Close Exxon
Dear Editor,
Guyanese behavior follows a pattern. Guyanese climb to incredible heights, then slip away arbitrarily to their wretched corners, where they stumble and brawl endlessly. They watch rains that bring sneezing, but ignore the storms that bring flooding.
For nineteen months, there were no more troubled and troubled people anywhere than Guyanese. Those who honestly wanted to be above the frauds either got sucked in, or pushed in, or collapsed on themselves when they should have known better. I’m talking about elections. To reiterate a stated conviction, last year’s elections were not democracy, but our internal selfishness and greed, and outside of us. Those were the motivating ingredients that made us soar with rancidity, crudities, and bigotries. We were fighting for the rise, not for democratic government (break that out), but for tribal ascent and racist governance. That is well known.
Previously, it was about the spoils of natural resources and personal benefits that divided and drove into madness. We blamed Burnham and Jagan, and they made their contributions. We blame the British and they are not unworthy. But, as we do so, we are not looking at what and where is most important. That is, on our own. We allow ourselves to be divided, because we want to be so, we like it, no matter the imbecilic denials that come from learned to losers. And that’s when the potential political and racial looting was rich, but on the thin side. We hated then, and then fought for supremacy. So, why shouldn’t we, and why wouldn’t we be much worse off, when the prospects were hanging in front of us, confirming wealth multiplication for every Guyanese a thousand times?
Editor, the oil came with a drop, and then with an ocean of boom likely. It was enough to transform weak saints into something unprecedented, to make martyrs forget the spiritual and to trap themselves with a barrel of oil good things. To put it differently, oil opened visions, the obvious reality, of enormous wealth for all Jack men, and that was enough to make mother and father, wife and children forget, and God and principles. This was the sum of the struggle in the last elections, not the ethos of democracy, that makes us crazy. That’s what intensified our divisions and hatreds more. Guyanese flew in unprecedented trajectories; but now they melt when a real challenge comes. That is to stand up for what is right, what is best for us. We must appreciate what all the noise was under the charade of democracy: only money and the supremacy for a little personal prosperity.
Because here we are, once again getting Exxon from the gonads, and there are Guyanese in the split, who are good enough to feather their nests, who rise up against other Guyanese, who dare call for the application of the crunch on Exxon. The crunch for a careless and dangerous gas blaze; the unused squeeze for Payara, and subsequent oil developments. Exxon’s billion-dollar shareholders are applying the squeeze for climate change (Blackrock is the latest), but Guyanese shared a shrink from doing so. Instead, they attack the messengers from a social media ambush and backpacking doesn’t go that far. Why not? Because their relationships will be strained; held their bank registers; their unfulfilled cruelty.
Exxon had us against a wall with money, expertise and technology and didn’t spare us. He went under the belt and held Venezuela over our head, which we hadn’t saved (2%); how confident the company was in Sarah Ann Lynch and Michael Pompeo, and their official followers. This is why I say that we shouldn’t be shy of Exxon in any way today. Exxon bought the silence of our political leaders, who can’t even speak to put their faces to shame. Exxon has bought Guyana elites, professionals, civil society, and all of them masters under one joint program after another. Here’s why they say: go easy. Don’t shut Exxon down. I say to hell with that. The company is vulnerable, squeezed and shaken: shut down its operations until it repairs gas torch satisfactorily. Exxon cannot afford to delay. Yes.
Correctly,
Lall GHK