Guyana is often mentioned for less than stellar reasons. There’s Jonestown (‘(s)he drank the Kool Aid’), rigged elections, the poorest country after Haiti in CARICOM and Latin America, the costliest failed infrastructural project in CARICOM (US$250M Skeldon sugar factory), and failed or captured regulatory agencies. Standouts among the latter was the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM)…
According to a notice on the Guyana EITI (GYEITI) website (www.gyeiti.org), Guyana is undergoing its first validation visit which started on October 1. The EITI based in Norway will give Guyana scores on 3 indicators: stakeholder engagement, transparency, and outcomes and impact, using the scale – not met, partly met, mostly met, fully met, and exceeded. This…
I noticed in today’s paper three full-page ads in newspapers, celebrating Caribbean Statistics Day under the theme, “Leave No One Behind…Everyone Counts.” There were messages by “Senior Minister of Finance” (no longer Minister within the Presidency?), the Chairman of the Bureau of Statistics Board, and the CARICOM Secretary General. The Senior Minister said, “Government recognizes…
What do we value as the oil and gas juggernaut rolls on? On your way to or from Guyana’s international airport at Timehri you travel on the East Bank Demerara road. Every mile or so, a small billboard displaying the village name will flash past your eyes. 29 kms from Georgetown and 10.5 km from…
Imagine if you drive your car to an Esso gas station and fill your tank with US$27.20 in gas. Then you decide to pay the cashier only US$20 for your gas and you walk out. The police would soon track you down for robbing the franchise owner of that Esso location. Hence, it is puzzling…
Guyana now has an oil purse of US$436 million dollars in a foreign bank that mysteriously sits untapped in a period of our greatest need. We are in the midst of a deadly pandemic; one the world hasn’t experienced since the Spanish Flu of 1918 that took an estimated 20 to 50 million lives. We…
The Environmental Assessment Board (EAB) is appointed by the Natural Resources Minister and comprises three persons. No qualifications or experience are listed in the Environmental Protection (EP) Act for EAB members. The EAB Commissioners for the 2021 calendar year are Mr Omkar Lochan (Chair, third year of service on the EAB), Ms Pradeepa Bholanauth, who…
I would like to congratulate Ms. lsabelle de Caires and the Moray House Trust for recently hosting a very informative panel discussion on “Shifting Power: Guyana’s Energy Mix” (video available on YouTube). Presenters included Dr. Simone Mangal-Joly who gave an over-view, Mr. Alfred Bhulai (focusing on solar/wind), former Minister David Patterson, MP (focusing on the…
On 7 October at 3pm EST, the Global Network for Human Rights and the Environment (GNHRE) and the Special Rapporteurship on Economic, Social, Cultural, and Environmental Rights at the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (REDESCA) are hosting an extraordinary panel of speakers who will come together to discuss the Escazú Agreement, challenges associated with its implementation and the…
The Escazú Agreement, or “Escazú”, is a regional agreement in which Guyana is obligated to guarantee citizens’ right of access to information, public participation and justice in environmental matters. Part One of this presentation dealt with two legal rights of citizens in environmental matters – namely, access to information and access to justice. This second…
