GUYANA’s 21st Century fortune continues to attract positive international attention and global news headlines, the latest including November 14, 2022 Bloomberg podcast headlined “Guyana is the Most Exciting Story in the World Oil Market” plus three other online YouTube videos titled “Why Guyana’s Economy Is Booming;” “Guyana’s Game-Changing Oil Discovery,” and “Is This the Richest Country in the World” and “How Much Could Guyana Make?”

The podcast examines “What happens when a huge player strikes (black) gold?” It also looks at issues like the US shale oil boom, OPEC and “The incredible rise of Guyana as one of the fastest-growing economies in the world.”

The podcast features oil historian Gregory Brew’s thoughts and insights into the Guyana story. His forecasts help better tell the story of the world’s newest Oil Dorado, coming as it is in the prestigious publication trusted by the world of finance and on global money markets.

Guyana’s oil story has, particularly in the past two years and under the leadership of the current PPP/Civic administration led by President Dr Irfaan Ali, has been a boon to the nation’s hitherto battered and broken image between 1964 and 1992, when world news headlines about ‘The Co-operative Republic’ were mostly negative — from electoral fraud, corruption, extravagance and wastage of natural resources, to naked political discrimination and violations of human rights, including the right to life.

During those dark days of PNC rule, Guyana developed its current reputation as the nation with the biggest diaspora population, with over one-third of its citizens residing and became the biggest Caribbean victim of the global Brain Drain, as talented, innovative and ambitious Guyanese had no choice but to opt to migrate to be better able to help families.

But the size of Guyana’s diaspora also has its positive sides in terms of both volume and value of remittances and the scope for positive engagement with and for the homeland, especially with a positive attitude on the part of the current administration.

All the videos quoted above, all positive, confirmed the ever-growing international and regional interest in Guyana’s oil wealth, as the last 27 months have seen prudent management of how the basis is laid to engage in best practices for Guyana’s sustainable future, by learning from and acting upon the lessons offered by other nations — big and small — that welcomed the cash windfall, but failed to look beyond black gold’s glitter.

The government has also repeatedly made it clear that it does not intend to lead Guyana into the trap of ignoring the need to develop other productive and income-generating sectors, from agriculture and manufacturing to tourism and expansion of regional trade – and using the nation’s oil wealth to ensure citizens’ social and economic needs are addressed at home and work, in their neighbourhood communities and regions, all across ‘One Guyana’.

The podcast and videos highlighted also reiterate that Guyana today is being increasingly embraced by Big Oil (for obvious reasons) and is led by an administration that’s being careful to avoid the country experiencing the so-called “Dutch Disease” that’s seen countries get rich with oil and sink in poverty thereafter.

But Guyanese have already started to taste and feel the difference between governments that talk and those that walk, which is why they’re also getting ready to walk to the ballot boxes to talk their minds loudly on March 13, 2023, when voters will have their mid-term chance to say, very loudly, how they feel about their government’s handling of the nation’s growing oil wealth, in free and fair Local Government Elections.