A true legend in his time, man over country
Kaieteur News – He dies in the ripe old age of 91, but his legend will live on among men, who treasure a country, those who dare to stand against the gods, come what may. Sheik Zaki Yamani, Saudi Arabia, was that kind of man in a well-lived life, where he was tireless in serving the interests of his struggling compatriots. If only we had those like us here in Guyana; if only one, with this oil of ours, brings so much feebleness, which causes so much uncertainty and distrust.
His ancestry was a royal one in royal Saudi Arabia, which is usually enough to consign it to the periphery, or never near the centers of meaningful power and influence. And yet, this was Sheik Zaki Yamani, only a commoner could accomplish, when he was called upon to rise and lead the way forward. He traded for his country time and time again, and in the one thing he has gone for: oil. Oil in such abundance that the drifts of predatory capitalists made their way into the wilderness, even to the hassle of eating in remote tents. We also have an abundance of oil, but we still scramble to find a figure of Sheik Yamani’s individual stature. All we get for our efforts and expectations is shadows and selling out.
The oil context and Sheik Yamani’s legacy as a minister was one in which the Americans led the way and maintained the alien sheep for decades on Saudi oil, nearly a century ago. And that takes into account the full nationalization that officially became in 1976. Sheik Yamani was one of the forces behind that development, which favored his country and significantly reduced oil companies’ profits. This only happened because of his determination to get the most out of his people, even if that meant crossing swords with the West, especially the Americans. This was the path of this Middle Eastern oil giant of a man, who stood up against the oil leviathan, stared them down, and walked away the victor.
One Reuters article credited him as the man who brought “the West to his knees” (February 23), and Bloomberg mentioned his leadership in the “1973 oil embargo” which paralyzed American and European industry, and dragged the rest of the world. down. Guyanese felt the pain over here, but this Saudi Arabian master was not a man to grieve for the benefit of his people. Not even on the outlook and reality that were the inevitable result of his fine and elaborate dog work, a couple of which have now been identified.
Sheik Yamani was an early architect of what became a scared and contemptible OPEC. Sheik Yamani was the man and patriot who, as Saudi oil minister, was at the forefront of a series of carefully calibrated measures that ultimately separated the “Saudi oil industry from the grip of American companies” (Reuters, February 23). That had to take some determined action, but the Saudi was the man for the occasion. He did not shrink, neither play games, nor deceive his people, nor the people to whom he answered. He had no such room, no option, but fulfillment. And he said: “The moment has come,” he said. “We are masters of our own goods.” Moreover, we add: and of the Saudi world, its times, and its fate.
We’re looking around for such a man here, such a leader. There is nothing; for there are only those who are so sensitive in dealing with this oil wealth of ours that they make a sentimental snake look like the straight straight arrows. Instead of Guyana slowly, and little by little, gaining a fairer share for our oil (not yet a full ascent), our leaders are retreating from every opportunity that could give us the opportunity to become equal partners with Exxon. Guyana’s de facto oil minister, its Vice President, is a shrinking violet, a study in artful evasion, which revels in taking on the hard-working jobs that gay men like Sheik Yamani of Saudi Arabia and Pedro Andres Gomez from Venezuela before. That’s when they didn’t have much going for them, but the invaluable commodity that made companies come hunting.
Today, there is concern and embarrassment about climate change, shareholder brewing uprisings, environmental interest pressures, and local denials over the state of our own oil. And our government and opposition leaders, in both public and private and civil societies, are still concerned with the plumbing of their pillows, and the thickening of their personal prospects. Guyana needs an oil warrior like Sheik Zaki Yamani. All he gets is either one political Judas after another, or a bunch of Quislings helping themselves.