How business operates

Jun 08, 2026 Features / Columnists, The GHK Lall Column

Hard Truths by GHK Lall

(Kaieteur News) – The men from Istanbul are giving Guyanese a free tutorial on how the real world operates. They may no longer count as a world power, but in Guyana they are the equivalent of one. Pay up, or else (for more electricity)? What will it be, gents? The gentlemen in the PPP government are so clueless that they don’t know what hit them, what to do. It’s cheap. Well, according to those controlling those two powerboats operating from Guyana’s rivers. They supply 96MW in urgently needed electricity. It’s $3.4M a day, or they are on their way. Money talks. B-S walks.

Sadly, for Guyanese, the PPP is into B-s. Cast eyes over to Wales. There it is: a grand scheme out of Freedom House and Govt House: a US$2B Gas-to-Energy (GTE) project, from Drs. Ali, Jagdeo, Phillips, Indar. They were beside themselves to get started, and now they can’t get it done. Enter the collectors from Karpower. Pay up. Don’t muck with the men from the land of Ataturk. The PPP government gang going through the motions of negotiation better get a load of how business is really done. None of this sweetheart stuff (Darren Woods, Alistair Routledge et al), about the brotherhood of man, and how Guyana is a specially treasured oil basket. What’s really being said under their breath is Guyana a special basket case. Recall that fancy one: sanctity of contract. Exxon say no, and so Guyana go.

Now Karpower is showing the power in its hands, and the savviness of its head: tek a 25% hike for good times sake; $3.4M more a day, a big, beautiful 25 percent jack-up from the old price. These folks are as serious as a spear in the scrotum. It’s all about money. Since the PPP government can secretly shell out US$97 million (plus US$2 million in tips for the attorneys), what’s the trouble with $3.4M lousy Guyana dollars more a day? Stop the crying. Take medicine like men. Mess up (f— up) with the Wales GTE and there’s the opportunity for Karpower to swoop and seize the moment. Talks? The PPP masters can prattle all they want about negotiation, but $3.4M more a day is the condition set in stone, a foregone conclusion.

Guyana is on the ropes, which are now wrapped around the necks of its people. No increase in money, say goodbye to the supply of 96MW electricity. What is the PPP of Ali and Phillips going to do? Run to the CCJ? Chase the two boats out of Guyana’s waters? On second thought, there are some real tough guys in the PPP, who would do that for fun, regardless of the extra battering that already brutalised Guyanese electricity users would have to endure. The formula was and still is simple: get the Wales GTE done, and Karpower is done. The company and its calculated shakedown of government and Guyana is last week’s garbage.

It is said that when it rains, it pours. This is what is happening to Drs. Ali, Jagdeo, and Phillips. Wales hang up in the air, and Istanbul hanging Guyana’s strongest sons by their jewels. Talk about a two-fisted whacking. Better make that three, considering how much it is raining and is not letting up; flooding widening. Even my computer screen needs a windshield wiper. Now, the richest people globally wondering if they are going to be faced with too much water under the house and too little light in the house. Or none at all. These guys from Istanbul are really callous. Of course, it is nothing anti-Guyanese, or anti-Ali and anti-PPP. It’s just business. How it is done. Clear-headed. Hardnosed. Bare-knuckled. Sharp elbowed. No prisoners. No friends, either. Relay that, please, somebody to Guyana’s business master, Dr. Sanctity of Contract Ali. To my fellow Guyanese: Good news: doan tek wurreez. The PPP will pay the people from Turkey the money: $3.4M a day more signed, sealed, delivered.

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

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GHK Lall, How business operates, Istanbul, Karpower, PPP Government

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