Our major parties must lose for Guyana to win

Feb 05, 2020 Letters

---

DEAR EDITOR,

I have decided to continue my advisory role for Guyanese to foster better outcomes in our national welfare. As we digest the news of the estimated US$55 billion signed away by the coalition administration to Exxon, we should also reflect that, as I have been saying recently, we are indeed a rich, wealthy people. It is also worthy to note that US$55 billion just relates to one contract alone. This money can only be recovered through renegotiating the contract. In light of the upcoming elections, given our own recent experience with the coalition administration with Exxon and Tullow, we have ample time to consider our alternatives. One of the things we are reminded of is that Trotman long ago cleared himself of the responsibility for his signature on the Exxon Contract by publicly declaring that he was ‘instructed’ to sign the contract. He [further] assured that the quintet (Ministers of Natural Resources, Foreign Affairs, Business, Finance and Public Infrastructure) was formed by President David Granger to review matters relevant to the oil and gas industry. (https://dpi.gov.gy/min-trotman-was-duly-advised/) In the absence of Trotman saying exactly who ‘instructed’ him to sign the Exxon contract, since Granger had put together the group of individuals to administer the Exxon contract, it would be very unlikely that Harmon or any other individual might have had the authority to ‘duly advise and duly instruct’ Trotman on the signing of the contract. Even if this was so however, David Granger must therefore take full responsibility for this US$55 billion give-away.
This nonsense about honesty, security and whatever is absolute rubbish, and we know it.
On the score of the PNC, David Granger and our oil, traditional supporters have ample guidance to judge Granger’s performance by asking themselves if Burnham, for all his faults, would have stooped so low as to engage in a virtual give-away of our oil wealth and other natural resources, as is currently been done. This is just one of the many aspects of betrayal endured. That we have the PPP vying for government in its current form is another.
The thousands of voters fed up with our two major parties will from their experience of preparing for elections this time around, learn that politics cannot be left to our friends, family or others, but involves us all actively paying attention and educating ourselves regarding the policies and programmes of political parties, and helping to build those which represent citizens’ welfare and properly articulate a vision for all Guyanese. As frustrated as we are with our major political parties, we have the opportunity to protest their administration by voting to change them at polls. As the Coalition administration has demonstrated, our governments have very easily been giving away our national wealth to foreign companies. The reason Guyanese public and private sector workers are essentially forced to survive on depressed wages and salaries, why retirees and elderly persons cannot get an adequate pension to enjoy their latter days is in fact because, as we have seen with Exxon, that our governments have been taking money that is supposed to fund national development which would promote higher salaries and afford more than adequate pensions, and giving it away to unscrupulous companies like Exxon, Bai Shan Lin and others. This is not to mention the reported entrenched corruption.
A sad reality of our population is that even as approximately 131,000 adults are in poverty, many are also unemployed, and still many are not familiar with discussions in our national newspapers (maximum newspaper circulation for each of the dailies is around fifty, on the internet, less than one hundred and forty thousand per media site, a lot of which is generated from abroad) much of which does not reach public television. Many are also locked out of traditional social media as a consequence of their financial conditions. It is hoped that this article reaches them also, because they in particular are the ones upon whom the outcome of our national elections hang.
Our upcoming elections, unless we commit to voting for a third party, gives us the opportunity to decide who we want to give away our money, since Irfaan and Jagdeo have also themselves committed to leaving the Exxon contract intact. The major parties are prone to beat their chests and promise their supporters. This is fine, and supporters should be wary of such claims nonetheless. Regarding the outcome of the March 02 elections however, we should consider that the AFC had won seven seats, with just over thirty-three thousand votes in 2011, and that the AFC/APNU alliance had realized a victory with only around 4,700 votes. If we therefore consider the residual strength of the AFC going into the 2020 elections, the outcome becomes a bit clearer. But even as we recognize that many of us might be wasting our vote on a losing party, now is the time to think about how to cast our ballot to recover the US$55 billion given away.
Our elections have occasionally been marred by violence in the past. Guyanese, supporters of both major parties are urged to resist any calls by party officials to get involved in such activities. Party officials should themselves be reminded that it is a criminal offence to incite violence at any time, elections or otherwise. Political violence does not win elections. Sound ideas, good governance and leaders do. Supporters, the man-in-the-street, must understand and accept that they cannot hope or expect their respective parties to win if these parties have engineered their own defeat. For Guyana, Guyanese to win, our major political parties must lose.

Craig Sylvester,
Party Leader, Democratic National Congress

---

---