The Schlumberger court ruling

Dec 23, 2022 Editorial

Kaieteur News – Guyanese should take heart as all is not lost. Citizens do not have to look to Politicians and Parliament for solutions and reliefs for both have proven to be mainly lost causes. Guyanese with a conscience, with concerns, with genuine fears can take some hope in our Court system.

Guyana’s courts are not viewed favorably by many citizens because of deep suspicions over how the law is interpreted, how justice is handed down. But there are Magistrates and Judges, who make us proud to be Guyanese. It is for the simple reason that their decisions are of what is of judicial wisdom, the height of practicality, and ordinary commonsense. The case involving residents of Lot 1, Area ‘X’ Houston, East Bank Demerara and Schlumberger, a world-renowned oil services company, is such an instance.

We recognize some courageous Guyanese willing to challenge the might of the State, if only to secure their own safety and peace of mind and for what is right. Danuta and Vanda Radzik, and Raphael Singh, all residents of Area ‘X’ Houston, who initiated the challenge in Guyana’s High Court are applauded, and we wish there were more like these two sisters, and Mr. Singh who did not sit on their hands and took whatever was being shoveled at them. We are encouraged by the willingness and courage of the three Attorneys, Ms. Marlene Alleyne, and Messrs. Ronald Burch-Smith and Siand Dhurjon to accept this case, and do what was right by these alarmed Houston residents, and all Guyanese. Regarding Justice Nareshwar Harnanan, we have only positives to offer on the record for this inspiring Guyanese Jurist, who was not overwhelmed by the magnitude of the circumstances, or the possible far-reaching effect of what could be a fateful decision.

We hail this as not just a fresh, possibly groundbreaking, ruling, but not with implications of substance and power. More worried Guyanese, more angry citizens, could utilize more heavily and more wisely the local court system. They are Judges who will do the right thing, come to the right decisions, without fear, without interest for who and where are made to look shabby, incompetent, and lacking in even the ordinary.

The Schlumberger facility in Houston had to have an expert, credible Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA), but of that, Guyana’s own Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) would not hear the first whisper. This has been the character and conduct of this most sensitive and pivotal of State Institutions in this time of great oil developments. When it should be assertive, it is passive; when it should be on top of things, it is content to be a laggard, and when it has to take a reasonable stand for the welfare of Guyanese resident in different areas, it has been conspicuous by being muzzled or missing in action. Guyana’s EPA couldn’t even take a stand when radioactive materials could be part of what the facility handles. Surely, the health and quality of life of Guyanese matter, that their lives should matter to the EPA.

Worse still, our Government and our Politicians have proven to be weak-kneed, without backbone, and woeful to the point of impotency, when oil-related issues are the subject of discussion and honest decisions. They are useless to the point of nonexistence where this oil is concerned, and on this there is little distinction between the PPP/C Government and the APNU+AFC Coalition Opposition. Our National Assembly, the House of the highest decision-making in Guyana, has now wasted away to nothing but a ghetto of bitter partisan political warfare, and where the PPP/C Government makes the best use of its one-seat majority to ram through whatever suits its crooked visions.

With the Government and Parliament of the day reduced to a place of rank political schemes, there is only one legal avenue left open for relief. Guyana’s court system is that avenue, and concerned and upset citizens should make every use of this channel to obtain the cures of justice. Well-thought out, well-presented, and well-argued cases that have merit will bring the remedies that Government and Parliament seem unconscious and unconcerned to do anything about, to rein in the kind of business developments that hold every Guyanese to ransom.