Bulkan pushes back against Jagdeo on ‘consultations’ with Amerindians for sale of carbon credits 

Jul 09, 2023 News

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Kaieteur News – Environmental activist, Janette Bulkan has pushed back against the statements made by Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo that the Government of Guyana (GoG) held consultations with the Amerindians over the sale of carbon credits earned for the forests in their communities.

In a letter to this newspaper, published on July 8, 2023 Bulkan said the Department of Public Information (DPI) carried a report on July 6, 2023 on the illegal sale of carbon credits from forests on titled Amerindian Village Lands. She said that the “statement mainly includes legally incorrect and misleading statements by the Vice-President, and which are damaging to Amerindians.”

The activist went on to argue that a consultation held by government staff in an Amerindian Village on the Low Carbon Development Strategy (LCDS) 2030 is not the same as a vote at a Village Meeting convened according to the Amerindian Act 2006.

Bulkan pointed out, “A consultation has no legal weight and is not a substitute for the procedure laid down by law.  And since the Vice-President refers often to his view that the lopsided Production Sharing Agreement signed in June 2016 cannot be negotiated with EEPGL and co-venturers because of ‘sanctity of contract’, it is not clear why the Vice-President seems to feel that the legally valid Amerindian Act can be ignored to allow government theft of titled Amerindian resources.”

She said that while the government has decided to hand out large funds to Amerindian villages to finance their plans, prepared on a government template, it has nothing to do with the sovereign right of titled Amerindian Villages to decide themselves how they manage their own resources.

Bulkan in her letter reasoned, “Amerindians in Guyana have steadfastly defended their territorial rights, since the arrival of the first Europeans on their shores. Amerindians have suffered from land grabs throughout history. Their territorial rights include the legal right that can be exercised by two-thirds of the members of each titled village to dispose (or not) of their aboveground resources. The safeguards against continuing land grabs set out in the Amerindian Act 2006 cannot be set aside by Winrock’s ART-TREES, Aster Global or the Government of Guyana.”

Jagdeo during an interview with the ‘Guyanese Critic’ on Thursday launched an attack on Bulkan, describing the activist as a hater of his party. According to him, she also comes from a group “who live abroad and think that they have all the answers for Guyana and they are the conscience of Guyanese.”

The former Head of State who received an award as a ‘Champion of the Earth’ told his viewers on the interview, streamed live on Facebook, that such individuals live off of advocating for Indigenous people and a clean environment.

He explained that the Amerindian People’s Association (APA) similarly attempted to block the funding for the Amerindian communities; however these villages have already received the revenue and have commenced projects through that stream.

The Vice President said that these funds will create more jobs, improve their access to health, address youth issues and other developmental matters, thereby changing the lives of the Indigenous citizens.

Jagdeo therefore concluded, “They don’t care, APA tries to block that. They failed by invoking the grievance procedure under the Architecture for Red Plus Transaction, they failed there…and now Janet Bulkan and the others are weighing in. This is what’s going to happen, these people live off of this, they are like leeches…you are not going to get rid of them. “

The VP said the government is forced to ignore those individuals and move forward with the support of the communities.

On Monday, this newspaper reported that Bulkan believes the sale of forest-based carbon credits by the Government of Guyana was fraudulent.

She explained that the Government had no authority to sell any of the resources on the titled Village Lands without explicit Amerindian agreement at Village level.

“This was a sale of stolen property, and Hess Corporation is likewise criminally guilty of purchasing such stolen property, having been informed of the illegality,” Dr Bulkan added.

She explained that any Amerindian Village Council can agree to dispose of natural resources of the titled Amerindian Village Lands only through compliance with sections 13, 14, 34 and 44 of the Amerindian Act cap. 29:01 2006.  According to Dr Bulkan, these sections require a properly convened village meeting and a vote of at least two-thirds of villagers in favour of such disposal.

To this end she said, “So far as I know, none of the titled Amerindian Villages has convened such a meeting or passed such a vote.”

Consequently, she said the sale by the Government of forest-based carbon credits was fraudulent, including the 2.299 million hectares of forest on Village Lands sold on December 1, 2022.

Back in December, the government inked what was dubbed a ‘historic’ agreement with U.S. oil company Hess Corporation for the sale of carbon credits the country earned for its massive forest cover.
The signing ceremony was hosted at State House, in the presence of members of Cabinet and the Diplomatic Corps, private sector representatives and other government officials.

The multi-year agreement is for 37.5 million Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD+) jurisdictional carbon credits. This initiative is a global mechanism that was created by the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in support of the Paris Agreement.

Hess is Guyana’s first client, purchasing 30 percent of the country’s carbon credits for a minimum of US$750M. It was explained that the cost of the carbon credits can increase and if this shift occurs, Guyana will benefit more.

At that time, Jagdeo announced that 15 percent of all proceeds from any sale of forest carbon will go to Amerindian communities.

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• Amerindians, carbon credits, Consultation, passed, sale

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