PRESIDENT David Granger has projected a broader vision for a green Guyana through his sincerity of purpose, passion for green growth and, even, green appearance, Prime Minister Moses Nagamootoo said.

The prime minister’s comments come in the wake of the President being invited by the World Bank to address its leaders in Washington, USA, on his green state agenda.
“We may be amused, even cynical, about his green shirt, green folders, green greeting cards or a greenish presidential complex and State House. But we cannot fault President Granger for the discipline and determination with which he pursues the green agenda,” the prime minister said in his weekly ‘My Turn’ column published in Guyana Chronicle on Sunday.

Mr. Nagamootoo related that when he was in Tamil Nadu, India, two years ago, the Green World Foundation of India presented him with a plaque, with the inscription, “The Green Man of Guyana”.

The director, he said, disclosed that he had listened to an address by President Granger at the United Nations General Assembly, and he was assured that Guyana had embarked on a trail-blazing path in the interest of humanity.

In extending the World Bank invitation to President Granger, Tahseen Sayed Khan, Director for the Caribbean and Latin America, said she was impressed with Guyana’s green growth development and green state strategy, which could become an inspiration to the other 188 countries in the group.

“In the past we have had our own problems with the World Bank, some for ‘Cold War’ and territorial reasons, but the effect was that we could not secure funding for the Malali (Tiger Hill) Falls in the 60s, as well as the Upper Mazaruni Hydro Project in the early 1980s. Either of those projects could have helped to transform Guyana.

“Now, the World Bank sees Guyana through clearer lens. While in 2013 Guyana was deemed “the second poorest country in CARICOM”, last year’s report still saw us as poor but with prospects of being among the richest. In short, the World Bank noted, ‘Guyana is on the verge of unprecedented wealth,’” the prime minister said.

The positive observations by the World Bank representative, he noted, came on the heels of similar favourable comments by Secretary-General of the Commonwealth Baroness, Patricia Scotland, on Guyana’s new infrastructure for justice and good governance; and those from Secretary-General of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association, Akbar Khan, who not only commended government for promoting a green agenda but for making remarkable strides in fostering social cohesion.

“I submit that we should pay close attention to what the world is saying about us; how the world is willing to help us, and not allow ourselves to be lost in the daily cackle of disagreement and disenchantment, that is cloaked under a porous veil of dissent. Our fight-back against a bad press and an ugly image is becoming evident to those who not only look at new or renovated public infrastructures but at the contours of an orderly, law-governed, stable democracy that has given Guyana a fresh face among the world’s democracies,” the prime minister said.