More now, more must come

Jan 03, 2025 Features / Columnists, News

---

Editorial…

Kaieteur News- The clamor of voices grows stronger.  The pressures are gaining traction, with strengthening stride.  More frequently now, there is one word that is beginning to light a fire under Guyanese:  renegotiation.  The 2016 ExxonMobil oil contract, a document of unprecedented obscenity, must be renegotiated.  So that every Guyanese gets more.  It isn’t that this ExxonMobil deformity called a contract between partners should be renegotiated.  Or, the usual nonsense of if and when circumstances make it possible.  Or that the ExxonMobil contract may be renegotiated, to see what Guyana can get for its people.  The bottom line is that this monstrous corporate concoction brazenly labeled as a fair contract must (must) be renegotiated.  It must be renegotiated now for more benefits for all Guyanese now.

Guyanese have waited too long, been too patient for over five years.  This must stop now.  The visions of a prosperous Guyana with only prosperous citizens from their massive oil wealth must be brighter.  The voices must be louder, the stances tougher, the energies harder.  The Oil and Gas Network, a largely overseas-based group of Guyanese have been calling for renegotiation of the ExxonMobil contract.  It must happen now, and not after the pending general elections.  Former Minister of Finance, Winston Jordan, who defended the contract before, was mostly silent, has now broke with the past.  He has joined the chorus calling for renegotiation.  Some in the opposition Alliance for Change have made clear their position on the ExxonMobil contract that wraps like a noose around the necks of Guyana: renegotiate this contract, get better for Guyanese.  We at this paper have been there from the start, never let-up, to renegotiate this infernal contract, renegotiate out of existence.

It has been allowed to exist for too long.  This ExxonMobil contract has sucked the life out of Guyanese hopes.  It must go down and do so now.  This ExxonMobil contract is  defecation on the head of every citizen whose birthright is of this soil, what’s below its seas.  This revolting, insulting ExxonMobil contract must be flushed down the toilet, dumped to live where it belongs: in the sewage system.  Renegotiation of the ExxonMobil contract is the only way forward.  It is renegotiation and no other way.  Guyanese must build toward that intense pitch, beyond that momentum.

The PPPC Government as led by President Ali and Vice President Jagdeo are seemingly so much under the thumb of ExxonMobil that the only word that they parrot is NO!  NO, to renegotiation of the oil contract that they once cursed.  NO! to what they once promised Guyanese to change through ‘reviewing and renegotiating’ what is the equivalent of a potentially lethal virus on country and peoples.  Which leaders can be so uncaring of their citizens, disdainful to their own promises?  The president and vice president do not conduct themselves like national leaders when Guyana’s rich patrimony is involved.  It’s sickening to watch them, how they apparently force their heads between their knees in efforts to avoid pressing ExxonMobil to renegotiate this disgusting oil contract.  Their fear of challenging ExxonMobil for what is right for Guyana is palpable.  Their feebleness stands as a symbol of shame for all Guyanese.  It is clear that President Ali and Vice President Jagdeo dread the word renegotiation, will not renegotiate, so beholden they are to ExxonMobil.

The leader of the PNCR Opposition, Aubrey Norton, is a kindred soul with Ali and Jagdeo where renegotiation of the contract is concerned.  He has struck the word renegotiation from his leadership vocabulary.  He is comfortable banishing renegotiation from his conversation, then dissemble about when he gets into office, with another hedge built on ‘engaging’ the oil companies for more.

AFC Leader, Nigel Hughes, has hidden his hand in his pocket, with no definitive public renegotiation posture.  It is sad that a Guyanese of power and vigor could be so cautious about renegotiation, while sheltering behind oil and gas committees that may mean nothing.  The circumstances surrounding Guyana’s oil patrimony call for, demand, renegotiation of the ExxonMobil slave contract.  Four national leaders speaking with one voice: in some shape of reform, it is no to renegotiation.  These men offer nothing to Guyana, should not be around this oil.

(More now, more must come)

 

---

• 2016 ExxonMobil oil contract, ALL GUYANESE, intense pitch, Oil and Gas, renegotiated

---