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2025 Manifestos – This time it is the PPP/C’s Record on the Line

Every Man, Woman and Child in Guyana Must Become Oil-Minded – Column 167

Introduction

The electorate in 2020 punished APNU+AFC for the lopsided 2016 Petroleum Agreement, revealed to the public only long after it had been signed in June 2016. Civil society was relentless, and the Ali–Jagdeo ticket was brutal and emphatic. They pledged to review and renegotiate the Agreement. They would establish an independent Petroleum Commission. They promised better contract administration.

Five years later, the debate has come full circle. This column looks specifically at the oil and gas sections of the manifestos of the PPP/C, APNU, AFC, WIN, and the Forward Guyana Movement, now offered up to the public. The focus is on what each party promises, what has been delivered, and which proposals stand up to scrutiny.

PPP/C: Spin Versus Reality

The PPP/C takes a dual approach. A review, nay boast of its achievements and a promise of what is yet to come. So, it highlights its legislative action: a new 2021 Natural Resource Fund Act, the 2023 Petroleum Activities Act to replace the age-old Petroleum Exploration and Production Act, and a new model Production Sharing Agreement with less outrageous fiscal terms for future blocks. It boasts about US$3.1 billion in the NRF which is in fact overstated by the amount of taxes it has paid on behalf of the oil companies but which it refuses to disclose. Boasts about 1,000 local firms registered under the Local Content Act which it promised to revise since 2023 but did not. Then it conflates these with stalled progress on the Wales Gas-to-Energy project which is being done without a feasibility study or a disclosed cost.

Nowhere does the manifesto admit that none of these touch the 2016 deal that lies at the heart of the controversy. The government promised renegotiation in 2020 but never tried. Contract administration has been poor: no audit completed on time, the first audit mishandled, and relinquishment deadlines allowed to drift. The Petroleum Commission, once sold as a centrepiece of independent oversight, has been quietly abandoned.

Even the NRF reform was shallow. Transfers are set by a simplistic formula based on percentages of the fund’s balance, ensuring political control rather than professional management. What the PPP/C calls reform is, in truth, centralisation of power in the hands of politicians.

It faces a huge trust deficit to explain the reality that its government campaigned as a reformer but governed as a dormouse and apologist.

APNU: Renegotiation and Fiscal Rules

APNU overlooks its primary role in the 2016 Agreement and has been annoyingly ambivalent about the Agreement and the PPP/C’s management of the oil sector for five years.

If we can take it at its word, it will “get a better deal within two years.” It proposes an autonomous Petroleum Commission, professional advisory teams, fiscal rules to discipline savings and spending, and publication of all contracts.

This is right in principle. Guyana cannot rely on future agreements alone while the Stabroek PSA drains the treasury. Codified fiscal rules would add stability and protect future generations. The challenge, however, is feasibility. Exxon is unlikely to accept changes easily, and legal routes are narrow. APNU may risk overpromising, but it at least faces the reality of the 2016 deal and couples renegotiation with stronger institutions.

AFC: Oversight and Environment First

Ironically, the AFC, whose top leader Raphael Trotman signed the 2016 Agreement and whose current leader and presidential candidate is a key professional service provider to the oil companies, offers the most detailed timetable. Within 30 days it would initiate renegotiation; within 60 days establish a Petroleum Commission. It pledges to enforce ring-fencing, ban routine flaring and produced-water dumping, and require full liability insurance for spills. It also promises quarterly NRF reporting with civil society oversight.

The manifesto’s strength is its seriousness about oversight and environment. By focusing on insurance and liability, it addresses the gravest risk – that a spill could cripple the country. Its emphasis on transparency and civil society participation aligns with international best practice.

The weakness is ambition. Attempting renegotiation, regulatory reform, and NRF overhaul simultaneously may overwhelm capacity. Yet of all the manifestos, the AFC’s is the most technically robust and grounded in the mechanics of sound petroleum management.

These provisions bear the unmistakable hand of Dr. Vince Adams, arguably the most accomplished Guyanese petroleum environment specialist.  

