THE Private Sector Commission (PSC) has endorsed an invitation by President Donald Ramotar to the main Opposition party, A Partnership for National Unity (APNU), to field a team that would meet with Government representatives “to once and for all settle..issues” related to the embattled Amaila Falls Hydropower Project.

The PSC, in a statement yesterday, urged APNU leader, Mr. David Granger, to accept the offer.

Following is the PSC statement:
The president’s invitation was contained in a statement issued Friday last. In it, he concurred with APNU that the party’s concerns about the debt used to finance the hydro project, and the tariffs consumers would pay for electricity produced are the “most important ones.”

According to a statement from the PSC, the Commission “believes the president’s offer to be fair and reasonable” and is “a genuine effort on the part of the president to seek consensus on the hydro project.”

It is the PSC’s clear understanding that APNU is still of the opinion that the Amaila Falls project will lead to unsustainable debt and will not result in a reduction in electricity tariffs, the statement read, adding: “We [the PSC] believe that the only fair and reasonable way to address these concerns is for APNU to engage the president’s offer.”

The commission also states that it believes that much harm has been done to the project by the peddling in the media of uninformed opinions by self-styled pundits who have based their analyses on incomplete or outdated information.

“We feel that this project is too vital to the future of our nation to allow such spurious analyses to determine its fate,” the PSC said, echoing sentiments expressed by Former President Bharrat Jagdeo that ‘charlatan economics’ had bedevilled the project.

The PSC asserts that it has been the consistent position of APNU that the government has failed to provide the Opposition with all of the information needed to arrive at an informed decision while at the same time criticising the project.

“What better way, therefore, to resolve APNU’s concern than a meeting with the Government’s negotiating team, with nothing withheld and everything on the table,” the commission reasoned.

The commission calls upon the Opposition to take up the president’s offer and let the talks continue in good faith in the national interest, the statement concluded.

The Amaila Falls Hydropower Project was plunged into disarray after its lead investor, Sithe Global, made good on its threat to withdraw in the absence of unanimous parliamentary support for the project. While the smaller opposition party, the Alliance For Change, voted with the ruling People’s Progressive Party/ Civic, to give the project majority support in the legislature, APNU withheld its support.