Dear Editor,
Recently, Raphael Trotman who had the Government of Guyana’s ministerial responsibility for oil and gas during the time when the production sharing agreement with ExxonMobil, Hess, and CNOOC Nexen was re-negotiated and signed in 2016, is quoted in the Kaieteur News as saying that “I would be the first to admit that we should have done far better with the Exxon deal”.
This is an admission of the ultimate dereliction of duty and betrayal of Guyanese as his failure to get a “far better deal” will cost Guyanese billions of US dollars in revenue over the life of the projects. Let me explain. When any foreign oil or mining company wants to do their business in Guyana, they are required to sign agreements with the elected government of the day which acts as an agent on behalf of Guyanese. The elected government, as an agent, is required to act in the best interest of their principals (Guyanese) just as the directors representing the foreign companies are required to act in the best interest of their shareholders. Trotman, as the elected agent with responsibility for oil and gas was required to act in the best interest of Guyanese and in so doing was required to obtain the best possible deal for Guyanese. As a member of the elected government of Guyana, he had access to the best oil advisors and negotiators in the world but chose never to make use of them. In circumstances where he did not have the technical skills and experience and there was none available in Guyana, then the common sense and most obvious thing to do would have been to access the technical skills and experience from other parts of the world. When you feel pain and do not know what is wrong with your body the most obvious thing you do is to get advice and help from a doctor. Instead, he claims he relied on GGMC which has little to no technical expertise and experience in analysing the fiscal terms of an oil contract and negotiating with international oil companies let alone ExxonMobil. A percentage higher on particular fiscal measures can result in billions of dollars more in revenue for Guyana. The result was not that Trotman and the government “should have done far better with the Exxon deal” as he puts it, the real result is that we had one of the worst deals on record even for frontier countries. The fact that he entered into an agreement which was not in the best interest of Guyanese without doing the most common sense and obvious thing is the ultimate evidence of dereliction of duty and betrayal of Guyanese.
Yours faithfully,
Charles S Ramson
