Good times… rolling

There was a time when we were told to know our place – said place being a small, poor country with “resources” that gave us a large appetite for promises, but sadly a modest capacity for delivering them!! Then ExxonMobil found oil, and suddenly modesty became an increasingly difficult national virtue to maintain!!
Especially now that not only has our share of production from the Stabroek Block risen from the original PNC-Trotman “negotiated” 12.5 per cent to 39.8 per cent – and yes, plus that 2 per cent bonus!! – but production’s gonna go pass that million+ barrels daily to join Kuwait at #16 on the world’s hit parade!! A bigger bite of a bigger chunk of oil production AND finally reaching the point where the oil’s beginning to look less like somebody else’s money passing through our waters – and more like our own!!
But that ain’t all on the good-news front!! As we start digesting the idea that we’re an oil-producing country of some consequence that can make us put a swagger in our steps, another extraordinary possibility has appeared: a Guyanese could become Secretary General of the United Nations!! That’s right!! Carolyn Rodrigues-Birkett just topped the second Security Council straw poll on which of the eight contestants is the fairest of them all!!
There’s something deliciously improbable about the juxtaposition, innit?? Guyana is emerging as an oil producer on a scale that would’ve seemed absurd a decade ago – while a Guyanese woman from Moruca’s emerging as a serious contender to become the world’s chief diplomat!! The oil boom gives us an opportunity to move from the margins of international affairs towards the centre of global attention, and the Guyanese Secretary General is gonna take that journey further!!
At this rate, the next visitor might soon assume we’re Qatar with cricket – and perhaps that’s the most delicious part of our current transformation!! For years we’ve complained the world was ignoring us, but now it’s gonna be paying attention because we got oil – and because one of our own’s in contention to preside over the institution where the world’s bickering and quarrels are supposed to be settled!!
Your (jaundiced?) Eyewitness, however, sees a danger in that we may start getting complacent based on our own hype!! We’ve seen that oil can make a country rich without making it wise, while a Secretary General can give a country prestige without giving it immunity from foolishness. Think Ghana and Kofi Anan!! ‘Cause neither oil revenues nor international prominence is gonna repair potholes, improve health delivery or keep the lights on – unless we have a govt that performs like the PPP rather than talk – like our Opposition!!
So let the good times roll – but let’s not fall for conmen’s hype at elections!!

…ending
They say “talk is cheap” – but Sanction Man may soon find out it can sometimes come at a cost!! Even when you have billions and billions from taxes you haven’t paid to shell out to the minions hovering around like flies around horseshit!! Sanction Man was slapped with a suit filed by GuySuCo’s CEO for accusations he made about the fella being “corrupt in securing roadbuilding contracts”!!
Well, accusations of this type have been flowing fast and furious from Sanction Man – who’s ironically sanctioned by the US for CRIMINAL fraud!! – About Pressie’s “friends and family”!! Let’s hope the courts will move with alacrity on this suit since it has to do with urgent matters in the eyes of the Guyanese people!! We now have a chance for Sanction Man to offer PROOF on his accusations – or face the music!!
The Guysuco CEO’s not only a large-scale cane farmer of long standing – but also a fella with long corporate experience – and an ACCA degree to boot!!
He’ll have kept meticulous records!!

…with cricket
Now that we’re becoming “Quatar with cricket” – we’ve got a chance to enjoy the latter with the CPL delivering some really exciting games so far in the season. Tonight there’s the Trini Knightriders facing off the Antigua Falcons!!