President Ramotar apologises to

APNU leader for oversight...

Corruption, begging and

the imminent Petrocaribe dependence

Dear Editor, The PPP had a great idea to develop hydropower in Guyana, but like everything else these days, a few corrupt individuals saw this potential advancement as a cash cow and an opportunity to brazenly enrich themselves and fatten their pockets while discarding the country. Instead of a conscious and decent effort to advance this country for the benefit of all, a few persons have plunged this country down a deep, dark hole of debt with Amaila Falls – a medium size project that will cost significantly more than it should to build. A few will get rich, but the rest of the country will not only be saddled with the same expensive electricity they get from the inept GPL, but face the situation where the PPP’s absolute mess on Amaila Falls has damaged this country’s ability to obtain or develop more hydropower that is vital to our economic progress. At US $840 million and likely to be well over US $1billion by the time it is done, Amaila Falls is going to sink this country. No rational lender will be foolish enough to lend money to Guyana for another major hydro project after this fiasco. Plus, we have to be deathly afraid of the facility not working to full capacity. This is the intellectual banditry and patriotic shallowness of the PPP. For a few to profit, the entire nation is pushed down the river without a canoe or a paddle. These projects are not about the development of Guyana. They are about how the cabal will profit. So, here we are facing more than US$ 1 billion debt for Amaila Falls for which the access road is still not finished. After wrecking this country’s cheap electricity potential, we are facing a dilemma. Venezuela just this past weekend concluded a summit of Petrocaribe that opened up a can of worms. We will not hear from the PPP on this summit because it spells doom and danger for Guyana. Venezuela wants something more in return for the cheap oil it is handing out. Unlike Guyana where astounding wealth in public office is for free, nothing is for free in other nations. Yes, Venezuela wants an economic zone, which will obviously be dominated by Venezuela, the controller of the 108,000 barrels of oil sent daily to these countries. The mendicants in other countries should not see as much danger in this proposal as Guyana should sense, because Venezuela does not maintain a territorial claim to two-thirds of their country. An economic zone controlled by Venezuela will establish economic dominance over Guyana and require this country to economically bow to Venezuela in return. It is an easy transition for Venezuela to assert territorial authority based on economic authority. The ‘ambitious’ within the PPP, lacking patriotism and ever greedy and money-hungry, will see nothing but dollar signs, while this country becomes nothing more than an indentured extension of Venezuela. This economic zone will enfeeble and eventually destroy Caricom, since most of Caricom’s members are begging oil from Venezuela. Without Caricom or with a weakened Caricom, these nations can be held hostage in any eventual confrontation between Guyana and Venezuela over its territory with most being forced to back Venezuela because of debt and oil. It is absurd for the PPP charlatans to think that Venezuela will not naturally expand its territorial claim to Guyana after it creates an economic zone that effectively controls the entire Caribbean. Even worse, Venezuela is contemplating a common currency, another element that will destroy our sovereignty and economic independence, already shaky and dissolving with growing Chinese and Venezuelan influence. So, what will the corrupt ones in the PPP do? I suspect they will tamely succumb to their greed and their lust for power. Greed has destroyed Amaila’s potential for energy independence just as corruption and mismanagement have made a mockery of the LCDS. Greed, mismanagement, corruption, lies, fabrication and deceit on Amaila Falls have robbed us of the ability to get energy independence from hydropower, despite living in the Land of Many Waters. The hunger for power will cause the morally and patriotically suspect PPP to plunge this country deep into the Petrocaribe economic zone, signing our sovereignty away to secure a pretentious and enslaving economic stability in order to remain in power. It does not matter that this economic stability will be fed and controlled by Venezuela. It does not matter that our nation will become indentured and will eventually be completely consumed by Venezuela with this arrangement. All that matters is that the gravy train keeps flowing and the corrupt remain in power to keep pillaging the nation. The current debt, which the PPP so conveniently failed to report during the Budget Speech which droned on for hours, is now US$1.8 billion. And the road to Amaila Falls is not even complete. I keep telling the Guyanese people that there will be a terrible price for the PPP’s corruption, wrongdoing, self-interest, self-aggrandizement, elitism, nepotism, mismanagement, waste, plutocracy and begging to enrich a few. The Guyanese people will pay a terrible price under the PPP one of these days and it could very well be becoming another state of Venezuela. The so-called leaders of this country will not care for they will be rich and free to leave Guyana and enjoy a first class life anywhere else on the planet.

M. Maxwell

Oh lord, another one...again.