Alliance for Change (AFC) Executive Member and former Public Infrastructure Minister, David Patterson is up in arms over the Prime Minister, Brigadier (retired) Mark Phillips’ alleged nondisclosure of pertinent agreements between the government and ExxonMobil etal regarding the Gas-to-Energy project.
In a letter to the Editor, Patterson lamented the top official’s sloth in making the documents available.
Patterson said that the PM, while defending the billions allocated to the project in 2022, 2023 and 2024, committed to providing the National Assembly with copies of the agreements signed with Exxon and other parties on the project.
On April 2, 2024, the Parliament Office wrote to the Prime Minister reminding him of his commitment to the National Assembly to provide copies of the contracts, something which he has refused to do for the last three years, Patterson said.
He noted that on November 2024, during the parliamentary session to examine the request for an additional G$25.3B for this project, the Prime Minister was again reminded of his outstanding commitment to the National Assembly.
Patterson said that the PM’s response was: “Mr. Chair, if I had failed in offering my response as requested by the honourable
member, let me apologize to this honourable House and I will seek to, in the shortest possible time, honour that request.”
This commitment, the AFC member said, has not yet been honoured.
With the election season already in motion, Patterson said the PM will speak glowingly about his government’s commitment to transparency and accountability. However, his alleged refusal to submit these documents contradict this claim.
Patterson was keen to add that the project is the country’s single largest capital project to date, adding that when it was originally launched, the budget was US$810M with a construction period of two years.
He noted that the project cost has now spiralled to over US$2.4B and climbing while the two-year construction period has long expired.
This, he argued, is a “sure sign that this is a failed and corrupt
project”.
“So once again in grand fashion, the PPP continues to fail to honour its promise of transparency and accountability. Everyone knows, even if they don’t say so – that PR and successful execution are two different things. in Guyanese parlance and as old people say, ‘Moutar and Guitar is two different Tar’.”
