It is quite alarming that in the face of serious questions about the future

of the Amaila Hydroelectric Project (Guyana’s single most development project,  prior to and since Independence 47 years ago), the Government should now find itself having to pay urgent attention to a threatening national security problem involving well known political activists with huge egos and unmistakable hatred for the governing People’s Progressive Party-led government.
First, we reflect briefly on issues pertinent to the signal that came late last week from Sithe Global, following the parliamentary approval for the Amaila hydroelectric project.
It would have come as a surprise to many Guyanese, across political boundaries, that soon after the Guyana National Assembly approved the project, and a related legislation to increase the national debt ceiling with the voting support the government finally received from the minority AFC, the primary spokesman for Sithe Global (Mr Brian Kubeck) should have thought it necessary to announce its intended withdrawal of further involvement because  APNU (the main opposition) did not also vote in favour of the project.
Mr Kubeck is quite familiar with Guyana’s vast potential for economic development and, relatedly, the healthy relationship that has been forged over the years between his corporation and the government.
He would also be aware of the constitutional significance of parliamentary approval — by a decisive majority — with the third parliamentary party, in this particular case APNU, choosing to remain adamant in opposition to the Amaila project, amid a whole lot of customary political jargon and double-speak.
Of course, even the AFC’s late support failed to meet a very vital requirement in the government’s expectation, since that party was inflexible in settling for a mere $30B to the $130B sought in the original hydro-project amendment Bill.
While, therefore, we hope that better judgment prevails in expected new initiatives between President Ramotar’s administration and Sithe Global, it is also to be assumed that both APNU and AFC would manage to overcome their respective internal party problems, and address the relevance of their myopic, divisive approaches to Guyana’s future economic progress and peaceful development.
And this brings us to the second issue of grave national concern: Ethnic unity and national security, in Guyana’s immediate and long-term interest.
By now, readers would already be aware of the threats to  national unity and national security, having learnt of the details of a statement from the Ministry of Home Affairs, published in our last Friday’s edition as well as an editorial of the same date.
The Ministry’s media statement disclosed how race-baiting politics and threats to stir passions for confrontations with the government had occurred during a recent “Ghana Day Conference” at ACDA’s headquarters on Thomas Lands.
Most surprising among the participants at that conference was the chairman of APNU (PNC in new clothing), who is also official leader of the PNC, David Granger, retired Brigadier of the  Guyana Defence Force.
Others in attendance and better well known for their political bitterness and venomous, divisive verbal broadsides against the PPP and the government it heads were the trio of Lincoln Lewis, Aubrey Norton and Mark Benschop.
There were also Hamilton Green (Remember that ‘Mayor’ of a city facing serious health hazards, including from garbage and clogged drains?); David Hinds, an academic who moves regularly between the USA, where he lectures, and Guyana; and Sharma Solomon of Linden, who was recently formally inducted into the PNC.
Seemingly quite stung by the statement from the Ministry of Home Affairs about some among those in attendance and  the recorded references to divisive rhetoric and political destabilization threats uttered, a press release was issued on the day’s event.
It was left to David Hinds to issue the press release on behalf of the “Ghana Day Committee”, and he rejected claims made in the statement from the Ministry of Home Affairs. The committee’s statement was published in our yesterday’s edition, and readers are free to make their own judgment.
All we wish to say, for now, is that since ranks of the Guyana Police Force were themselves under the verbal salvos fired at the ACDA headquarters on that “Ghana Day” event, those employed by the GPF to ensure peace and security and, generally uphold the rule of law, must simply DO THEIR DUTY on behalf of ALL of this nation. More later!