the persons who believes that the contract is a very bad contract…that deprives us of a lot of resources.”
This did not sit well with Ali who although he opted to not name Ramotar in his speech on Friday evening was clearly referring to him.
“You know everybody’s a specialist, whether you’re a former president or president, you’re whoever engineer, you’re the owner of Beharry group, everybody specialized now… I don’t spend my time on negative energy but it’s tiring to listen to some of these guys. You want us to change the contract, we have an existing contract, you think that is how it happens, that is how the world operates… That you can just walk in one day and decide I have this contract with you I’m changing it now, one lawsuit, this is not a plaything, and some of these guys were policymakers”, the President said.
Ali continued “So believe that you know it’s fanciful, it’s nice and exciting and very popular to say to change the contract that is why we’re very careful to say that we have to learn from the mistake and ensure that future contract does not make the same mistake.”
He said that given Guyana’s trajectory currently, investors and others are looking keenly at Guyana’s system.
“How will you build confidence in the system when you have the sophisticated investors looking on from the outside and say ‘who are these guys? You can’t depend on them”, he said.
The President added that that is why a recent IMF statement on Guyana “spoke so extensively about the reforms in the system. But everybody wants the front page now. Some of them had plenty years to change it but they want the front page now. The easiest way to get a front page is to say we support the contract to change.”
Ali then stressed that he would have also wished that it was a better contract.
“For God and heaven’s sake I wished it was a better contract, all of us wish that. We have been given a bad hand, we have to correct it now. We have to ensure the future hands are not that bad and we have better positions to call the shots”, he said.
He then urged, “You have to be realistic sometimes, not opportunistic.”
