LET me get to the point of this column fairly quickly and ask the questions everyone is curious about. Is Nigel Hughes, the newly elected leader of the Alliance for Change, in bed with big oil? As the leader of a political party with larger-than-life aspirations to assume the presidency of the country, can Hughes be counted on to represent the interests of Guyana or will he continue to champion the interests of big oil?

For those who are unfamiliar with the term “big oil,” it is a media shorthand that refers to companies such as ExxonMobil, BP, Chevron, Shell and others with a combined revenue of $1.4 trillion U.S. dollars in 2023. Big oil does not include Saudi Arabia’s Aramco, China’s Sinopec or Russia’s Gazprom.
There are times when I hear things that cause my mind to go racing, and I tell myself ‘You’ve got to fact-check that.’ That instinct kicked in when I heard V.P. Bharrat Jagdeo made some fairly serious allegations against Hughes.

Hours after his election, the inner core of the AFC began to project him as a leader who will take them to new heights. Their chutzpah was a bit too much for Aubrey Norton who rightfully interpreted their glee as a premature ambition that cast Hughes as a “consensus presidential candidate” of the APNU+AFC coalition.
Evidently annoyed, the re-elected leader of the People’s National Congress (PNC) shot down that idea in a hurry, making it abundantly clear that the Presidential candidate of the coalition would most certainly emerge from within his own party and not from any of its coalition members.

Hughes was asked by Demerara Waves Online News (June 30) whether he would resign as a managing partner with Hughes, Fields & Stoby – a law firm that has represented some of the most powerful natural resources companies in Guyana including ExxonMobil. Here is how Hughes answered the question:
“No, no! This issue really only arises if and when I become President or acquire a position of power because, then, I’m in a position to influence government policy, they can claim. Right now, I can’t influence government and, therefore, it’s a theoretical conflict. If I were ever elected President, I would have nothing to do with the firm. I wouldn’t be participating in their management or decision-making but until then. You seriously couldn’t be asking me to compromise my client’s integrity because the interest of Guyana is at stake because I happen to be the leader of a political party.”

It was a strange and bizarre answer from a prominent lawyer and an aspiring politician. Jagdeo found it to be “obscene” and so should the entire nation. Evidence of just how “obscene” Hughes’ answer is can be found in a Global Witness Report that was first released in February 2020 and slugged “Signed Away.” A year after it was released Global Witness withdrew the report on grounds that it “overestimated the potential economic benefit of oil extraction.”

Pages 15-18 of “Signed Away” contain a timeline that ought to give pause to any Guyanese concerned about the future of this country and who leads it. Here is why.
Hughes resigned as chair of AFC on April 11 of 2016 although at the time he did not hold a government post. Three days later – April 15 – APNU-AFC signed a Production Sharing Agreement (PSA) with ExxonMobil. Why did Hughes resign?

The negotiations between ExxonMobil and the government began on May 16, 2015. We know this because on this date Esso Exploration and Production Guyana Limited (EEPGL) – ExxonMobil’s name before September 2023 – sent a document to the government of Guyana setting out several timelines for the execution of what would eventually become the 2016 PSA.
Three days earlier before the start of negotiations, David A. Granger was signed in as President and Raphael Trotman, co-chair of AFC, became Minister of Natural Resources.
On page 15 of “Signed Away,” the report states that “Global Witness believes that the relationship between Trotman, Hughes, and Exxon should be investigated to determine the existence or extent of any conflict of interest.” And the report explains why.

“As the AFC head, Trotman’s political interests were aligned with Hughes – the party’s deputy head. Given that Hughes’ firm has represented Exxon since 2009, and given that Hughes himself has represented Exxon on other matters, a Stabroek deal that was favourable to the company may have preserved or promoted that lucrative relationship.”

In the interest of accountability and transparency, Hughes must come clean on his role in the negotiation of the 2016 PSA that gave big oil giant ExxonMobil a lucrative deal at the expense of his nation’s sovereign wealth.

DISCLAIMER: The views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Guyana National Newspapers Limited.