Stabroek News editorial ‘grossly misplaced, misinformed and inaccurate’
THE following is excerpted from a news item published in Monday’s edition of the Chronicle:

“Head of the Office of Climate Change, Shyam Nokta, has taken issue with the July 4, 2011 editorial in the Stabroek News, describing it as ‘grossly misplaced, misinformed and inaccurate’.”
In a letter to the Stabroek News editor, Nokta said, “It’s a prime example of an editorial rush to judgment based on unfounded presumptions bereft of the facts.”

Nokta contends that the editorial mixes up a large number of issues, with the central premise being, as quoted from the S/N editorial, “…that the government is making little evident effort to construct a low carbon, clean energy economy…”
According to Nokta, this conclusion is based on a bizarre reading of the fact that GPL is “…installing additional fossil fuel-based generators this year.”
Nokta posits: “You know well, and have already carried the news that Guyana’s Low Carbon Development Strategy (LCDS) will see the near-elimination of Guyana’s dependence on fossil fuel for electricity generation by 2015. Specifically (as follows):

** The Amaila Falls Hydro-Power project – which is one of the flagships of the LCDS – will deliver cheaper, more reliable, low carbon energy.

It will enable Guyana to become the highest clean energy consumer per capita in the world – how does this square with your assertion that Guyana is not pursuing a low carbon path? Details about its role in delivering a low carbon future for Guyana are available at www.amailahydropower.com.

** The LCDS Hinterland Electrification Project, to commence in September, will result in 11,000 solar panels being distributed to previously un-served households. The electrification of these homes will provide citizens with access to energy for the first time. This will create new opportunities for tens of thousands of Guyanese, based on a low carbon energy source.

** The GUYSUCO 30MW Skeldon bagasse co-generation plant will provide bio-fuel energy which will be linked to the national grid. This will add to the capacity provided by Amaila, and further contribute both to Guyana’s low carbon development and economic growth.

While these three key elements of the LCDS come on stream between now and 2015, any sensible assessment of Guyana’s immediate energy needs will recognize that GPL, in the short term, must respond to the current 7% increase in annual consumer demand for electricity, which is driven by the country’s continued, accelerating development.”

Stabroek News is a perennial critic of the performance of GPL, despite being aware that the bulk of the equipment and systems currently in use have been in existence since the turn of the twentieth century when the energy sector was first established by the International Power Company (IPC) of Canada, and that most of that equipment are battered and ailing, in spite of a high-cost maintenance regime and injections of new equipment as the need arose over the decades since.
Also, editors of Stabroek News are quite aware that the equipment currently in use is almost moribund and cause frustrating lapses in service delivery to consumers; hence the need for short-term solutions until the Amaila Falls Hydro-Power project kicks in.
Nokta queries whether the Stabroek News prefers that the country be subject to the blackouts it is quick to complain of.
Nokta posits: “The Stabroek News is quick to point out the need for transparency on the part of Government, but this newspaper also has a responsibility to high standards of transparency and journalistic accuracy. This editorial shows a respect for neither….”, because that newspaper neglected to verify its facts, which are readily available on the websites of the Office of Climate Change, the Amaila Falls Hydropower project, the Office of the Prime Minister, Guyana Energy Agency (GEA), and GPL’s Development and Expansion Plan 2011-2015; or even consulted its own back issues.”
If the editors had been interested in factual reportage instead of using every ploy to discredit the Government and its adjunctive institutions then, according to Nokta “… it could not say that the Government is not making serious efforts towards a low carbon economy.
“Instead, a newspaper would acknowledge that the International Monetary Fund 2011 Review of Guyana’s economy gives full and unqualified recognition to the critical importance and value of the LCDS, noting that “the medium-term outlook for Guyana is positive, given the authorities’ development agenda premised on the LCDS.
“Building on the favourable performance of the economy over the last five years, the authorities are preserving and improving the gains of prudent macroeconomic management.
According to staff, real GDP growth is expected to reach 4.8 percent in 2011 and to average 5.7 percent over 2012 to 2014”.
The staff report illustrates that the growth impact of the Guyana-Norway deal on low carbon development will directly contribute to an increase of 0.4% in GDP growth on average”.
Nokta concluded: “It is unfortunate that the Stabroek News should essay to attack the Low Carbon Development Strategy in such a hopelessly uninformed manner. While genuinely mistaken reporting may be forgiven on occasion, an editorial so misguided is inexcusable.”

