Chris Ram

Every Man, Woman and Child Must Become Oil-Minded: Column 201 President Irfaan Ali recycles the argument so often that it is now official doctrine: the 2016 Stabroek Block Petroleum Agreement is a bad deal for Guyana, but “sanctity of contract” prevents renegotiation. In his recent Al Jazeera interview, Ali again asserted the Agreement was bad…

Introduction The series began on May 26, 2017 as Oil and gas – The New Economic Horizon and was expected to run for twenty-five weeks. As the research deepened, it became Road to First Oil – Every Man, Woman and Child Must Become Oil-Minded, borrowing the Daily Chronicle exhortation brought to my attention by historian…

“We cannot have crude oil and don’t have security of supply.” So said President Irfaan Ali on August 26 as he unveiled an expansive conception of a national oil company. According to the Department of Public Information, the company would not invest in offshore production but would be built around a domestic refinery and expanded…

Road to First Oil – Every Man Woman and Child Must Become Oil-MindedColumn No. 198  Introduction  Last week’s column ended with Professor Clive Thomas’s estimate that wastage, incompetence, mismanagement and corruption consume 20% of public expenditure. Applied to 2021–2025, that is G$838 billion, or about US$4 billion. My fear is that the true figure is…

Road to First Oil – Every Man Woman and Child Must Become Oil-Minded Column No. 197 Having promised renegotiation and abandoned it on taking office, President Ali offered the country a substitute. The 2016 Agreement would stand, but it would be properly administered. He argued that as leader of a country governed by the rule…

Road to First Oil – Every Man Woman and Child Must Become Oil – Minded Column No. 196  Part I welcomed President Irfaan Ali’s announcement that Guyana’s entitlement from the Stabroek Block production has risen from 12.5% to approximately 39.8%. That percentage reflects mainly the recovery of accumulated exploration and development costs: as less production…

Road to First Oil – Every Man, Woman and Child Must Become Oil Minded – Part 195 Part I of II President Irfaan Ali brought Guyanese some genuinely good oil news this week. He announced that Guyana’s entitlement from production in the Stabroek Block has risen from the historical 12.5% to approximately 39.8%. Even if…

The Road to First Oil: Every Man, Woman and Child Must become Oil-minded Column 194 – The Resource Curse Begins on a Farm (Part 2) In Column 193, I argued that the controversy surrounding President Irfaan Ali’s farm at Long Creek is not fundamentally about agriculture. It is about governance in an oil-producing state. It…

Road to First Oil: Every Man, Woman and Child Must Become Oil-minded. Column No. 193  July 12, 2026 The Resource Curse has arrived – on a Farm Part I The story of the month, and perhaps of the year, has been President Irfaan Ali’s farm at Long Creek, an area off the Soesdyke-Linden Highway. Readers…

Road to First Oil – Every Man, Woman and Child Must Become Oil Minded; Column 192 July 3, 2026 The financial, audit and regulatory weaknesses highlighted in this mini-series make for disturbing reading and raise serious concerns. Matters might have been very different had both the external auditors and the ministerial auditors taken a firmer…