Dear Editor,
There will be more oil finds. There will be more signing of contracts. There will be more problems, and it is not necessary to repeat the US$55 billion Guyana will lose over the next forty years. Every Guyanese is aware of this sad news but we are not sure what impact it has had on them. Sooner or later this news will sink in. In the meantime, the caretaker APNU+AFC carries on as business as usual: no flinching, no budging, and no comment. The citizenry has become accustomed to this forked style of government. However, the citizenry, at least fifty percent, must have reached a point where some questions have penetrated the inner sanctum of their minds. How much of the regime’s recklessness coupled with incompetence can they take?
To answer this question for them, as Forbes Burnham once said, would be an imposition on their intelligence. They know what to do and they will exercise that on Election Day. Burnham’s remark was, of course, a cover to the repeated rigging of the general elections. The crux of the matter is this: how much are you, the voters, willing to retain this regime in power for another five years which has signed away your future, your children’s future to foreign multinational corporations?
Are you willing to retain the same people who negotiated, the same people who signed and the same people who refused to inform you about the content of the contract of the only natural resources you have ever owned naturally, oil and gas? There is no other commonality Guyanese share than the ownership of oil and gas, and yet, it was practically given away by a group of individuals belonging to one political party. The coalition is a one party system, and rest of the so-called parties is an addendum to the PNCR. I am inclined to say that the damage done by signing that one-sided contract is irreparable and unthinkable. It can only get worse from here. I would rather allow anyone else to manage Guyana’s oil and gas than the current individuals who will be managing it in the future, if retained in power, a growing distant possibility. Frankly, I would rather see these individuals as far away as possible from anything that sounds and smells like oil and gas.
Yours faithfully,
Lomarsh Roopnarine
