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Every Man, Woman and Child in Guyana Must Become Oil-Minded – Column 175

Introduction

Today’s column concludes a two-part piece arising from comments made by ExxonMobil’s Chief Executive Officer during the company’s fourth-quarter earnings call. When Darren Woods spoke of force majeure “pausing the clock,” he was addressing shareholders and the wider investment community, not the Government of Guyana, a regulator, or an arbitral tribunal.

That context matters. In describing Guyana’s offshore acreage as something Exxon can count on “in the short term and in the longer term,” Woods was signaling future opportunity and growth. Guyana’s petroleum resources were being presented as deferred value — assets temporarily unavailable but nonetheless expected to be realised. In practical terms, Guyana’s natural resources were being used to support ExxonMobil’s forward-looking narrative to American and international shareholders.

What makes that possible is not bravado. It is experience.

Poor history

Guyana’s past treatment of force majeure has been notably permissive. On previous occasions, force majeure has been accepted by the Guyana authorities under expansive and accommodating conditions, with little public explanation and no visible demonstration of strict scrutiny. The practical effect has been repeated extensions of time, prolonged retention of acreage, and the suspension of contractual obligations without a corresponding showing that performance was genuinely prevented.

Over time, that practice shapes expectations. When force majeure is treated as something that can be obtained by request rather than established by proof, it ceases to be exceptional. It becomes routine. Contractors learn that delay carries limited cost and that contractual clocks can be paused with minimal resistance. In such an environment, it is hardly surprising that force majeure is spoken of as an advantage rather than an excuse.

But as we said last week, force majeure is not self-proving, and it is not unilateral. The determination lies with the Government of Guyana, subject to the dispute-resolution and arbitration mechanisms provided for in the Agreement. Where that determination is approached loosely or informally, the legal balance of the contract shifts from the Government.

But Woods is clever. He knows that statements made on international earnings calls shape analyst reports, investor expectations, and perceptions of future reserves. When Guyana’s petroleum acreage is publicly framed as future opportunity awaiting activation, it implicitly assumes State acquiescence. Silence or passivity by the Government in such circumstances risks being interpreted as confirmation.

Government must act

This is why the Government should not treat force majeure as a purely technical footnote. Once it is publicly invoked in a manner that carries market implications, the Government has a duty to engage. Engagement does not require confrontation, but it does require clarity: clarity that force majeure is not automatic; clarity that it is not indefinite; and clarity that it does not confer a future option over national resources.

That duty to engage is heightened by the Government’s own repeated reliance on sanctity of contract as the reason for refusing renegotiation of the 2016 Agreement. That principle cannot operate selectively. If the Agreement is to be respected, it must be enforced in full – including the limits it places on force majeure. Liberal accommodation today undermines contractual discipline tomorrow.

It also weakens Guyana’s position over time. Each unexamined extension – or non-relinquishment or partial relinquishment – becomes precedent in practice, even if not in law. Each accommodation reinforces the perception that even simply asking is more than sufficient. That perception, once entrenched, is difficult to reverse.

None of this is to deny that force majeure may arise in genuine cases. It can. But the history of permissive application explains why force majeure is now spoken of as a benefit to be managed rather than a disruption to be overcome. That is not where Guyana’s petroleum governance should be.

Conclusion

This issue now sits squarely with Cabinet. Continued silence or routine accommodation is no longer neutral; it carries legal and governance consequences. Once force majeure is asserted, the Government’s response becomes an administrative decision affecting public resources and is therefore subject to scrutiny. A history of permissive treatment does not protect such decisions; it weakens them. Cabinet cannot credibly invoke sanctity of contract while allowing force majeure to function as a default extension mechanism.

The choice is between reasserting contractual discipline now, or defending it later under judicial review.

Every man, woman and child must become oil-minded

Introduction

On 31 January 2026, Stabroek News carried a story that exposes how surreptitiously Exxon seeks to draw every drop of blood – sorry, oil – from Guyana. The report once again brings the issue of force majeure sharply into focus.

Force majeure is a contractual mechanism intended to grant additional time where performance has been genuinely and adversely affected by defined events beyond a contractor’s control. Speaking during ExxonMobil’s fourth-quarter earnings call, the company’s Chief Executive Officer, Darren Woods, stated that portions of the Stabroek Block remain under force majeure because of the Guyana–Venezuela border controversy, adding that one of its advantages is that it “pauses the clock” until the affected acreage becomes accessible.

Force majeure 

In recasting force majeure not as an inability to perform, but as a benefit derived from delay, the formulation matters. But the statement is even more dangerous. First, it ignores Guyana’s permanent sovereignty over its own resources. Second, it treats force majeure not as a temporary legal cause for non-performance, but as a mechanism for preserving future access to Guyana’s petroleum acreage. The language assumes continuity of entitlement, subject only to timing. The sheer arrogance of Exxon and its disregard of the 2016 Petroleum Agreement, of which force majeure is an integral part. 

This concept which traces its origin to the law of contract, is narrow and exceptional, applying only where an event is beyond the reasonable control of one party to an agreement is unable to meet his performance obligations because of an event – an “act of God” – not reasonably foreseen at the time the agreement was signed which genuinely prevents the performance of contractual obligations. It is not designed to suspend contractual time while a contractor waits for more favourable political or legal conditions. That is part of the risk of contracting.

Force majeure is not self-proving and is certainly not unilateral. While one party may assert it, that party does not determine force majeure. Neither Exxon nor its Chief Executive Officer is the arbiter. The determination lies with the Government of Guyana, subject to the Agreement’s dispute-resolution and arbitration provisions.

Questions

Measured against that standard, Exxon’s own account raises questions. The controversy over Guyana’s western border is neither new nor unexpected. It predates the 2016 Agreement by two centuries and was widely known internationally long before Exxon applied for the blocks which it now claims are subject to force majeure. Those blocks formed part of the geopolitical risk environment against which the investment decision was made. Let us not forget that Texas bullied the GGMC team into signing the Agreement. 

Foreseeability matters. A risk that is long-standing and openly acknowledged at the time of the contract cannot later be repackaged as force majeure simply because its resolution has been delayed or its consequences have become inconvenient. Remember too, that devious Exxon partly financed the ICJ case in the matter, in the form of a signing bonus which they and the Coalition sought to conceal.  

Conclusion

Under Guyana’s constitutional and international law framework, including the principle of permanent sovereignty over natural resources, access to petroleum acreage is not suspended property awaiting reactivation by any private contractor. It remains subject at all times to contractual compliance and lawful State decision-making. Force majeure does not confer a future option over national resources; it merely exempts performance where strict conditions are proved to have been met.

Having chosen sanctity of contract over sovereignty, the Government will have to explain why it would now not enforce the Agreement. That principle cannot now be applied selectively. Sanctity of contract means enforcing the Agreement as written, including the limits placed on when performance may be excused.

Whether those limits have been met in the present case is a question that cannot be answered by assertion or optimism of Exxon. It requires careful, independent scrutiny by the State.