Dear Editor,
Guyanese have this old saying: ‘mouth open, story jump out.’ This is exactly what happened with a fine Guyanese brother, scholar, and recently created auditor by the name of Professor Floyd Haynes. There I was knowing my place and going about my business when I passed the caption “Audit of Exxon’s US$9B+ costs underway” (SN August 14). I actually passed by and then turned back, for I sensed that some Guyanese truths might lurk.
I am delighted to share that the professor did not disappoint. “The idea that Exxon has been overbilling and overcharging, is grossly misleading and it is not fair to mislead the public.” Ahem, thanks Professor Haynes for that peculiar piece of auditing wisdom, which I recommend should be the reaction of all Guyanese. I really hope that this sudden, overnight discovery of a fine Guyanese auditor possessing the necessary forensic skills that were so glaringly missing is jesting.
For auditors must keep an open mind, if not a critical one, and all the while harbouring a healthy level of skepticism. Editor, I believe that it would have been more constructive if Professor Haynes and his team of audit experts went about their business with not just the appearance of no leaning in any direction (for or against Exxon), but also actually staying silent about their real audit objectives, whatever those may have been. The professor had a moment of rare frankness in showing his hand as to where he truly stands, and how he plans on going about this most sensitive of audits. Though Exxon is not entitled to any benefit of the doubt (it has not so earned, given its Guyanese predations), it is due a clean and professional audit by genuinely capable people.
By the same standard, the Guyanese people are due an audit saturated with value and the fullest authenticity possible. This gives them justice for their money (and trust) in Professor Haynes’s team with the audit exercise now underway. What is now obvious is that the professor turned banker transformed into auditor has made clear where he stands, in that overbilling and overcharging are sensational exaggerations. It was a well-known and respected Guyanese-based auditor (himself a many hatted fellow) who took a look at some half a billion in bills submitted by Exxon for an earlier offshore oil project and he had difficulty with about US$90M of that total, which was close to 20% of the company’s costs handed to Guyana for payment.
I recall that the veteran domestic auditor also spoke less than glowingly about adherence to international accounting presentation standards in the work Exxon delivered to Guyana. Exxon has progressed from bad to unbelievable, but here we are with this profound declaration, almost a Delphic oracle, from Professor Haynes about what is misleading, and what was unsaid, but may also be a done deal. That is, this farce of an audit may qualify to be either fine, folly, or a new strain of fraud itself wreaked upon the Guyanese people. I know where I stand.
It should be noted I said nothing about that joke of timelines set, which they tell the gullible is not written in stone. As my fellow Americans would say, go tell all this bull to the Marines.
Sincerely,
GHK Lall
