Latest update February 11th, 2025 2:15 PM
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Award of oil blocks and public service
Dear Editor,
Interests in oil blocks should be awarded in ways that maximise the value to the resource owner, that is to the country and its people.
Countries maximise their resource wealth by directly hiring competent and reputable contractors to help develop their resources.
Conversely, countries degrade their resource wealth by hiring unknown
contractors who have no track record producing 100,000’s of barrels of
oil in applicable environments and who do not have billions of US$ in
assets.
It is common in the oil industry around the world, especially in countries with weak institutions and a high prevalence of corruption, for government officials to act in ways which do not maximise the
resource wealth to the country, and instead they act in ways which
enrich themselves and their cohorts in the private sector.
Any action by a government official, which does not maximise the benefit
to the country from its resource wealth, will be seen as a serious dereliction of duty on the part of the government official, and likely will require prosecution and redress to rebalance the distribution of the resource wealth.
Government officials in Guyana awarded numerous blocks to companies, and
sometimes to individuals, who had zero track record producing oil and
who had no assets. Hence government officials in Guyana may have acted
so as to degrade the resource wealth of the country, and instead maximise the returns to the companies. Therefore, these government officials in Guyana were likely in dereliction of their duties and were likely out of compliance with their responsibilities as public
servants. For there to be justice for the country and the people, and
for wrongs to be corrected, officials must be prosecuted and applicable
awards of oil blocks must be rescinded. Subsequent officials who have
not addressed these issues may themselves be seen as responsible.
Yours faithfully,
Jan Mangal
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