A most unwarranted attack against the media

Aug 20, 2014 Editorial, Features / Columnists

The government is the elected representative of the people. It is there to pursue the interests of the people and these include creating conditions that would make the people contented. Those conditions would include social services, jobs and protection for the people by way of established institutions such as the police and supporting services.
Running a country also includes monitoring its assets for the creation of wealth, which in turn would create better living conditions for the people. Indeed, the Guyana Government is not creating the wheel; it has the examples of numerous other countries, some of which were at the same stage of development as Guyana a few short years ago, but which have gone so far ahead that none of us alive would see such level of development in the years to come.
One of the most talked about countries is Singapore, which unlike Guyana, has no natural resources and a population fifty times larger than Guyana’s. Today that country is a first world country, enjoying a level of development that is inconsistent with Guyana’s. Our country, despite our best efforts over the past 25 years, remains the second poorest country in the western hemisphere.
But this rating needs not be the case. Like Singapore, Guyana sees the need to attract direct foreign investment. Unlike Singapore, Guyana has not applied conditions to the foreign investors that would help the people of Guyana.
For example, investors were compelled by law to employ Singaporeans at every level of the investment and to train the Singaporeans so employed. The investors never balked because they knew what was at stake. They saw their profits and the cost of extracting those profits were considered favourable.
The Guyana Government has been stumbling from pillar to post when it comes to foreign investors, to the extent that the government has now resigned itself to accepting the terms and conditions laid down by the foreigners.
One glaring example was found during the construction of the Marriott Hotel. The Chinese contractor had developed a method of erecting tall buildings without driving piles. Most Guyanese engineers had never been exposed to this technique. Instead of the government insisting that locals be hired among the foreign contracting staff, the Guyana Government claimed that the locals did not have the work ethic of the Chinese.
This is poppycock. The very Guyanese opened up the interior so that foreigners can now come in and extract as much gold and diamond as they could. The very Guyanese went to remote places, braving hardships just to make Guyana develop.
In any case, even Guyanese labourers were never employed on the Marriott project. It is the same with the airport expansion project, except for the fact that the protest at the Marriott development has caused the Chinese contractors to pledge to hire some Guyanese at the lowest level of the project.
Bai Shan Lin, with its investment in the forestry sector, is using local loggers simply because some of the concessions being exploited are held by Guyanese. Sadly, the government holds the view that even this is a good thing, because the Chinese are putting money into the pockets of the local concession holders.
We are certain that the local concession holders had no say in what they were being paid. To add to the obvious exploitation of the low level Guyanese labour, we now hear of loggers who work but are not being paid. And despite complaints, the government has done nothing.
Instead, when the media highlight the obvious wrongs and the rape of the country, the government attacks the media. Just the other day the government encouraged thugs to attack those media houses that have been critical of the exploitative nature of the Chinese investor.
Simple Guyanese who contend to be leaders in the manufacturing sector, before recognizing that there is much more to be had from the sector without the addition of another acre, are content to accept the proverbial crumbs that fall from the Chinese investors.
The government itself has made no bones about abusing the media for highlighting the nature of the exploitation. This could only be described as a case of self interest.

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A most unwarranted attack against the media

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