Latest update November 13th, 2024 1:00 AM
Apr 06, 2024 ExxonMobil, News, Oil & Gas
“Exxon don’t come and the government does nothing as the majority in that Committee…because of this incestuous relationship government does not want that kind of scrutiny and that is where the democracy guardrails are collapsing as a result of the nonfunctioning of our Parliament and its committees.” – Khemraj Ramjattan
Kaieteur News – The Parliamentary Sectoral Committee on Natural Resources has been unable to get officials of oil giant ExxonMobil and its regulator, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to appear before the body for scrutiny.
Opposition Member of Parliament (MP) and former Minister of Public Telecommunications, Cathy Hughes flagged this as a serious concern on Friday during an Alliance For Change (AFC) press conference. Hughes who is a member of the Natural Resources Sectoral Committee explained, “Since our meeting of November 10, 2023 (we) asked our committee why we have not been able to get a date from Exxon yet as to when they will come to the committee to answer some of the questions and concerns that we have.”
She said it was worrisome that a Committee designed to provide and ensure scrutiny and transparency in the operation of the natural resources sector has not been able to question Exxon and the EPA despite the Committee agreed and discussed sending the correspondences, as the Minutes would confirm. “This reflects badly on the operations of the Parliamentary Committee of Natural Resources because it’s not for the want of asking and following, up we have minutes to show and also the fact that Exxon has not found it fit to respond also troubling,” the former Minister noted.
The Committee is presently chaired by Opposition MP, Dawn Hastings-Williams while Minister of Natural Resources, Vickram Bharrat is the Vice Chairman. Also from the government are Minister of Home Affairs, Robeson Benn, Minister within the Ministry of Local Government and Regional Development, Anand Persaud, and MPs Faizal Jafarally, and Lee Williams.
Representing the Opposition along with Hastings-Williams and Hughes are Vincent Henry and Rickey Ramsaroop. Hughes explained that the Committee had agreed to a work plan which included information gathering and transparency efforts which involved the invitation of organizations to answer questions. “The Committee operates in the interest of bringing the concerns and questions all Guyanese have to the Parliament and we request answers,” the Chairperson of the AFC highlighted.
As part of this process, she explained that the Local Content Secretariat had appeared before the Committee where a number of recommendations were made to the organization. However, Hughes said, “For many months, I’m talking about from October, since the start back of the session after we had our closure from August to October, since then we have been asking and the Committee has written to both the EPA and to Exxon inviting them to come to answer questions and provide information on areas of concern and as I have said to you, since November letters of invitation have been extended and up to now, we are talking about close to six months later, these have been totally ignored and the Committee has not, and the Parliamentary structure has not been able to confirm a meeting date yet.”
Hughes said this was very “unacceptable” before making it clear that the issue will be raised with the Speaker of the National Assembly, Manzoor Nadir.
She said, “We are due a meeting next Friday which is statutory meeting and even today we are in the process of drafting a correspondence to the Speaker because we continue to be worried at the slothfulness of the Parliamentary support group in pinning down those meetings.”
Meanwhile, Leader of the AFC, Khemraj Ramjattam said this was similar to the “shut down” of the Parliamentary Security Committee. He explained, “We have powers to even subpoena witnesses to come and give answers to the questions…what has happened now is a blank shut down. We had one meeting where Benn was named the Chairman and never another meeting.”
He added, “What we see here in this Committee that Cathy is talking about whereby they didn’t shut it down like what Benn has done, they have, Vickram Bharrat was a little more open and at least he convened meetings but the next step equivalent to shut down is to have maximum administrative delays so when the Committee ask for Exxon to come to answer questions as about reserves and all of that and proprietary interest Exxon don’t come and the government does nothing as the majority in that Committee. It is not doing anything too so because of this incestuous relationship government does not want that kind of scrutiny and that is where the democracy guardrails are collapsing as a result of the non-functioning of our Parliament and its committees.”
Nov 13, 2024
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