Once again the sovereignty of the Republic of Guyana is under threat by a neighbouring country, the leader of which has made utterances and pronouncements against Guyana’s rights to oil explorations in its own maritime and other territories that are anything but neighbourly.Venezuela encompasses a huge land mass and already produces oil that should have made that country a highly-developed nation-state in the South American continent; but profligacy and mismanagement have squandered its bounties and left large swaths of its society living in dolorous poverty; so it has once again turned its covetous eye on Guyana’s richest county – the Essequibo, and is also laying claim to maritime territories that hold much promise of abundant oil deposits. Because of an undefined western boundary, the British had commissioned Robert Schomburgk, a surveyor and naturalist, to delineate that boundary. His 1835 survey resulted in what came to be known as the Schomburgk Line.
However, Venezuela disputed the British delineation, claiming instead that its borders extended as far east as the Essequibo River, which was an approximate two-thirds of British Guiana’s territory.
Lord Salisbury’s government submitted the dispute to the American boundary commission and Venezuela submitted to arbitration, but rejected a binding decision handed down on October 3, 1899, which directed that the border follow the Schomburgk Line.
Nevertheless, despite agreeing to submission to the commission’s decision, Venezuela still keeps, like a festering wound on the psyche of the Guyanese people, making intermittent pronouncements on its rights to the Essequibo and its maritime territories.
The Maduro government has once again attempted to annex Guyana’s maritime space, according to local media reports, and has accused the Granger Administration of a disrespectful response to this illegal claim.
However, the Guyana Government has deemed sacrosanct to Guyana its offshore jurisdiction and any of its Essequibo territories. In this the Opposition has thrown its full weight behind the Government’s decree of non-submission to Venezuela’s bullyism.

Guyana’s Government has stated, unequivocally, that Venezuela’s claim “… cannot be applicable to any part of Guyana’s territory”.
Venezuela contends that the Arbitration Award of 1899 is null and void, and is giving credence only to the regulatory framework of the Geneva Convention.
However, the land boundary established between Guyana and Venezuela as defined by the Arbitral Award of 1899 is internationally accepted as final and indisputable, and renders any claim by Venezuela to the disputed territory as without legal merit.
Venezuela has also recognised, over its decades’ long existence, the 1905 demarcation of this boundary; thus Guyana is contending that Maduro’s recent pronouncement is a violation of international law.
The sovereignty of Guyana is unquestionable since independence was granted to this nation by Great Britain; and it is despicable for a more powerful neighbour to covet and threaten to wrest, with force, Guyana’s resource-rich territories.
The threat by Venezuela is like a dark cloud forever looming over Guyana. It is real and extant, because there have been many forays by Venezuelan troops into Guyana’s territory.
Guyana may have internal disputes and problems, but in the matter of our sovereignty as a nation, Guyanese stand as one as we refute Venezuela’s nefarious claims and together let them know that we will never yield ‘… a blade of grass’.