Column 194 – The Resource Curse Begins on a Farm (Part 2)
In Column 193, I argued that the controversy surrounding President Irfaan Ali’s farm at Long Creek is not fundamentally about agriculture. It is about governance in an oil-producing state. It raises questions that no presidential video, however polished, can answer. Those questions belong to independent institutions.
But Long Creek did not arise in isolation. It is the latest manifestation of a style of governance that has become increasingly evident during President Ali’s administration. The issue is not simply the acquisition or operation of a farm. It is whether Guyana’s institutions of accountability have kept pace with the extraordinary concentration of political and economic power that has accompanied the country’s petroleum transformation.
Every presidency leaves an institutional legacy. Some strengthen Parliament, reinforce the rule of law and enlarge the space for independent oversight. Others centralise authority, weaken scrutiny and leave institutions less capable of performing their constitutional functions. It is against that standard that every presidency should be judged, including this one.
The record is troubling.
Parliament, the central institution of representative democracy, has become progressively less effective as an instrument of accountability. The Public Accounts Committee, historically one of Parliament’s most important oversight mechanisms, has ceased to play the role contemplated by the Constitution and the Standing Orders. Public accounts have remained outstanding for years, depriving Parliament and the public of timely scrutiny of the expenditure of billions of dollars of public money. Parliamentary sittings themselves have become infrequent, often convened principally to facilitate the Government’s legislative and financial agenda rather than to provide sustained scrutiny of executive action.
Equally significant has been the weakening, or failure to strengthen, institutions specifically intended to hold the Executive to account. The previous administration established the State Assets Recovery Agency as part of a wider accountability framework. The Ali administration repealed that legislation and abolished the Agency. Whether SARA was effective is open to debate. Eliminating an accountability institution rather than reforming it sent an unmistakable signal about the direction of governance.
The promised Petroleum Commission has likewise failed to materialise. That omission is difficult to reconcile with the scale of Guyana’s petroleum sector. Every major oil-producing nation recognises that technical regulation should not rest exclusively within central government. Guyana, despite repeated commitments, continues without the independent regulator that has long been promised.
The same concerns arise in relation to access to information. A democracy cannot function effectively if the disclosure of information depends upon executive goodwill rather than enforceable legal rights. Yet the Office of the Commissioner of Information has never assumed the prominence or effectiveness that Parliament intended. Transparency remains more an aspiration than an institutional reality.
Perhaps no institution better illustrates the failure to modernise accountability than the Integrity Commission. Guyana is no longer the country it was when that legislation was enacted. The economy has been transformed by petroleum wealth, sophisticated corporate structures and unprecedented opportunities for the accumulation of assets. Yet the disclosure regime remains substantially frozen in time.
The declaration form itself is wholly inadequate for a modern petroleum economy. It is neither a comprehensive disclosure instrument nor a true statutory declaration attracting the ordinary legal consequences of sworn statements. It occupies an uncertain space between the two. More remarkable still, despite almost three decades of profound economic change, successive governments have failed to modernise it. If Guyana is serious about integrity in public life, the law requires more than cosmetic adjustment. It requires fundamental reform.
These institutional weaknesses matter because they coincide with the expansion of executive discretion in matters involving immense public resources.
Silica City is a striking example. Presented as one of the country’s flagship development initiatives, it has attracted commitments involving billions of dollars. Yet the public has received little comprehensive accounting of expenditure, procurement, implementation or measurable outcomes. Public confidence cannot be sustained where projects of such magnitude proceed without regular and detailed public reporting.
Long Creek therefore assumes a significance that extends well beyond the President’s private affairs. The question is not whether President Ali is entitled to own a farm or engage in agriculture. He is. The question is whether the Head of State, exercising enormous constitutional authority while simultaneously pursuing substantial private commercial interests, should be subject to disclosure standards more exacting than those applicable to ordinary citizens. The answer must surely be yes.
That is particularly so because the Presidency does not end when a President leaves office. The law provides substantial continuing benefits, recognising the enduring dignity and importance of the office. Those public privileges reinforce the need for rigorous conflict-of-interest rules and comprehensive disclosure obligations. Private commercial interests must never be allowed to collide with public office and authority, without transparent safeguards protecting both the office-holder and the public.
The issues raised in these two columns concern the architecture of constitutional government in a country rapidly developing by oil wealth. While the general rule is that every administration builds projects, only some leave behind stronger democratic institutions than they inherited. Future Presidents will inherit the institutions being shaped today. If those institutions are independent, resilient and capable of scrutinising executive power without fear or favour, President Ali will have made a lasting contribution to Guyana’s democracy. If, however, they emerge weaker, more dependent or less capable of holding the Executive to account, that too will become part of his legacy.
History’s verdict on President Ali will rest not only on the prosperity generated during Guyana’s first oil boom, but on whether he strengthened the institutions that protect the Republic or weakened them when they were most needed. If the verdict is the latter, Long Creek will be remembered not as a controversy over a farm but as the moment when Guyana’s Resource Curse ceased to be a theory and became both a constitutional and an institutional reality.
Finally, obvious as it is, it is still worth noting that a President governs not only by constitutional authority but by personal example. If legitimate questions about his own conduct remain unresolved through independent institutional scrutiny, his moral authority to demand the highest standards from Ministers, public officials and the wider public is inevitably weakened.
That is not only sad. It will be self-inflicted.