While Norway has been the ground-breaking first-world nation to actualize funding for the earth-saving partnership between nations, as strategized in the LCDS, the funds allocated to Guyana are being reprehensibly withheld from this country by the World Bank and the IDB, which are facilitating disbursement agencies.
This may be so because opposition parties, which have powerful lobby groups with great influence in these organizations, have been agitating against the release of these funds to the Government, presumably until they attain power (sic)!  It is the general perception that the Stabroek News is representing the interests of the AFC, which has as its members/supporters Christopher Ram, Janet Bulkan, the APA, et al, who have been carrying out a campaign, along with the PNCR, against the release of the Norway GRIF funds to the PPP/C Government.
Nevertheless, the government is continuing, as Nokta has pointed out, on its low-carbon pathway of development.
His Excellency President Bharrat Jagdeo has initiated, over a decade ago, a lobby to restructure the mechanisms by way of which the Bretton Woods Institutions engage developing countries, especially in the vital area of funding. However, impoverished and vulnerable third-world nations have been forced to accede to the terms engineered by First-World nations, which are skewed to their benefit, and which always eventuate in most of the funds returning to European entities under European and first world management, with third-world nations having no scope for appealing this injustice and what actualizes into elements of legal fraud, with the developing nations being robbed by the powerful league of first-world nations through these intricate grant and loan mechanisms that they have devised.
Recently he has had cause to rebuke the IDB and World Bank for behaving as though the US$70M Norway/Guyana REDD Investment Fund (GRIF) is theirs.
President Jagdeo promised, however, that the Government will have to go ahead with the financing of the solar panels for Amerindian and riverine communities from the national coffers, with the hope that the financing for this project, and others, would be released retroactively; which the Government is still awaiting through release of the Norway funds to facilitate implementation of priority projects under the Low Carbon Development Strategy (LCDS).
The President emphasized the commitment of Government to continue on its low-carbon development pathway, despite the fact that, “….We have US$70M deposited in Guyana’s account. It is this nightmare to unlock it, but I can’t wait forever on these matters.”
According to the President, the World Bank and the IDB are treating the money Guyana has earned as if it is a grant and noted that grants are disbursed in dribbles, with most of it mandatorily going back to consultants under stipulated conditionalities.
Under the Hinterland Electrification Programme, Cabinet had approved the procurement of up to 11,000 65W solar home systems.
Further, the Ministry of Amerindian Affairs recently distributed 574 solar panels to 16 Amerindian communities in Regions One, Two and Nine through the Office of the Prime Minister under the Unserved Areas Electrification Programme.
The Amerindian Affairs Ministry was tasked over the last year with distributing 1,000 (15-watt) solar panels to 23 communities and these 16 areas are the first beneficiaries.
Some of the communities that benefited are: Four Miles and Hotoquai, Region One; Mashabo, Region Two; and Surama, Rupertee and Katoka, Region Nine.
President Jagdeo had assured that priority projects under the revolutionary LCDS would have translated into reality this year when development partner Norway announced its readiness to release the second tranche of forest protection funds in March this year.
Among them are the Amaila Falls Hydropower Project (AFHP), improvements in the country’s digital infrastructure, Amerindian community development and the construction of a world class Centre for Biodiversity at the University of Guyana.
The editors of Stabroek News are aware of all of the foregoing facts, thus the only logical conclusion is that their editorial of 4th July last was a deliberate attempt to make mischief, which is in direct contrast to the bounden duty of a national newspaper, which is to disseminate information with fairness and accuracy.