A guaranteed future from oil revenues for the next 30 or more years seems likely, and Guyana needs to move in a direction that maximises the general interests of the Guyanese. Each country does that.

No country, maybe except a very tiny few that are literally dependent on big powers for their existence, would implement policies for their population that their citizenry does not want.

This is not sovereignty. It is slavery. Countries must move in a modern direction but they must do so with the approval of their people. I repeat – all countries do so. In another column, I will look at major legal immigration changes that would drastically reduce the intake of non-White people in France, the UK and Canada.

The United States deports any person who is convicted of a criminal offence once the person does not have American citizenship despite the fact they may have come to the US as a five-year-old and is now 45. For the US, that is in American interests.

Many strong post-colonial countries chose not to approve of sanctions against Russia because they felt that the Russia/Ukraine issue was a Western security controversy and for the Third World, matters of disadvantages in global trade are exigencies for them rather than an isolated war in Europe.

Guyana must pursue policies that the Guyanese people want, not what other nations want us to do. The standard bearer of this perspective is Kenya. President Obama went to Kenya and urged it to accept homosexual rights. The Kenyan President said that is a decision best left to be considered by the Kenyan people. President Obama joined a long, long list of his predecessors who never failed to say: “What the American people want.”

What do the Guyanese people want? Do they want the abolition of the death penalty? Should they not be consulted? The European Union for over 40 years has been pressuring post-colonial states, including Guyana to abolish the death penalty. We have not resumed hanging maybe because of this pressure.

The last hanging was under President Hoyte’s government more than 35 years ago. The EU cannot single out Guyana when there are countries in the world that are extremely closer to the EU nations than Guyana and they have the death penalty. On Thursday last, the US executed a man in Alabama.

Justice Kissoon last month sentenced a group of fishermen to death for the horrible pirate attack at sea in which the victims were cruelly tortured and thrown into the sea to die. If the appeal deadline was not met, those men should be hanged. There is no philosophical argument I can think of that says the death penalty is irrelevant in situations where men have become worse than jungle predators.

In 2024, I would like to see Guyana revert to a foreign policy that both Cheddie Jagan and Forbes Burnham shaped for Guyana after Independence. I will never be a fan of Burnham. My dislike for Mr. Burnham is based on three pillars – theoretical, actual totalitarian practice and personal vendetta against me. But I acknowledge Burnham had a brave, realistic and nationalistic foreign policy.

Guyana must look at its slow evolution from a poor nation that got poorer from the 1970s through to the beginning of the 21st century and go out into the global forum from 2024 and maximize its foreign policy based on what is good for Guyana, what can bring Guyana advantages and what can strengthen Guyana’s future.

The world where a country stuck with a friend because that was the only friend it knew when it emerged as an independent state has gone forever and will not return. Guyana emerged from the bosom of India, Africa, Portugal and China. Those are the sources of our people from foreign lands. We were colonised by the UK. Then the USA became an integral part of Guyana’s existence, especially through migration.

But our foreign policy must not rest on those foundations only. The world is wide with more than 200 nations and we must seek closer relations in economics, finance, technology and science with countries whose partnership Guyana needs.

Asia, the Arab world, Africa but particularly China and Brazil are nations that Guyana must seek closer partnership with.
Small, poor countries like Guyana cannot secure a future based on the traditional foreign policy we knew when it was a colony.

There is nothing better I would like to see in 2024 than a South African Embassy in Guyana. This is a great country that in 2023 showed the world the courage and philosophical mind a country must have. South Africa was the definitive country of 2023. I will look at other things I need to see in Guyana in a forthcoming column.