Ambassador Theriot’s silence makes sense

May 17, 2024 Features / Columnists, The GHK Lall Column

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Kaieteur News – American Ambassador, Nicole D. Theriot’s silence was surprising at first.  Then, as that silence lengthened, it became unfathomable.  It was only when the sustained silence of the American plenipotentiary was coupled to her near invisibility that the light came. Her arrival, her disappearance into the US Embassy fortress, all made perfect sense.  To express diplomatically, Excellency Theriot has her hands full and her mind occupied.  Her hands are full of nothing to do; and her mind occupied by boredom.

In fairness to the US Ambassador, she came to this posting with a disadvantage.  Her predecessor, the irrepressible Sarah Ann Lynch blazed an unprecedented trail, left big shoes for any successor to fill.  In addition to that handicap, Ambassador Lynch spoiled Guyanese.  The more she spoke, the more they couldn’t get enough.  The more she swooped around, scouted about, and worked her special brand of American magic, the more Guyanese wanted, the more they expected.  Who can cope with such a legacy?  But, despite that, or because of it, new Ambassador Theriot inherited another gift that is priceless.  All the groundwork, most of the heavy work, has already been executed.  As one comprehensive example, citizens are urged to think of two things.  The first was how building blocks were painstakingly laid out one on top of the other for the Wales gas-to-energy project to spring from the drawing board and land in the lap of American big business.  Second, an American financial institution was recruited to lend over three quarter billion dollars for one phase of the project, present hiccups notwithstanding.  An additional way of thinking about how the ubiquitous Excellency Lynch went about her overt duties would be visualizing how those pipelines for the Wales gas-to-energy project are laid out, viz., one following the other, and all the pieces connecting.  In other words, that was the comprehensive way she went about her duties to the American government and American taxpayers aided by the powerhouse Pompeo.  Note that I limited myself to her overt duties only and speaking only about commercial interests.  This leaves Ambassador Theriot to tick boxes and mop up loose ends.  Or welcoming new American companies seeking to get the lay of the land here, whose ear to bend and hand to shake. The hand-shaker must not be empty-handed.

Relative to governance in Guyana, Ambassador Lynch did yeoman work.  With powerful assistance from then US Secretary of State, Michael Pompeo, Excellency Lynch lured the PPP Government to the best place imaginable: fully accounted for, lock, stock and barrel. To use a familiar Americanism: the PPP Government is in the bag.  National governance in Guyana is in a very good state from an American perspective.  From a Guyanese point of view, it is a mixed bag.  There is a government and there is a National Assembly, but both are at the call and command of America and its interests.  In fairness, the Guyana parliament has its share of upstarts and mavericks (the opposition contingent), who can be ornery from time to time.  Apart from some jousting and diving here and there, everyone in that august house is pro-America and none dares to risk being sharply anti-American.  Not one member or any group would be that politically suicidal. There would be no rising from the dead in such an instance.  This is raw politics, not soothing Christianity.  It is that strange new beast flourishing here: democratic imperialism.

It must not be lost on locals that the hard-fought battles for national independence by Guyanese political pioneers in the 1950s and early 1960s from the United Kingdom has been feebly and cowardly surrendered to renewed US hegemony (imperialism) less than 60 years later.  The liberties introduced by Independence from the British have been subjugated to the yoke of American imperialism. Gunboat diplomacy plus warplanes emphasizing American imperialist stranglehold here.  The PPP Government is an American stooge.  Business is happy.  The legislature functions for what feathers Exxon’s interests.  Many tribunes in the magistracy rule with an eye on the way the winds blow.  It is a work-in-progress following in the subservient steps of government, parliament, and private sector. By this time, thinking Guyanese should have discerned that America allows PPP Government leaders to preen and prance about without too much restraint in the domestic arena and on matters that are purely local in character.  I encourage citizens to examine the piteous state to which public institutions has been reduced. But, on matters involving big business, there is only way.  The American Way.  Things are on autopilot here, which makes Ambassador Theriot’s posting a walk in the park.  She can whistle and bird watch, since there is little requirement for her to foist on local minds.  Already sealed, delivered.

I think of Exxon’s power here, and American influence now so dazzlingly dominant in Guyana, and I recall that impeccable title chosen by Steve Coll for his incomparable work of penmanship.  It is: Private Empire: ExxonMobil and American Power.”  Personally speaking, that says it all, could not have been crafted better.  Even a passing study of Guyana confirms the commercial and imperial power that rules its day, its life.  In surveying the condition of Guyana today, it is why Excellency Nicole D. Theriot can sing to herself and speak not a word more than is necessary in Guyana.  God bless America.  Just don’t ask me where that leaves Guyanese.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper.)

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