WIN: Transparency and Renewables

While not the most technically sound or complete set of policy proposals, WIN relies on its appeal and offers a people-centred focus. It promises full publication of all extractive contracts, strict ring-fencing, and transparent monitoring of oil revenues. More strikingly, it proposes a bold national wind and solar programme to complement gas-to-shore, reduce tariffs by up to 70%, and end chronic blackouts.

WIN’s vision and its perceived authenticity seem to resonate with the ordinary voters. Households care as much about electricity bills and reliability as they do about royalty rates. Tying petroleum wealth to cheaper, cleaner power connects oil policy directly to daily life. The weakness is feasibility — financing and executing such an ambitious renewable rollout will be difficult. Still, WIN adds a valuable emphasis on sustainability and transparency.

Forward Guyana Movement: Linking Oil to Governance

The Forward Guyana Movement situates oil inside a broader governance reset: shared power, zero tolerance for corruption, audited NRF accounts, and movement toward a National Oil Company. It emphasises that without tackling corruption and exclusion, no resource management system will succeed.

This perspective is valid. Oil cannot be insulated from Guyana’s wider governance challenges. The weakness is that the manifesto offers fewer technical details compared with the AFC or WIN. But its central message – that petroleum governance is an offshoot of political governance – is important.

Conclusion: Rating the Promises

My assessment is that the AFC’s proposals come out tops, followed by the APNU, WIN and FGM with the PPP/C’s suffering from a betrayal of trust and a promise of more of the same.

 The electorate’s decision will determine whether Guyana continues with political control dressed up as reform, or whether it begins the hard work of building professional institutions and securing a fairer share of its oil wealth.

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Oil as an election issue

Every Man, Woman and Child in Guyana must become oil-minded – Column 166

Today’s column compares the role of oil and the 2016 Petroleum Agreement in the 2025 election campaign and in 2020, the first year of oil production. Then Bharrat Jagdeo and Irfaan Ali were seeking to unseat the APNU + AFC Coalition. The Agreement was released to the public on 28 December 2017, but its terms were hotly debated and Jagdeo was violently opposed to every aspect about the contract.

Critics could hammer its poor terms and secrecy, link it to Raphael Trotman’s signature, and fold it into a wider indictment: APNU+AFC had lost a no-confidence motion in December 2018, refused to call elections on time, and then – when elections were finally held – spent five months trying to rig the results. With its 2% royalty, sweeping tax exemptions, lack of ring-fencing, and a year of secrecy before disclosure, it was the PPP/C’s sharpest weapon against the APNU+AFC coalition.

In that climate, the oil contract symbolised incompetence, impunity, and contempt for the rule of law. It was political dynamite.

Today, the deal is intact, citizens’ worst fears about the lopsided nature of the Agreement have been proved right. Yet, the political fire is gone – not because the problems have been resolved, but because the ground shifted.

A changed landscape in 2025

Production has more than quadrupled. Prices have stayed steady, revenues have kept flowing, and the budget is now about four times 2020’s size. The PPP/C has used this wealth not to fix the deal, but to bury it under high-visibility spending, ribbon-cuttings, and cash grants with more to come. For many households, a grant feels more important than a royalty clause. Attention has shifted from how the deal was made to how the windfall is distributed.

The opposition is weakened. APNU+AFC cannot credibly attack its own agreement. The scars of the no-confidence saga and the 2020 electoral impasse remain, and leadership changes have not restored trust.

More significantly and inexplicably, the PPP/C changed its tune. In opposition it promised “review and renegotiate.” In government it has refused to release the report on how the deal was signed, avoided investigating Trotman, kept secret the financing of billions in tax concessions, completed no audits of cost claims, stalled on renegotiation, and quietly channeled oil revenues into the much-delayed, over-budget gas-to-energy project. Its language now matches APNU+AFC’s old line: “sanctity of contract” and the Venezuela bogey.  Then of course, the Vice President is the Petroleum Commission.

Several forces have removed the oil contract from Guyana’s political agenda. Direct cash handouts have proven more politically effective than contract debates. When voters receive immediate benefits, arguments about royalty rates lose both urgency and meaning. For many, the fear of antagonising Exxon – and by extension, the Trump administration – has become a new political reality. With Trump’s return to power and his pro-business stance, challenging American oil interests may seem  riskier than defending sovereignty.

