Dear Editor,
Legitimate investments totalling millions of USD are not made without the involvement of lawyers, and no reputable lawyer would advise buying land from NICIL mere days before an election. The spate of sod-turning events on GuySuCo lands in Ogle are based on sales concluded well past any spectre of legality, these are just more holes left to fill by the Granger Administration.
Granger borrowed US$150 million to fix GuySuCo; he then promptly shut down four sugar estates, laid-off seven thousand plus workers and authorised the use of the sugar bond by a Special Purpose Unit. That money remains unaccounted for as NICIL has not submitted audited financial statements since the departure of Winston Brasington in 2015. To alleviate the shortfall in foreign currency caused by the closure of the sugar estates, Granger sold Guyana’s gold reserves at US$1150-1350 per ounce; Gold is expected to pass US$1800 an ounce shortly. The loss runs over US$500 million; in retrospect it may have been better to have kept the estates open, earn the foreign exchange and keep the workers employed. The decision to fire seven thousand workers is evidence of a hole where a heart should be.
The entire term of the Granger Administration can be characterised as holes! Five years of squander has left a massive hole in the treasury; five years of massive increases in taxation have left a hole in the pockets of citizens; a hole in the Constitution where ‘no gloss was required’. Holes in math and logic and of course the Exxon contracts; no discussion is had in Guyana without the US$55 billion loophole mentioned.
As with the Exxon exploration and PSA contracts, every story that breaks are full of holes, AC Marriott to be constructed, but Marriott Inc not aware, same for the Hilton, that group has an email they sent that was acknowledged. Surely that is not evidence to convince the Privatisation Board? Every Administration endures talk of square pegs in round holes, for Granger, pegs of any shape would be welcome; all we have to show for Guyana’s patrimony is an endless series of holes.
Now there seems to be a hole in the oil tanker that collected our profit oil, for years his supporters have touted David Granger as a ‘holy’ man, it would seem this is an error of spelling. The filling of these holes will take hard work and determination by the next Government. On March 2, vote to fix it and let us rid ourselves of these holes.
Respectfully,
Robin Singh
