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No clear management framework for oil & gas sector – Jagdeo
Opposition Leader Bharrat Jagdeo speaking with reporters yesterday
Opposition Leader Bharrat Jagdeo continues to highlight the lack of clear management of the oil and gas sector by the coalition administration.
Due to a power outage yesterday, Jagdeo spoke to reporters outside his state-funded office on Church Street.
“There is no clear management framework for the oil and gas sector,” Jagdeo pointed out.
On the establishment of the Sovereign Wealth Fund (SWF), Jagdeo urged that Government take cognizance of the Santiago Principles and a model similar to the principles on which the Norwegian model was developed.
He noted that the establishment of the fund is only one element of a management framework for the sector. Jagdeo reminded that there should be no ministerial involvement in the Petroleum Commission and that the remaining oil blocks should be subject to a competitive auction or kept for future generations.
He also noted that the government should complete the work on the Local Content framework.
“There have been no substantive moves in any of these directions,” Jagdeo outlined.
United States Ambassador to Guyana, Perry Holloway and the Finance Ministry, recently expressed differing opinions on the establishment of a SWF.
Holloway in an Op-ed said that as Guyana considers its future, it will not be enough simply to have a “rainy day fund” or even an investment fund, but to institute a revenue and investment framework that protects and effectively leverages wealth to transform the nation.
In response, the Finance Ministry said that it appreciates the spirit of the Op-ed, but wishes to make clear that the establishment of a SWF is “already designated priority for the Government
The Ministry also stressed that it is the government and people of Guyana who will decide on the tenets of the SWF.
Jagdeo noted that for months, Guyanese have witnessed the coalition government fail on its promise to deliver on the SWF, choosing to neglect work on a solid and apolitical management architecture for the sector.
The Opposition Leader noted that the views expressed by the Ambassador represent a mild urging of the government to pay attention to an important issue and take substantive action to establish SWF.
The Ambassador, according to Jagdeo, has repeated what Guyanese have already said, that the establishment of a SWF is quintessential to the future prosperity of the country.
“The Government’s response to the Ambassador can only be described as petulant ramblings. Minister Jordan, like his colleagues, continues to be impervious to suggestions, a disposition that does not bode well for our nation.”
“I feel that given the state of affairs, the response by Minister Jordan is reflective of how ‘thin-skinned’ the Coalition Government is, and exposes its reluctance to consider any view that is not its own,” Jagdeo noted.
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