Work to create partnerships, not sensational headlines

Dear Editor,
As a former Minister for Mines and Minerals (1992 to 2011) I write in response to that startling front page headline in the Kaieteur News of Tuesday May 18th, “Chinese company pays G$1000 rent per acre yearly for Guyana’s largest gold claim.”
That statement is true, still absolutely true, but still absolutely true for each and every large scale gold mine, whether owned by a Chinese, a Canadian, an American, an Australian, a European, a Ghanian, an Indian, a Pakistani, a Saudi, a Guyanese, or any nationality. At a minimum, that shocking statement was “much ado about nothing”.
That startling headline (and others like those on the standard incentives on the front page of Wednesday, 19th) have been sending imaginations running wild. There were some who saw it as confirmation that Government (and governance) in Guyana is pursued at the whims and fancies of Ministers and Officials, and there were others (sometimes the same persons) who felt that it ought to be so.
That is what bothered and perplexed me: that that startling headline, true but unremarkable, was dismantling and destroying efforts made over decades at working for a steadily more ordered, standard way of Government and governance.
I am not concerned about the Chinese company Zijun Mining Group beyond what such action says about us Guyanese to them and to every other foreign investor (and to local investors as well). Kaieteur News, as a responsible member of the media, should not indulge themselves so. I cannot accept that they did not think of checking whether those leases and incentives were not standard.
I am, however, emotionally connected to that location. I invested a lot in that location (and a number of others) in many meetings from late 1992 with father and son Patrick Sheridan Sr. and Jr., along with their adopted Guyanese family member and Country Manager, Violet Smith – travelling to the prospecting camp there in approximately the year 2000, boating up the Cuyuni, portaging around Timmerman’s/Chinaman’s falls; meetings with Barama in approximately the year 2007 for the shared use of their Buckhall road, and visiting Aurora by road during its construction, and later flying to its opening in about 2015.
Just from the outside, the reported differences among shareholders about its management and subsequent sale suggest that returns have been falling below what was expected. Our concern, hope and efforts should lean towards keeping the Aurora mine going profitably, if at all possible.
I want to say some similar words about our oil in calling for a more comprehensive, reasonable, balanced attitude towards ESSO (and its partners). It is time to leave behind the too-often-espoused position that we Guyanese are just receiving crumbs and dribbles. Don’t take that suggestion from me – I was involved, but not compromised – in urging us to put out a welcome mat and be at our most seductive when Dennison first told me, in about 1998, that ESSO was interested in the far off-shore, where no one was yet (then) venturing. See the letters and poems from Guyanese-born Midland Texan Dr. Tulsi Dyal Singh – some things could have been arranged differently, many things could have been tighter, but we are getting a return that is in the range.
The EXXON oil finds came about 100 years after the first search was done within our boundaries and after about 40 drill holes that were non-commercial but would have entailed expenditures/investments of about USD ten billion. We shouldn’t throw our hands up in the air saying it is just our bad luck that now that we have found our oil, climate change seems to be calling for an end to the use of fossil fuels (including oil). We must guard against the easy answers of all or nothing, and consider the balanced road of development, a low carbon development (LCD) path that our Government is arguing and pursuing.
For sure, from our history of slavery, indentureship and colonialism, we want as much as we can get, and we must keep the closest watch to ensure that we get all that we should get; but perhaps even more, our struggles from slavery, indentureship and colonialism were for us to take our equal place among all Humankind, equally responsible, knowledgeable, contributing, sharing and so on. With a population of less than one million in 7,000 million humans, our aim should be to develop satisfying partnerships with all other peoples of the world. And when we speak proudly that one could find a Guyanese in every significant city around the world, we are saying that we are already far along that road.
Perhaps we could start in considering to develop a sense of, and then the reality of, partnership with ZIJIN, EXXON, HESS and CNOOC. They no doubt give away nothing, but they are not the worst out there.

Sincerely,
Samuel A.A. Hinds
Former Prime
Minister
Minister of Mines
and Minerals