During the oil conference last month, three anonymous full-page advertisements were published in the Stabroek News. The first one appeared on February 21, and the caption screamed out: “Exxon lies and the planet dies.” The following day, the next one asked the question if Guyanese wanted a future with the oil industry with the sewage and noise pollution that accompany oil production.

The final one of February 22 has a bold headline: “A brighter future is possible and it does not include oil.” What interpretation should the analyst put to this action by nameless, faceless persons?

One of the common remarks you hear at every level of discussion, be it newspaper letter, dinner conversation, academic conference, road side chat, goes like this: “It can only happen in Guyana and no other country.” In this country you see things that are hard to imagine can occur in other nations.

Why would there be voices out there telling us that the oil industry is not good for Guyana, and we don’t need it because it is harmful and refuse to tell us who they are? What description do you put to such action – asininity, comicality or immorality?

If the oil industry is harmful to Guyana’s future, then what kind of morality a human has to lecture to a nation on this danger but remains nameless and faceless? What is wrong with such people? First, it is unadulterated arrogance and pomposity. These people feel that they can lecture to us and we must follow them and we don’t need to ask them questions about what they are advising us about.

Secondly, deep immorality is involved here. You are telling a nation to leave its main industry that generates the revenue it needs for the reduction of poverty but you are wealthy enough to spend $1.2M in advertisements denouncing the oil industry. Each one of those full-page advertisement cost roughly about $400, 000. Add that $1.4 million to 15 court cases filed against the oil industry at an estimate of each case with high priced lawyers and litigation in all three tiers of our court system, costing $6M each. That is $90M.

Can you see the big picture? The anti-oil lobby is a group of very wealthy people who, because of their anti-PPP instincts are using their wealth to harass the government. In each court case, the government, whether it is the AG chambers or the EPA or the Ministry of Natural Resources, is burdened with legal defense.

One person who wants the Guyana Government to drag Exxon at the table to renegotiate the contract celebrated his 77th birthday with a dinner and dance at the Pegasus followed up the next night with a special programme at the Theatre Guild. That person is building a business head office at the cost of $700M.

If Exxon should refuse to renegotiate and walk away, the state’s revenue dries up, and poverty expands. UG will no longer pursue free education. But their children are foreign citizens who have the luxury of attending any university they want to. Two sisters are the key players in the anti-oil lobby. These women come from one of Guyana’s most enduring super-wealthy, multi-billionaire family. They have never worked a day in their adult lives.

So now you know why the three advertisements were anonymous. Because if the names and faces are revealed, two graphic facts emerge that will be plastered on the walls of Guyana for the entire nation to see. One is that these are wealthy people that have no understanding of poverty and will never understand it.

Professor Clive Thomas referred to their campaign against the oil industry as “crass inhumanity.” The professor went on to detail how the income from oil will finally enable Guyana to attempt substantial reduction in poverty.

Now it is important to note that the anti-oil lobby is a friend of Professor Thomas and they share the same disdain for the government so they have never sought to comment on the professor’s use of the term, “crass inhumanity” to describe them. But they cannot confront the professor on his label because they know it will embarrass them.

The other graphic fact that would have emerged if the three whole-page placements had carried the sponsors’ names would have been the defeat of the very purpose of the advertisements. If you are educating people to lobby against the oil industry and then when they see how you live, how your family lives abroad and the comfortable life you will always enjoy, your message will be rejected. More on the faceless, nameless enemies at the gate in a forthcoming column.