The National Assembly has avoided discussion of the petroleum agreement. Neither party shows willingness to reopen the contract, quarantining the issue from debate. Government influence over media has shifted coverage toward positive messaging while marginalizing critics. The transformation has been so complete that even Kaieteur News, once the loudest critic, lost a leading anti-contract journalist to the camp of its defenders.

Years of technical arguments with little change have exhausted commentators and the public. The complexity of petroleum economics has proven difficult to sustain politically. The absence of disasters has weakened reform arguments. Without oil spills, critics’ warnings remain theoretical, removing catalysts for concern.

Broader democratic concerns have overshadowed contract issues. Questions about governance have drawn energy away from petroleum debates toward institutional health. Venezuela’s territorial claims have made ExxonMobil’s presence geopolitically valuable. Challenging the company is seen as undermining security, increasing threats to our territoriality.

With this retreat, Exxon may feel that it has taken ownership of Guyana. 

The consequences of silence

But the PPP/C is as much an asset to and a friend of Exxon as the APNU +AFC has been. Its record on oil governance is no better than APNU+AFC’s: no reform of a widely criticised contract, no completed audits, no accountability for its signing, no delivery of an independent petroleum commission; secrecy over vast tax credits that would wipe out the Natural Resource Fund if properly accounted for. And the control of every aspect of the largest sector of the economy in the grip of one man, in a mutual pact with Exxon.

Each passing year reinforces the belief that nothing can and will be changed. An agreement condemned in 2020 that remains unchanged in 2025 becomes more entrenched with each passing year. And that does not escape the wily eyes of Exxon.

Yet, the fundamental issues remain as they were in 2020. Oil belongs to the people; so do the revenues. Being “oil-minded” does not mean memorising production data – it means looking beyond today’s grants to securing Guyana’s sovereignty and tomorrow’s sustainability. It means insisting on transparency, audits, and investments that outlast the oil era: education, health, infrastructure, and diversification.

Conclusion

The 2016 Petroleum Agreement has not faded because it is no longer an issue. It has lost its sharpness because of the duplicity and the about face of the PPP/C. It has been buried by money, messaging, a weakened opposition, parliamentary silence, media influence, fatigue, democratic erosion, geopolitics, growing evidence of pervasive corruption, and the threats to our democracy.

In 2020, it was a sword. In 2025, neither main party wants to touch it. That is exactly why the people must. Every year of silence makes Exxon’s position more unshakeable and Guyana’s leverage weaker. The window for fair terms is closing with each passing barrel. We must remain oil minded.

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Business Commentary Part 32: The Underground Economy in two parts

Business and Economic Commentary by Christopher Ram

Part I: When business disputes expose underground networks

Introduction

The leak of an explosive March 25, 2025, interview between businessman Azeem ‘Junior’ Baksh of Gold Target Imports and intrepid journalist Travis Chase has triggered more than just a public clash between wealthy businessmen. Baksh detailed what he described as a “harrowing” gold importation scheme, claiming it implicated high-ranking officials. “I am sure that they want to close me down,” Baksh said. “Tamesh Jagmohan wants me closed down… Sonna made that very clear to me – if I pursue him for owed cash, (those in authority) would use state agencies to get me.”

The parties have denied the revelations. But beyond the specific business dispute lies a more troubling question: how did our country arrive at a point where underground economic networks appear so deeply intertwined with state power?

This is no child’s play. It recalls a time when the underground economy which kept the country supplied to an extent that it was tolerated by the state and woven into everyday life. But crucially, it did not threaten the state’s survival – it existed around politics, not inside it.

Frighteningly, Baksh, reflecting his experiences, tells us that in this new world, State agencies would act as agents of a different type in service to private disputants.

In the 1970s and 1980s, it was sometimes difficult to distinguish the underground economy from what was described as the official economy. Top public servants and business executives left their offices to buy contraband flour and potatoes and dhal and toilet paper from shops that had lookouts for the state police. After the Sophia Declaration nationalisations, the government controlled an estimated over 80% of the economy. Import licences, foreign exchange rationing, and price controls created chronic shortages. The oil crisis of 1973, collapsing bauxite prices, and the fixed exchange rate of G$2.55 to US$1 became a fiction.

