On the hustings, the constant refrain, of course, is on development! The “of course” being appropriate due to the fact that for centuries we’ve been used as vehicles – and worse!! – to develop the folks from up north so they could live high off the hog. That expression illustrates our condition perfectly: they ate all the choice parts (high) of the hog – while we were thrown the feet, snouts, tails, guts (tripe), etc!! So, our politicians duking it out to run our country gotta focus on ensuring we, at least, get the bare necessities to keep body and soul together.
So, what was that hullaballoo about “maintaining biodiversity” at the Convention Centre – with the launching of the Global Biodiversity Alliance Summit a few weeks ago with world leaders and all?? Yet hasn’t even been mentioned on the campaign trail!! “Bio” means life so combined with “maintaining diversity” unsurprisingly means we should maintain the diversity of living things on our dear old planet!! Having global leaders commit to this goal means the diversity of living things is being threatened!!
Now, we’ve been plugging away for more than a decade on one aspect of this threat – global warming. This is gonna kill ALL living things unless we get it under control much less maintaining the three levels of diversity: species, genetic, and ecosystem. It’s rather ironic that the threat was caused by those who lived high off the hog and (hoggishly) increased their consumption patterns in all spheres of life to such heights that their energy demands led to both global warming and reducing “biodiversity”!!
Interestingly, discussions in Guyana on maintaining biodiversity kicked off back in 1989 when then Pres Hoyte agreed to create the Iwokrama International Centre for Rainforest Conservation!! This 371,000 hectares nature reserve proudly stands as one of the last remaining intact lowland tropical forests on the planet!! There’s been international efforts to maintain biodiversity since the 1990s – but as with so many multilateral initiatives, those who live high off the hog pushed the burden on poor countries like us!!
You’d think the solution is simple, wouldn’t you?? That the folks up north reduce their consumption a tad – while allowing us in the underdeveloped world to catch up!! But no Siree Bob!! They want to lecture us from on high (the hog!!) – along with some of their local acolytes – to insist we remain like “noble savages”!! Who aren’t seen as so noble since the folks from northern climes say we’re living in “shithole countries’!! Not much nobility in that, is there??
So Prezzie has taken a lead in steering the discourse on development while maintaining biodiversity – for which we can be the model to the world!! YES!!!
…on US and sanctions
It’s beyond irony that the Opposition parties are criticising the US Ambassador for explaining the implications for folks becoming involved with an OFAC-sanctioned individual – who decided to run for the Presidency!! They claim her clarifications violate a directive from the State Department that Ambassadors shouldn’t opine on the “fairness or integrity of an electoral process, its legitimacy, or the democratic values…(but) when appropriate, noting shared foreign policy interests”.
Now the good Ambassador wasn’t commenting on our electoral process – but elaborating on the “shared foreign policy interests” of her country and ours!!
From our standpoint losing US$50 Million in taxes from smuggled gold by the sanctioned presidential candidate is certainly in our interest to recover!! And the US, would’ve only taken action because the fraudulent practices impacted on their interests – one way or another!! Was some of the gold sourced from sanctioned Venezuelan mines?? Were they smuggled through routes traversing our Reg 1 to the US used by drug smugglers??
A hint to Beneba mek Quashi tek notice!!
