Taxes could be the death of us

Nov 25, 2022 Editorial

Kaieteur News – If we don’t look out with taxes, ExxonMobil is going to kill us. The American oil supergiant is already draining us to death with the taxes that it has squeezed out of us. Considering that billions of American dollars are involved, ExxonMobil is stabbing Guyana, slashing this country, bludgeoning its citizens, and condemning Guyanese to a slow death.

This newspaper in the span of a few consecutive days beginning on Tuesday, November 22^nd identified the general picture of oil companies and taxes, and then the specific case of ExxonMobil in what is does overseas, and what the same company does here, when taxes is the issue on the table. In some shape or form, taxes are involved directly or indirectly, and always to this country’s detriment.

On Tuesday, November 22^nd, we reported that UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, keeps calling for oil companies to be taxed. This is only fair and to be expected, given what the operations of oil companies do to the environment, the devastated state in which it is left, and considering the excess profits that they are now reaping due to high oil prices. SG Guterres has been the lead bellringer in holding oil companies’ feet to the fire, and calling for Governments to force them to share their massive profits, through payment of reasonable taxes. Unsurprisingly, oil companies riding the huge profits waves would not give up a single penny of profit to taxes, if they can help it. It is the usual incomparable greed, the unwise selfishness, that has come to be a standard feature of the practices of those controlling oil companies’ visions and strategies. Part of that strategy is, not a dime for taxes.

Also, on Tuesday, November 22^nd, one of ExxonMobil’s own shareholders, Great Britain’s advocacy group, Oxfam, filed a resolution calling out three American oil companies on their ‘secretive’ tax practices. ExxonMobil is one of the three oil companies named. Oxfam’s concern is that ExxonMobil’s lack of transparency on taxes could jeopardize the interests of others. No less important is Oxfam position that ExxonMobil’s tax practices are inherently unfair because they hurt those oil producing countries where the company operates, and which are in dire need of the most revenues they can get from their oil asset. While ExxonMobil is content to be ‘secretive’ with taxes, poor countries are left in the dark as to how they are possibly cheated, and which extends their seasons of grinding poverty. This paints a grim picture for Guyana, where taxes are concerned, with ExxonMobil in the local picture.

On Wednesday, November 23^rd, another oversight group, the Financial Accountability and Corporate Transparency (FACT) Coalition, rapped ExxonMobil for falling behind in the filing of their Global reporting Initiative standard tax reports. Any lapse on ExxonMobil’s part with tax reporting attracts our attention, since it doesn’t smell right, and tells us that there is the likelihood of tricks and skullduggery at work. The reports that ExxonMobil fail to file would highlight two areas of keen interest for Guyana. The first is for us to get a clear picture of what ExxonMobil may (or may not) be doing relative to profit shifting, which means tax avoidance. Though the American oil superpower is not paying a cent of corporate taxes here, it would be helpful for independent Guyanese analysts to wrap their minds around how much we are losing in taxes not levied. It would relay to the nation what this means for this country, which the PPP/C Government admits is not getting enough from oil for developmental needs.

Last, on Thursday, November 24^th, Guyana’s leading Opposition group insisted that Guyana should get more from its oil sector. In simple terms, this means that ExxonMobil must pay taxes, including regular corporate taxes, like all Guyanese companies, and what the Opposition has been pressing for, windfall taxes. We agree that ExxonMobil has been short changing us, even cheating us by not paying its fair share of taxes. Something is going to have to come to a head with all these excesses favoring ExxonMobil. They must not be allowed to go on, Guyanese must become sufficiently enraged to push for meaningful change. Taxes is a start, a big, juicy, low hanging fruit.

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