Dear Editor
I note a number of inconsistencies in Kaieteur News’ coverage of the oil and gas sector of late including the claim that the Liza Destiny FPSO “had already flared 12.4 billion cubic feet of gas per day.” That would be the equivalent of roughly the total world emissions!
In two stories I also saw the baseless speculation by the reporter that “In light of the fact that Guyana has no legislation predating the signing of the contract, which sets out the US$30 penalty for flaring, it therefore means that Guyana will ultimately have to compensate ExxonMobil.” Whatever that paper may think of the present government’s handling of the sector, they can’t seriously believe this will be the case.
This is very similar to an article where the paper asserted that various educational, environmental and social projects undertaken by the consortium would be claimed as part of cost oil. Incorrect. As was the 2018 claim that a large part of Guyana’s fishing grounds would be off limits because of oil production. “ExxonMobil effectively bans fishing in huge swathe of Guyana’s waters–Ram”.
It is all part of the same shoddy journalism that simply conjectures in the hope of eliciting some response. And indeed the administration would do itself a great service by knocking down such absurdities as they appear. Kaieteur News may be anti-oil but it still has to be factual if only for its own credibility.
Yours sincerely
Lynn Nicholas
