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Trump you are right!

Jul 10, 2018 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

Donald Trump was right when he referred to certain countries as ‘shithole’ countries. He may not have specifically mentioned Guyana but he would find quite a few supporters who would agree with the view that Guyana is a ‘shithole’ country.
Guyana is reducing itself to a banana republic. It is positioning itself a backwater state, one that has allowed itself to be plundered and shortchanged by foreign capital.
Guyana can leave you mentally and physically drained. And this has nothing to do with the climate. Just reading reports of some of the daily occurrences is enough to want you to go and take a long nap.
Reading the reports of ExxonMobil appearing before the Parliamentary Sectoral Committee on Natural Resources leaves one depressed and dismayed at the level of representation of the Opposition. Presented with an opportunity to grill officials Exxon over the most controversial deal in the history of Guyana, the opposition parliamentarians reduced the sitting to high comedy, farce and lameness.
ExxonMobil’s Directors are going to have a good laugh about Guyana when they read the excerpts about that parliamentary sitting. Guyana faced embarrassment and ridicule over the innocuous questions which were posed. Even a high school student would have done better.
It makes one feel that it is time to give up in Guyana. If this is the quality of interrogation which Exxon is going to face after the controversy over the signing bonus and the generous terms, which it enjoyed, then it is perhaps best that people give up on Guyana because there can be little hope generated by the pedestrian representation at that sitting.
The Opposition was woefully unprepared for that sitting. They should have gotten young Ramson to prepare a few questions for them so as to save them from humiliation and embarrassment.
Can you imagine Exxon was asked why the company did not secure legislation for local content? It is a bizarre question. The responsibility for bringing legislation to the House rests with government and it is the House, which has to pass such legislation. It was therefore not surprising to read that one of the representatives from Exxon could not conceal his amusement at the question.
Why would Exxon be asked why it was not providing jobs for sugar workers? Exxon has no obligation to provide such jobs. Which sugar worker has the skills to work on an oil rig? Doing what?
Exxon is not running a charitable organization. It is running a business. Perhaps the better question would have been the level of positions, which Guyanese hold within the oil operations.
The lackluster performance of the Opposition at that sectoral committee sitting is in direct contradiction to the expectations created by the Leader of the Opposition. He had promised that the Opposition members would bring their ‘A’ game to the meeting. Clearly, he miscalculated and mispronounced.
He had also stated that he was far from satisfied that the Opposition was doing enough to be prepared to hold the government to account. The sitting turned that admission into an understatement.
Jagdeo promised strong representation. If what transpired at the sitting was strong representation, then Guyana is futureless. Guyana will become a laughing stock in the eyes of the shareholders of Exxon.
Jagdeo had also promised that specialist assessments would guide his people in their questions. This hardly seemed the case. The specialist assessments did not appear.
Yet, there was sufficient information in the public domain to have elicited a better performance. All the arguments against the Exxon contract were exhaustively ventilated in the media for more than one year now. Yet, these were placed on the backburner. The performance of the Opposition leads to the conclusion that problems of the Opposition are just as great as those of the government. Given all that has been written about the Exxon contradict the type of questions being asked would make any foreign company feel that Guyana is a pushover when it comes to negotiations.
What happened last week was not a missed opportunity. It was a mess, a mess that is typical of ‘shithole’ countries. Long live Donald Trump!

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