How the original underground worked

On the streets, US dollars traded at several times the official rate. Traders traveled to Trinidad, Suriname, Venezuela, and Curaçao to buy goods with black-market dollars for resale at home. Tellingly, when President Hoyte introduced cambio licences to formalise currency exchange, the men who had been selling US dollars in Commerce Street (where else?) and around Stabroek Market were among the first to apply for licences to operate non-bank cambios.

Border routes moved goods from neighbouring countries: Springlands on the East, Lethem on the South and fuel coming via Morawhanna to the North. Some operators became household names – the man with an oriental nickname who started out dealing with flour, built a massive construction equipment empire, an accomplished athlete who hawked ladies’ underwear was eponymously associated with a nightclub (and noise nuisance) and now a major entertainment and gambling operation.

That phase also produced the market vendor who founded a prominent national newspaper; another whose buildings have transformed Georgetown’s skyline, and three enterprising professionals who pioneered the barrel trade that grew into a major shipping operation. These were textbook cases of how contraband profits could be folded into legitimate corporate identities.

Political tolerance, not dependence

Despite public threats to “stamp out smuggling,” the state often looked the other way. Contraband eased shortages, and the underground currency market provided hard cash that even official agencies sometimes accessed through intermediaries. Crucially, operators did not try to buy political influence – they were traders, not power brokers. Indeed, one of them up to this day describes himself simply as a hustler.

By the mid-1980s, this economy was part of normal life. Border towns like Lethem and Corriverton bustled with unofficial markets. Regent and Water streets offered goods that government outlets lacked. Civil servants and police officers ran small side ventures – a minibus, a shop, rental rooms – to supplement incomes. These were modest, low-profile, and carefully kept separate from public activities.

That sector did not escape academic interest. Perhaps the most famous was Clive Thomas whose study found that the underground economy at 80-100% of the official economy during the mid-1980s. Notable too were Bishnodat Persaud (UWI) and Kenrick Hunte (UG) who found valuable opportunity to study the phenomenon of parallel markets and shadow activities, exchange rates and tax evasion. Inevitably too, there were institutional sources like the IMF, World Bank, and ECLAC.

Then and now

This first-phase underground economy distorted prices and eroded formal business, but it was not an existential danger to governance. The black market, not the Bank of Guyana, set the real price of the dollar. Formal importers could not match contraband’s speed or cost. Staying in one’s place was the rule. Politicians tolerated the underground economy. The unwritten rule was simple: take a little, keep it quiet, and stay away from the political arena.

The most telling difference between then and now lies in scale and integration. In the 1970s-80s, a senior public servant might own one or two minibuses or run a small shop. Today, many in similar positions have become major contractors, licensed and unlicensed exporters, or concession-holders, and dredge owners, using public office as commercial weapons.

This change is fundamental: the side hustle has moved from the margins to the heart of the state apparatus. Phase One was a safety valve in a scarcity economy. Underground operators made money but did not bankroll political parties and their election campaigns or dictate policy. Nor did politicians need them to survive in power to retain – and remain in – power.

Conclusion

What we see in the Baksh revelations is fundamentally different. The underground economy has grown richer, politically powerful – and dangerous. Unexplained and dark money are called on to finance expensive election campaigns. Political and commercial interests combine in a symbiotic web of private and public corruption.

This is no longer tolerance – it is mutual dependency. When underground wealth and political power lock together, they threaten not just fair competition, but democracy itself.

Next week: Part II examines how this transformation threatens democratic institutions and what the Baksh case reveals about modern underground networks.

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The PPP/C’s campaign has suffered degradation in standards in contrast to an issues based opposition

Dear Editor,

The PPP/C’s elections campaign has taken a nasty turn. One arm has leaned on disguised vote-buying and selective, distorted facts. Another has descended into language so coarse and abusive as to be unprintable. It is not confined to fringe voices. Leonard Craig, Joseph Hamilton, and even the Vice President himself have joined in.

