Gas-to-shore, a project mystery or more PPP/C sorcery?

Aug 22, 2022 Editorial

Kaieteur News – What does this Government know about the US$1.3B gas-to-shore (GTE) project? What does the man in charge of the nation’s crucial oil and gas business know about this costly GTE project? Does Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo really know as much as he is making a big show of knowing, when he doesn’t appear to know much about the substance of this GTE project? Why has he set his heart on bringing it into existence, with so many unknowns and so many unanswered questions?

The Vice President held a three-hour long press conference last Friday, and by his own words manifested that he himself is in the beginner’s stage of his highly touted GTE baby. When pressed on the existence of insurance coverage for the pipeline aspect of the GTE project, this is what the Vice President had to offer the Guyanese taxpayer: “We are now procuring material…We are now mapping the route. We are still mapping the route. We are still completing the environmental studies.” And, of note, the Vice President also said this: “It’s reasonable. It’s commonsense. You can’t not know the cost of the total pipeline as yet, and seek to insure it. You understand.”

Indeed, we fully understand what the Vice President is saying, but there are some things that he said that are not so reasonable, and not what pass for commonsense. We use his own standards about full knowledge, proper sequencing, and timing, and it is clear that there is much that he himself and the PPP/C Government do not know at this stage about this most expensive GTE project. By his own words, the PPP/C Government does not know the route (as finally mapped). The Government does not know what the environmental study is going to say, or at what stage it is currently. The Government does not know the amount of pipeline that would be required. And we are all but certain that there are range of other things and components that both the Government and the Vice President do not know, or have the fullest grasp of at this time, including the crucial final cost of this GTE project.

Yet this nation’s Vice President of Oil (in reality its Oil President) is barrelling ahead with the project, and dragging along, willingly or unwilling, both his captive Government and the rest of the nation along for the ride. It could prove to be the most dangerous and damaging of rides. To repeat our longstanding position, we are interested like every other Guyanese in the exciting prospects of much cheaper and far more reliable supply of electricity for our homes and businesses. We welcome such a development, but only if it makes sense, and is backed up by independent expert studies. This has also been the longstanding position of this paper, and it is one from which we have not deviated by a millimetre, or for one second.

Again, we find it fit to use the Vice President’s own words from his Friday press conference: it is because it is reasonable. It is reasonable because the Vice President, when he was President, was the spearhead for what has turned out to be costly and heavy white elephants in Berbice and elsewhere. This nation has been burnt repeatedly by the suspect project selection and decision-making of Vice President Jagdeo (when President), and we don’t have the stomach to be a part of such again.

Focusing on the GTE project alone, it would have helped all Guyana immensely, if the Government and Vice President Jagdeo had come with a project with a full slate of information. As examples, what does a credible feasibility study say, and share it. Also, what are some of the variables (route, pipeline type and quantum, environmental study results, genuine consultation reception, final cost, and such). Most, if not all of these components are either mysteries or state secrets purposely withheld from the people who, ultimately, have to pay for the project. To complete Vice President Jagdeo’s house example, rarely is a house started unless the cost and whether it is viable for purposes intended have been conclusively answered. Regrettably, it has not been so, but we are still racing ahead, regardless.