Oil spill legislation, as foreseen 

May 10, 2024 Features / Columnists, The GHK Lall Column

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Kaieteur News – All Guyanese should see straight through any oil spill legislation coming out of the PPP Government.  The primary objective would be to insulate and immunize to the utmost Exxon and its partners from being obligated to this country and its citizens.  Whatever the final form of any billbeing readied for parliamentary appearance, it will have two vital components.

The first is to limit or neutralise the strength of locals to challenge Exxon et al in the instance of a significant oil spill.  The second, is to enhance Exxon’s ability to weaponize our own law to deny and diminish Guyanese of justice.  I will table two other things: 1) it would not surprise if Exxon had material input in oil spill drafts and objectives; and 2) given the incomparably broad streak of cowardice in our leaders, whatever becomes the oil spill law would have the highest probability to devastate citizens and ultimately enslave this country.  Build whatever must be incorporated into a bill for passage to law to protect Exxon by any means-ambiguities, loopholes, deceptions, and all deliberate-is what Guyanese are going to get, must live with.  I am saying so from today.

Some may say that this is going too far, delving into the unknown.  No Guyanese-PPP or PNC supporter-should need any additional education regarding what is known about Exxon, and how poorly Guyana has done because of it.  Because of that knowledge, and with no law with teeth to instill restraint, then dangerous recklessness could prevail and damage this country and its people incurably.  I present this little bill of my own as a test for Guyanese, an invitation for them, whether supporter or skeptic.  What has there been a bill laid in the National Assembly by the PPP Government, a law assented to, that has started out with what is truly and thoroughly, for the best interests of the Guyanese people?  When has such a parliamentary creature not been of what gives some leeway for what redounds to the credit of those pushing such profanities through, and calling it law?

The Hon Attorney General, a man of the law (in his own mind), a man who impresses himself of his mastery of the law (in his own self-made legends) could intervene and grace his fellows with his sagacity.  While at it, perhaps, he will deign to tell citizens how it is that the people behind what became the NRF law were wise enough to affix penalties on whistleblowers exposing those doing wrong by the Oil Fund, but were wiser still not to protect Guyanese hopes for their trust fund by embedding draconian provisions for those who actually interference with its assets.  In the potentially biggest vault for the holdings of Guyanese, there is that weakness, that key of authority to enter and tamper with its deposits.

The NRF is the one bank account that matters, because it is of such materiality, holds such promise, so many rough times reserves.  It had to be buttressed with the most comprehensive and robust provisions that warn and ward off those with a malefactor’s mind, that war will be waged on them should they get ideas, should they act on them.  But when that most basic of common sense component that should have been part of the NRF Law, it is blindingly invisible.  What then could be expected in any PPP-sponsored oil spill law, where Exxon is the deciding factor about who stays in power, and who gets removed?  If the people’s oil money was plotted against with potentially naked criminal intent in its first manifestations from the PPP Government, then I submit that an oil spill law finalized will mutate into the shrine on which the protections that Guyanese need will be sacrificed and devoured.  The oil trust subterfuge, that detectable criminal camouflage, was and is about money and how to make merry with it.  Any upcoming oil spill law is sure to have what barricades Exxon to the maximum and leaves Guyanese at legal straws.

I repeat something said before.  Men in the PPP Government sit and scheme about what is to their benefit in the design and construction of new laws.  An oil spill law that has what is tight, embodies what is potent, and is loaded with intent and unequivocal language to protect this country and its people at all costs would raise the hackles of the directorate and management of Exxon.  If it is not Woods and Routledge, there will be another destroyer in Exxon committed to wrestling for what is the absolute in protection for the company from the PPP Government (or any other) relative to oil spill legislation in the making.

Guyanese with clarity of mind and honesty in their hearts should try this reference: if there is no Nicolas Maduro in Venezuela, there is bound to be an ambitious successor, man or woman.  Now think along the same lines with Woods and Routledge from Exxon, no different in what they covet from Guyana, and what they will do to get it.  The PPP Government is the stooge of Woods and Routledge.  The oil spill draft under consideration will be the proof of this conclusion.  One national institution after another has been subverted and converted to treacherous PPP visions.  It is again the turn of the law, and this time around to devastate the independence of the judiciary, one of the two protective bastions remaining.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of this newspaper and its affiliates.)

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• GHK Lall, Government, legislation, PPP, primary

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