Minister Vindhya Persaud, to her credit, spoke out against the conduct. But hers was a lone voice, quickly drowned by the noise of the campaign. The party or its women’s arm took no corrective action. GECOM, which is supposed to safeguard fairness, has remained silent. The Ethnic Relations Commission, which had only weeks ago promoted a code of conduct, also looked away.

What is even more striking is who has been asked to carry the harshest lines. It is not the party’s leadership, but campaigners given licence to say what the leaders will not. Their role is clear: to reach certain voters while proving their loyalty and securing their place. They are being used, while the leadership hides its hands.

The problem runs deeper. The PPP continues to shelter individuals facing serious criminal charges, including sexual misconduct. When vulgarity, falsehoods, and compromised candidates are tolerated, the damage goes beyond politics. It corrodes society itself. It lowers standards, teaches the young that indecency is strength, and normalises such behaviour.

Some argue these tactics come from desperation or fear of the opposition. But fear cannot justify filth. The contrast between them is clear: opposition parties, even the one most vilified, are running restrained campaigns, focusing on issues more than personalities. They have shown that an election can be fought without dragging the nation into the gutter.

This matters because once such behaviour is accepted, it is not easily reversed. Today it is vulgar language, tomorrow it may be worse – harming members of the opposition and their supporters. If standards collapse, elections will no longer be contests of ideas but battles of abuse. That is the road the PPP/C is taking the nation. 

This is not healthy politics. It is distortion and vulgarity, a degradation of our society and its standards. Decent voters should recoil – and show their disapproval come September 1.

Sincerely,

Christopher Ram

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GMSA’s compliments government on its tariff failure

Dear Editor,

I refer to Mr. Howard Bulkan’s letter “We are incensed at non-consultation and composition of GMSA’s press release” (SN August 4, 2025). Adverting to broad assurances about the “negotiations” that led to a five percentage points increase from 10% to 15% in the tariff imposed on Guyana’s exports into the USA, the entrepreneur and processed wood product exporter asks the simple but profound question about the reported negotiating process by Guyana: “At what levels? Between whom? “Over what conditions?”

The answer to these questions appears to lie in the limited scope of GMSA’s actual involvement in the process. While the association acknowledges that the wood sector – particularly companies like Bulkan’s – would be most affected by these tariffs, their engagement appears to have been confined to a meeting with VP Jagdeo rather than any direct participation in negotiations with US counterparts. As part of the GMSA – Government engagement, then head of the GMSA revealed in April of this year that “the government has asked [the GMSA] not to issue any public statements until a resolution is reached”. Without consultation or feedback, the GMSA agreed.

It appears that the Government of Guyana took a disjointed approach to the matter. As the Stabroek News of July 7 reported, President Ali engaged the CARICOM Heads; Guyana “was in advanced discussions with the US side”; and that “we are approaching this in partnership with the US.” Despite all the optimism expressed over each of these approaches, we ended up coming out worse than the 10% baseline which replaced Trump’s initial hypothetical (and flawed) 38%. None of these however, appears to have included the persons most directly affected, or seemingly, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs where we have not one but two ministers.

And what did the GMSA do about this failure? It issued a statement complimenting the Government! Of course, no consultation. It is not too late, and a meeting of affected and concerned members should now be convened. 

It appears that the leaders of the GMSA does not understand that it comprises a cross-section of Guyana society, and that its leaders have no authority to make what are no more than political statements in the name of the association. They are free to do so in their own names, thereby demonstrating their political preferences.

The Private Sector Commission has not been much better in this matter. As a corporate member, I persuaded the chair of the relevant PSC sub-committee to convene a meeting to address the tariff. One meeting was called. No follow-up, and no action of which I am aware. That is not an isolated issue. I have called unsuccessfully and repeatedly for a meeting of the corporate members, speaking with the group’s Convenor on more than one occasion. Results: None. 

Only the leaders of these bodies can say whether they seek these offices to satisfy their ego or promote their personal, business or political interests. They will therefore measure their effectiveness differently. What is certain, however, is that they have failed their members, like Mr. Bulkan, who join these organisations for the greater good and for proper representation, not for political theatre masquerading as advocacy.

Sincerely,

Christopher Ram