Now that we have drawn the curtains on 2020 and have gone through the best year-end formalities and informality we could under the COVID-19, we should all make a collective decision to put our shoulders on the wheel of our national progress vehicle to get it out of the morale it has become stuck with in the past two years. Although, objectively, one new day is just like any other, subjectively, we all view a “new” year as a fresh start. As such, this gives us the opportunity to act consciously in a way that would bring about that progress. After all, with US $ 180M already in our national accounts at the NY Fed from the first year of oil production – which has now reached the 120,000 bpd production targeted by Lisa 1 – we know we have some of “grease” to be applied to the progress wheel. And maybe we can start with this circumstance of oil revenue which, unfortunately, has become such a contention. There is no question that almost all Guyanese, except the APNU / AFC line minister at the time, Raphael Trotman, accepted that the contract he signed away for the Stabroek Block was stacked against our best interests. But at this point, with the political directorate of both sides of the split concluding that it was not advisable to insist on renegotiating the contract, we should move forward to ensure that we have a consensus on how best to spend the revenue from the oil, intended for extraction to rise to 750,000 bpd by 2025. Related issues, such as determining the best future rate of production or use of the associated gas, should be left to those who can guarantee the certainty of their prognostications – which no one can , of course. The PPPC Government has set out in their 2020 Manifesto their general development plans, which they would be expected to implement, as it was on this basis that they were given the electoral mandate to take over the Government. For example, referring to the oil revenues, they committed to using it as support for job creation, to build state-of-the-art education and healthcare systems for Guyanese, as well as social and economic infrastructure. They also committed to introducing targeted money transfers to Guyanese, especially the elderly, children, the poor and other vulnerable groups. What has been encouraging is that, since taking up post on August 2, 2020, they have launched initiatives in each of these areas without even touching the oil revenue. This shows a commitment to its promise of national development, and all Guyanese should play its part, as governments can only provide the goods for “us the people”. Another area of effort in which we can play our part is to defeat the COVID-19 pandemic in our country. New Zealand demonstrated that, with a combination of sound government controls and regulations, coupled with a disciplined population adhering to guidelines, the pandemic can be defeated, even without a vaccine. However, with vaccines already being introduced in the developed countries, and in the coming months, we must guard against complacency, which would increase our adherence to existing COVID-19 guidelines indifferent. In the political world, which is our most contentious area of national life, unfortunately there is a lot of unfinished business that could cause tensions to rise again. The Guyanese public from all “sides” of the divide should therefore take a deep breath and act maturely to defend their mutual interest, which lies in cultivating a peaceful atmosphere to settle our inevitable differences in political opinion. The debate about the elections has been presented to the Courts, which have been mandated to settle such differences. We must wait for the consummation of that process, and receive the judgment, whatever.
