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“Guyanese must get more out of any new oil project” – David Patterson
AFC President David Patterson
Kaieteur News – Alliance for Change (AFC) President David Patterson said at the party’s weekly press conference on Friday that any new oil project approved by the Guyana government must benefit Guyanese more than anything else.
Patterson was asked Kaieteur News To demonstrate his party’s stance on the government’s approval of a seventh oil project that lacks key elements, including special protections.
“What we would like to see is a more equitable distribution of the benefits of oil production. Certainly, we have a record that any agreement, any new agreement, any renegotiation will benefit Guyanese because you can renegotiate something but ultimately you are not going to benefit from it,” he said.
Patterson said any discussion of what benefits Guyanese will receive would be of interest to his party. He said while the party acknowledged that the Production Sharing Agreement (PSA) had flaws, no matter what projects were approved, “we should be looking for greater benefits for the Guyanese public and that is an area we are working on in our policies and we hope to announce them one by one in the coming weeks.”
He announced that in two weeks, he would discuss the party’s oil and gas policy at his party’s press conference along with Dr Vincent Adams and Dr Shamiel Ali.
The AFC has repeatedly reiterated its commitment to make changes to Guyana’s oil contracts if the party is elected to government. In 2016, the AFC was part of the Alliance for National Unity (APNU) coalition government when it signed an unbalanced production sharing agreement (PSA) with oil giant ExxonMobil.
“The Coalition for Change supports any amendments to the Public Service Act that benefit the Guyanese public and we stand by that position. So any amendment that benefits (our people), we will support (it) and I have made that statement in Parliament on every budget since 2020,” Patterson said.
For years, the party has expressed its commitment to renegotiating a better deal, and in 2021, Patterson said in an interview on the Kaieteur radio show “Guyana’s Oil and You” that they were not given the opportunity to correct the lopsided deal during the five years of APNU/AFC rule.
In addition, Patterson said the AFC would provide “unconditional support” if the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) government renegotiated oil contracts.
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