Dear Editor,
Having asked the question of how Mae Thomas’s selection for secondary questioning became an issue for the UNCHR, and further speculated that it looked like the work of local ‘cookup’ artists, I was not overly surprised to learn that the issue was raised in the submission to the UNCHR by the OGGN, a New York City-registered 501(c)(3) non-profit (The Oil and Gas Governance Network) entity.
What shocked, however, was the OGGN submission in its entirety: sixty-four pages, long on speculation and innuendo while simultaneously short on specifics, truth and facts. It would be remiss of me to let this ‘submission’ go, lest the lies grow roots and become pseudo-facts.
The falsehoods begin on the introduction page.
Political
‘The OGGN has no political affiliation. We work for the benefit of ALL people of Guyana. OGGN’s mission is to advocate for rule of law, environmental protection, and financial norms with respect to oil exploration and production and good governance in Guyana.’ (sic)
This all sounds good, but is patently false. The OGGN was formed by retired overseas Guyanese professionals who viewed themselves as an indispensable resource to the Granger administration following the discovery of oil in 2015. They began with individual approaches, and could be seen daily trekking to OP with hopeful faces, leather satchels and voluminous folders of documents in the morning, and trudging back dejectedly in the afternoons following polite rejection by President Granger. They came to be anointed ‘Oil& Gas Governance Consultants, and left as a Network of Granger rejects.
Dr. Vincent Adams took the political route, joined the AFC in an executive capacity, and found his way to head the EPA in October of 2018. Dr. Adams is now seemingly with a foot firmly in both organizations despite the opposing ideals.
It is interesting to note that many members of the OGGN also share memberships in other politically active anti-PPP organizations. Janet Bulkan is an old-fashioned armchair environmentalist with a penchant for emotional arguments; Alfred Bhulai is plodding mathematics to the table, and some such as Andre Brandil, a medical research professor, is a member of the diaspora “who follows politics at home closely”. They remain unknowns in Guyana.
I believe that examining each of the claims made by OGGN would be instructive, but space can only permit a broad overview, and I begin with the glaring omissions.
APNU+AFC
OGGN makes no mention of the illegal unilateral appointment of James Patterson as Chair of the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM); the failure of David Granger to acknowledge the government fell on a motion of confidence on the 18th December 2018; the refusal/ failure of GECOM to declare itself ready to conduct Regional & General Elections within 90 days, as is their well-funded mandate; the abuse of the judicial system to frustrate the holding of elections by the incumbent APNU+AFC; the attempt to steal the 2020 elections, which was described as “a conscious and deliberate –even brazen – effort to violate the provisions of section 84(1) of the Representation of the Peoples Act by senior officials of the Guyana Elections Commission; the subsequent refusal to demit office by David Granger and his cohorts, which caused Guyana to sit in squalid limbo amidst the global Covid19 pandemic.
The OGGN saw no evil worth reportage during Guyana’s greatest democratic challenge since the passing of Forbes Burnham in 1985. With this perspective, we can now examine the OGGN submissions in detail.
Incompetent
OGGN complains to the UNCHR that “Many of the Laws of Guyana are not word-searchable: not saved as PDFs, but posted as images. Two examples are the Forests Act 2009, signed into law on 12 October 2010 but which was only made available as a word-searchable PDF in 2016 on the Ministry of Legal Affairs’ website. The second is the Natural Resource Fund Act 2021 [only available so far as the version of the Bill in the Official Gazette, and not word-searchable] This deliberate action to hinder easy access to national legislation should be discontinued.”
The examples in the complaint are self-defeating. As OGGN points out, the Forestry Act is now ‘word-searchable’ and EVERY pdf (even ones saved as images) can easily be converted into word-searchable documents via Adobe Acrobat, Microsoft Word, or a plethora of free online services such as pdf2go.com. Is the Government of Guyana to blame for OGGN’s membership unfamiliarity with modern technological advances? These are the folks who were to be rewarded handsomely to advise on Oil& Gas Governance nationally, but lack knowledge of pdf usage; experts who would need teenagers to guide them through the ‘interwebs’, LMAOF much?
