Billboards and Bharrat

Mar 13, 2024 Editorial

Kaieteur News – Things that have truth as their essence often take a while before registering openly and deeply. This was the case with the billboards that ExxonMobil plastered across some well-traveled places in Guyana. The big chiefs at the American oil giant insisted and persisted with the exaggeration of a 52% total take of this oil for Guyana. ExxonMobil’s big chiefs used the oil dollars of Guyanese to deceive small Guyanese, citizens who do not know much about oil matters, about the money they were getting from their wealth. When a company can take it upon itself to deceive and mislead an entire population about its portion of the national patrimony so publicly and so shamelessly, then there is no limit to what it would not do when Guyanese are none the wiser.

We at this publication believe that Guyana’s number one oil man, Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo had some knowledge, more than a passing idea, that 52% was not it, was inflated, was a falsehoods foisted on the Guyanese people. Yet, he said nothing, did nothing to rein in his so-called analysts and intellects, themselves fully committed to peddling for a penny ExxonMobil’s 52% income farce. What kind of analysts are these, and what could be said about their intellectual honesty, their commitment to delivering accuracy and what is truthful to Guyanese? Whatever they are, it is not about what is good for Guyanese, but a shameless bunch of brownnosers, who will try to justify anything for a dollar, and for partisan purposes. This is how dirty this oil wealth has made some of them, almost all of them. But what does this say about Vice President Jagdeo himself, in whose hands has been placed this most sensitive, this richest, of national portfolios?

He must have known that ExxonMobil’s 52% was wrong in number, wrong in money, and wrong in the damage being done to Guyanese being sold a blown-up pig in broad daylight. There are those billboards, thanks to the brightness of ExxonMobil’s corporate standards. There was Dr. Vincent Adams pressing that 52% total profit button and blowing it out of the water. Other Guyanese have pointed that out, but Jagdeo was so deep in ExxonMobil’s belly that he couldn’t see the light, did what he does best, which was to refuse to admit to seeing any light. For some strange reason, Jagdeo has now finally come to his senses. He can finally acknowledge that, “One thing I can agree with Vincent Adams on, is that these billboards ExxonMobil (is) putting up all around the place, is misleading in many ways… Exxon’s billboards are misleading. So, they said that Guyana receives 52% of all profits from Stabroek Block…they don’t speak of 75% going to cost recovery.” It is healthy that Jagdeo could finally speak to this 52% untruth, that he could find it in himself to use the word “misleading” twice to describe the hoax with which ExxonMobil was brainwashing Guyanese. It is worth going back to a point made earlier here. If ExxonMobil can try to trick Guyanese so blatantly and so openly with this 52% sham, then what can Guyanese trust the company to do with real production numbers, real exposures to this country, and real protection for everyone here.

Moreover, oil czar Jagdeo found the time and strength (and truth too) to mention “they don’t speak of 75% going to cost recovery.”

Indeed, men of the prowess of Alistair Routledge never do, likely never would. It is good, therefore, that Jagdeo has nailed that 75% cost recovery detail that ExxonMobil prefers to have swept under the carpet. What would be most encouraging is for Jagdeo to take steps to have all those concealed expenses representing billions, and audit and other reports that conceal so much, to be laid before the Guyanese people. Let them be made public, so that Guyanese analysts (those worthy of the name, and genuinely patriotic ones) can go through them. Put them in the public domain, Mr. Jagdeo, and let the real analysts determine if and how and by how much ExxonMobil is misleading Guyanese in other ways. ExxonMobil has little credibility with honest Guyanese. Bharrat Jagdeo could, but he must deliver.

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American, Billboards, Editorial, ExxonMobil’s, Guyana

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