Nationalize the oil blocks!

Nov 12, 2020 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

Kaieteur News – The oil companies are taking Guyana for a royal ride. By the time they are finished with us,
our tyres will be worn and our tubes will be punctured.
All of this has happened because we have two main political parties which have drifted
away from the foundational left-wing policies of their founder leaders.
Neither Cheddi Jagan nor Forbes Burnham would have allowed the country’s oil wealth to
have been hijacked by the oil companies and by individuals who are acting as front men for political charlatans.
It is useless calling or expecting either the PPP/C or the PNC/R to do anything to restore the stolen oil blocks. It is even more useless asking for them to negotiate a better deal. Both of
these political parties have betrayed the country and both deserve to be snubbed by the
people of Guyana.
The people of Guyana are the real losers because of the sell-out of the oil assets of the country to the two main political parties.
Neither side seems willing to correct what each other did in relation to oil. But both sides
seemed willing to go after the deals which each had made with investors. It does not take
much thinking to understand why both of these political parties are on the same page when it comes to these oil deals.
The people of Guyana will have to demand that the oil blocks be returned to the country.
They have to insist that this be done or else they will not be voting in any elections, local,
general or regional.
There have been suggestions made that Cabinet did not see the oil agreement until after it was signed. The PPP/C government ought to now be in possession of the Cabinet records.
Has anyone asked why they are not making public the date on which Cabinet would have
seen the oil agreements?
The reason why is because the PPP/C does not want the truth to be known because
ExxonMobil has an interest in the very oil blocks – Canje and Kaieteur – which the PPP/C
handed out without so much as a signing bonus.
Exxon now has a stake in those oil blocks and because of this, the PPP/C does not wish to do
anything which will displease Exxon.
The people of Guyana should not have had to work another day in their life.
They should have all been able to stay home and receive a million-dollar cheque each month in the port.
Instead of this, they are scrambling all over each other for a pitiful G$25,000 one-off payoff for COVID-19.
We should not have been borrowing any sums to finance housing. If Guyana had gotten a
reasonable deal, the government would have been able to build a house with a swimming
pool for everyone.
This can still happen but not under either the PPP/C or the PNC/R or even what remains of
the AFC. These three parties and even most of the new parties are all neo-liberal in their orientation and would therefore subscribe to the sanctity of contracts – which in
reality means that ExxonMobil gets away with the deal it made with the country.
There is only one solution and that is for the oil blocks to be nationalized. For this to happen, a left-wing socialist party consisting of the workers would have to be formed immediately.
That party would have the responsibility of seizing possession of the oil blocks and returning it to Guyanese.
No non-liberal political party is going to do that. Only a socialist party can do that.
The PPP/C is supposed to be a left-wing party but it is practising right-wing politics.
The PPP/C is a discredited political party. It has been turned into an appendage of the
business class who control it through their puppets in the leadership of the PPP. The PPP/C
therefore cannot be expected to lead the process of nationalizing the oil blocks.
Guyana’s only hope rests in ensuring that the Canje and Kaieteur Blocks are returned to
Guyana. Unless that happens, ExxonMobil and company are going to end up controlling all of Guyana’s oil. And with the deal which they signed that will mean that the average citizen
would have nothing to get.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper.)

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