Disconnected
OGGN claims “Access to Justice is limited by poverty. No poor person suffering from Government injustice can afford the requisite lawyers and court costs. The Legal Aid Services is very much underfunded, but it allows the Government to claim there is State-supported Legal Aid.” This claim is made with no supporting examples, and suffers from the distance OGGN members live from Guyana. Any resident would be able to point anyone, poor or rich, who thinks they are ‘suffering from Government injustice’, to a plethora of competent opposition-leaning lawyers (PNC or APNU) who would gleefully take it on at no cost to the citizen despite the merits. Anything with the potential to embarrass or cause loss of face to an incumbent is embraced and funded by the political opposition. This is the reality in Guyana that the ‘Diaspora’ may fail to appreciate in any measure.
Legal Aid serves those who cannot afford lawyers with distinction. It incorporates the nation’s top attorneys in a pro-bono capacity, its clients are mainly women seeking child support, divorce, and protection from abuse, its work deserves high praise and separation from those seeking relief from ‘Government injustice’. OGGN members would be well served by the occasional visit to the homeland and a reconnection with our realities.
Anachronistic
On the issue of Freedom of Expression, the OGGN relies entirely on an EU report, which it quotes verbatim and then endorses blindly. Those who reside in Guyana know that the days when our freedom of expression was curtailed are long behind us. If anything, the pendulum has swung too far the other way, as evidenced by articles and missives during the recent Venezuelan aggression that was borderline (forgive the pun) treasonous.
The EU report states, “Guyana, considering its limited population, benefits from a considerable number of media outlets. The media environment includes some twenty TV channels, thirty radio stations, four daily newspapers, and about ten popular online news media. All of them disseminate news content also via Facebook”.
Given how influential social media is within Guyana, I would ask: Who needs access to state media anymore? If your message is coherent, meaningful, or even hilariously nonsensical, there is a large, receptive, accessible audience on Guyana’s non-state media platforms. State media is an anachronism…much like the members of the OGGN.
Anti-oil/anti-development
The absurdity of an organization titled ‘Oil & Gas Governance Network’ with membership having no links to oil, gas, or governance, coupled with a strong ‘stop oil’ sentiment, is lost on the fossilised membership of OGGN. Since the change in administration in 2020, every word uttered by this group is dedicated to halting the burgeoning oil industry in Guyana. In my opinion, it is a purpose born out of Granger’s rejection, and in a larger sense, the rejection of these ‘experts’ by the Guyanese population as a whole. A bitterness pervades.
The OGGN submission speaks extensively on the need for ‘unlimited liability’ oil spill coverage, which any sensible person knows is unnecessary, and would add an enormous amount to the cost of oil production, so much to make the entire enterprise economically unviable to Guyana. OGGN share a schizophrenia that affects many of their ‘stop oil’ brethren. Contradictions abound in their philosophy and actions. Save all the oil money; share the oil money equitably. Oil production is a boon; oil production is potentially too dangerous to the environment to continue. Fossil fuel use is an abomination; keep my lights on, my car on the road, and my flights on time.
This group and its members fight constant battles that seek to drive the cost of oil production upwards in the name of wanting more money for Guyana. It is uncomprehensive behaviour by bitter old people who cannot bear their irrelevance.
Since accepting Dr. Vincent Adams into their fold, the OGGN has become an ardent campaigner for his return to the EPA, and is conversely a constant critic of the EPA. OGGN has (in their minds) tried and decided matters before the courts, and now provides pronouncements without waiting on the judiciary. This arrogation of responsibility is seemingly unlimited. Alfred Bhulai, in the UNCHR submission, stated that he “attended the same virtual course” with senior technical personnel at the Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs and Governance, titled “Advancing Open Government in the Caribbean, Strategies and Tools to Increase Transparency and Citizen Participation in Public Policy”, and Bhulai noted, “The Government attendees were not always present, and when they were, they did not like to admit any shortcomings” …which begs the question of if Bhulai was the course Facilitator or a student given to snitching or telling tall tales about classmates. It would be interesting to hear what his fellow student think of this ‘unchristian’ behaviour.
Conclusion
The entire OGGN submission to the UNCHR is an attempt to gain relevance, to place unfounded innuendoes and allegations on the public record, and thereafter give them life as ‘facts’. OGGN has become a political lobby for the APNU/AFC, as is marked by its absence of comment on the undemocratic events of 2018-2020. It will be interesting to see if they can retain their US 501 (c) (3) status after this blatant attempt at political lobbying, an activity specifically prohibited under that designation.
The OGGN membership is a motley crew of Granger-era rejects who are willing members of any organization that would allow them an anti-PPP platform. They are a real breadnut collective; or, as the locals know it, ‘Katahars’.
Sincerely,
Robin Singh
