On the one hand, I commend American Ambassador Nicole D. Theriot for doing her job. Standing up for US interests, from large US companies investing here, to small US companies hunting for a toehold. Excellency Theriot was so expansive, she included companies from everywhere. They must have peace of mind. I interpret. Not to be looking over their shoulders. Not to worry that their investment, the terms of it, is in jeopardy, at risk of being changed. I hear Excellency Theriot loud and clear, and spoken with fulsome American authority. On the other hand, while Ambassador Theriot shows that she can hold her own peace, she displays that tendency, which made ostriches famous. She buries her head.
First, no self-respecting sovereignty, no patriotic Guyanese leader, should ever be able to coexist with an oil contract that disembowels, castrates, this country and every citizen. For when that contract is such a calculatingly depraved work of partnership treachery that a national lawmaking body (parliament) is rendered impotent, then I tender that that heinous contract should not stand. To be so insightful as to neutralize a national parliament must rank as insidiousness itself.
Second, it should not have escaped the attention of Ambassador Theriot and her people that I have employed language characteristic of criminal conditions and proceedings. The reasons should be obvious. For when an Exxon first, as bolstered by the full might of the US government, through its despicable contract, puts a ring into the nostrils of Guyana’s leaders and the Guyanese people, then that can never be about partnering, but of the enslaving. What leads to groveling. What empowers Exxon et al to put their jackboots on the necks of Guyanese leaders and dispatch them to crawling on their bellies. Look at them, these sons of Guyana proud to be cultural inferiors, intellectual second-raters, and masculine pretenders. When this is now so irrefutably obvious, I regret to say to this excellent American that there is not a special relationship in existence, but a pathetic, captive, lead-by-the hand, leadership cohort in practice. I see not a contract to be renegotiated. I see an injustice to be reversed.
Third, whither peace of mind, Excellency, for Guyanese? Whither that peace and contentment that they have been dealt with fairly, honestly, honorably? Where’s the confidence among Guyanese that they and their leaders (from PNC to PPP) have been treated as men and not as mental midgets, men and not as menials to be picked apart, kicked around, trampled over? I behold in Exxon the condescension held for children of a lower order, a lesser breed, a nobody deity.
Fourth, when Guyana’s National Assembly is reduced to a nonentity re the Exxon contract, when its judiciary remade into a joke, toyed with, by local politicians (recall the nose-ring). Recall also a loquacious American oilman John Hess, former Exxon partner, who spoke so cavalierly, yet absolutely persuasively, about a court guarantee. Who offers such guarantees other than leaders with ringed noses, and an M-16 pointed menacingly? Excellency Theriot has a duty to assert peace of mind for US companies in Guyana. Likewise, I have a right to insist for equivalent peace of mind for all Guyanese with their inheritance.
Fifth, in the US, there is a protection called State’s rights. Men died for those rights. Ambassador, Guyana is a sovereign state, with similar rights enshrined. Yet a twisted, deformed, odious, repugnant piece of paper severs Guyana from its sacred sovereign rights. Bluntly, Guyana is now a lackey colony of Exxon with pitiful leadership to complement.
Sixth, I note how the plural is misused, i.e., companies. The concentrated resentment is directed at Exxon. There are other companies-ABCEU and Chinese-that have negotiated cheap contracts. None is so one-sided (like Exxon’s) as to amputate Guyana’s prospects. None so callous that it collects the body parts (like Exxon’s) and prospers from them at Guyanese expense. Ambassador Theriot took the high road to emphasize corporate rights to peace of mind. I travel a higher road to highlight Guyanese inviolable rights to be their own masters, and the accompanying peace of mind.
