$20B paid, not one word

Kaieteur News – The headline fairly screamed: “Guyana secretly paid US$80M to Wales gas plant contractor after losing arbitration (KN April, 3, 2026).  I wanted to scream.  The arbitrator within counseled: go ahead, write.  Excellency Ali insists that his government has been about transparency more than any. When US$80 million is secretly paid to settle a lost petition, will he still persist with that fable now?  An insulting, degrading farce; where the insult is inflicted on the Guyanese people; and the degradation what he afflicts himself with, rots further his government.

There it is: the equivalent of more than GY$20 billion; simply chickenfeed to the PPP Government.  A development buried in a stable, with the door secured, the key tossed overboard.  Meanwhile, the animals urinate and defecate on that secret GY$20 billion paid, as if some under-the-table, some sly, sideways dealing between sinister, shadowy partners in crime.  The government isn’t; or at least it shouldn’t be, nor ever think of operating in this sleazy manner, if its leaders are truly about accountability, as they say they are.  Hiding US$80 million, or GY$20 billion from citizens is not of clean governance, it is of leadership that disrespects Guyanese enough to spit on them first, then defecate on them.

How long would that payout have been held underground?  How long will the leaders in the PPP Government comport themselves in this underhanded way?  There is precedent.  Recall the US$214 million IHS Markit audit findings that diminished to US$3 million, via the same secret operating mechanism. When the government was cornered to get a scapegoat, a senior clerk, to admit to the deed.  With respect to the PPP Master of the Stables (Dr. Come Clean and Cleanup) Gopinath Gossai, the world knows that his confession was a cover for higherups in the PPP Government’s food chain.  He couldn’t have, and most probably wouldn’t have, decided on his own to loan or sell to Exxon that US$211 million in findings (its half share of that reduction).  Thus, even when the PPP Government discloses an instance of secret dealing that was costly to this country, that new concealments were happening through secretive arrangements.

If that backdoor, overnight US$211 million subtraction had remained undetected and unexposed, Guyana’s hit would have been US$105.5 million, or GY$21 billion.  Looking at the secret Wales gas contractor payout of US$80 million, it could be said that the PPP Government, with Irfaan Ali in the leadership seat, has shown some fractional improvement.  It went from the negotiation secrets embedded in US$214 million plummeting to US$3 million to the Wales payout of only US$80 million.  Put differently, from a secret deal involving GY$21 billion (IHS Markit findings) to GY$16 billion paid to Lindsayca-CH4.  Perhaps the plan is to take the GY$5 billion in savings and allocate it to Live in Guyana to finance its misinformation and disinformation campaigns for PPP Government.  What say thou, the propagandists enjoying easy taxpayers’ millions in the Office of the President?  What plans President Ali to live that second inaugural address promise about misinformation and disinformation?

I think a spin job would be timely to neaten this dirty matter no longer shrouded in secrecy.  Recall that Lindsayca-CH4’s original claim was for US$106 million.  In paying a mere US$80 million, the sterling representations of Guyana’s topflight luminaries saved almost US$25 million from the Wales gas contractor, Lindsayca-CH4’s, groping, grasping hands.  Lesson One: when billion-dollar projects are rushed, because of the plums that could be picked, then costly discoveries surface: the ground can’t hold.  Lesson Two: when hacks and quacks, political and technical, are in charge of these projects, and no credible studies, then US$80 million is the price.

Finally, President Ali is always on the rush, a leader of boisterous disposition.  Oil has such multivitamins.  His government operates secretively, with every intention of keeping Guyana in that dense darkness.  The PPP settled for secrecy from the inception.  Bow, there is no choice but to continue to govern and function as if the PPP Government is some secret society.  Clearly, it is.  Guyanese should petition the Office of the Access to Information for details on the Wales settlement.  I recommend that they get a stamp of approval from Office of the President first.  This information application has received official sanction.  Billions here, billions there.  Nobody is counting.  There is more to squander.

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