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The VP – a master builder (of sorts)

Feb 07, 2022 Editorial

Kaieteur News – Guyana’s all-powerful Vice President is a study in contrasts. When he deals with citizens of this country who stand up to him and question him, he is a ferocious pit bull. But when he has to represent Guyanese and deal with the slick and take-no-nonsense powers of Exxon, he is the picture of a pussycat in its tamest rendition.

This is what came to light in one of his most recent exploits with this oil wealth with which Guyana has been blessed (or cursed, depending on the point of view), and as we presented in our Sunday edition, “Pussyfooting continues… Jagdeo shifts responsibility for full coverage insurance from Exxon to EPA” -KN February 6).

Clearly, this grand Vice President of ours fancies himself to be a master builder. The question is what does he think he is building? It is nothing other than smoke and mirrors where this vital issue of full insurance coverage for Guyana is concerned since nothing could be more imperiling to present and future generations of this country. Also, the accumulation of our current paltry oil take from production could not absorb should a catastrophic oil spill occur, and we do not have full coverage insurance firmly in place to protect us. While the Vice President fiddles and shifts, the issue becomes more sharply engraved in the consciousness of worried citizens, and it is not going away, as he would like. This is because we at this paper will not let the issue to fade away into the darkness and distance of the back burner or the irrelevance of a second-rate consideration. The Vice President would like nothing better than that, but we caution him, remind him, that we are unable to accommodate him on this one, or any similar such situation that endangers this nation.

It could be on the matter of money, where we feel we are being robbed blind by cheating partners, or expenses bulked up in billions without reason or pursuant to accepted standards by Exxon, or on this dangerous, and let’s face it, existential issue of full coverage insurance. One bad oil spill and all the returns from that oil would be going away from us, as in not being in our hands and for our benefit, because it has been swallowed up by liabilities.

Yet the Vice President splits hairs and shifts with the wind when it suits him. First, it was that he was waiting for some kind of “acknowledgement” from the people at the Exxon parent company. We remind him that those billions of barrels of oil are ours and that Exxon needs them more than we do, so that its bottom line is healthy and it can keep its shareholders happy. Therefore, he (the Vice President) does not have to resort to these dodges, these walking around on eggshells exercises that he employs to evade the heavier sides of the responsibilities that he rushed to monopolise when his party took over the reins of power.

He craved the job of oil merchant and oil monopolist. He must answer the bell, he must face the music, he must deliver. It will do him no good, give him no breathing room to catch himself, when he seeks to duck the mantle that he has seized for himself, and lateral this full coverage insurance matter to the EPA. The EPA has been reduced to wretched impotency, and it is apparent that this is due to the great handiwork of the Vice President himself, who now saddles it with this unwanted burden that it cannot carry. It cannot cope, it is not capable. It is just not up to such a demanding task, and the Vice president knows it.

So, when the Vice President says that “This is an ongoing discussion and it is done mainly by the EPA, he is blowing smoke at Guyanese. If he couldn’t get the job done, the EPA will fare worse. If he is running away from the fight for full insurance coverage, the EPA will do no better than being floored repeatedly, and with its own blood running all over its sorry face, while leaving us vulnerable.

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