Granger still to issue decree to override contract confidentiality

Jan 16, 2020 News

Even though all of the contracts for the petroleum sector have been made public, agreements for other extractive industries like gold, bauxite and forestry, continue to remain hidden from public scrutiny.

President David Granger

For more than 20 years, the respective administrations have been saying that “confidentiality clauses” contained within the agreements stymie their efforts to release same. Also, confidentiality clauses within the nation’s laws have been cited by the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) as the key reason why it has not been able to release the tax information for gold, bauxite and forestry companies to the local Chapter of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (GY-EITI).
But in spite of the reasoning provided by GRA and the nation’s politicians, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) believes this state of affairs needs to be changed. In one of its most recent reports, the IMF premised its call for change on the fact that Guyana was admitted as an EITI candidate country in 2017, and is therefore expected to comply with its principles. EITI requires its members to disclosure all contracts as well as tax information for the purposes of ensuring that the government is truthful about what it says it receives from the companies in the extractive sector.
It noted in this regard, that President David Granger was supposed to issue an authorization to allow GY-EITI access to the tax information. But to its knowledge, the IMF said that this issue is yet to be resolved.
Further to this, the IMF’s Fiscal Transparency Code (FTC), which is revered as the international standard for disclosure of information about public finances, notes that Governments should publish or disclose project-specific contracts, licenses and agreements.
In its updated policy paper, the Fund said, “…There should be no legal impediments to publication of resource contracts, which do not typically contain commercially sensitive information. Where such impediments do exist (e.g., clauses requiring confidentiality of agreements themselves) an effort should be made to remove these by mutual agreement among the parties.”
GUYANA/ EITI HISTORY
EITI is an international body that was established in 2003 with the aim of making it harder for governments and companies to hide the truth about the proceeds garnered from the extractive industries.
The companies in the extractive sector report on what they are paying the government, and the government reports separately on what it received from the companies in the sector.
A report is then prepared by a Multi-Stakeholder Group. The document, among other things, will highlight whether the data collected from the two add up, or if there is an irregularity.
Guyana has prepared one report thus far. Preparation for the second is underway.