–praises its oil, gas ‘expert’ but fails to provide facts to counter Craig’s argument

THE Alliance For Change (AFC) on Tuesday launched a withering attack on former member Leonard Craig over his criticism of its oil-and-gas expert, Dr. Vincent Adams’ “misconstrued concept of cost oil and profit oil”.
In a statement on Tuesday, the party said it welcomes a “healthy debate” on topics that are of interest to the people, such as oil and gas, the environment, and infrastructure. However, the AFC then proceeded to make condescending remarks against Craig.

The seemingly agitated AFC, in its tirade, went as far as to accuse its former member of not being qualified to comment on the topic without producing any facts to counter his argument.
This, in spite of its own leader, Nigel Hughes recently stating that he believes political figures “should never be threatened, whether by some veil, or expressly”.

On Monday, AFC’s lead oil-and-gas ‘expert’, Adams, who the AFC praised in its Tuesday statement as “a qualified person”, was upbraided by Craig for his “callous, careless and shallow” statements on the issue.
In a column published in the Guyana Chronicle on Monday, the former AFC member criticised statements made by Adams, along with the manner in which the party holds its press conferences.
He said that the AFC “slaps together” responses on Fridays, based on what Guyana’s Vice-President Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo says on Thursdays at his weekly press conferences. Because of this approach, he stated that the party does not give itself ample time to put together responses that are robust and properly researched.

At the AFC press conference last Friday, Adams said that Guyana’s income from oil will never be 50 + 2 per cent, and misconstrued the concepts of ‘cost oil’ with ‘profit oil’.
Craig pointed out the pseudo-intellectual nature of Adams, and stated that even though he attempted to rebut the Vice-President’s assertions that in due course Guyana will receive its full share of 50 per cent of revenues, it was evident that Jagdeo was referring to ‘profit oil’.
Craig then stated: “He guesstimated that 30 to 40 per cent of oil will go towards production costs, and the difference of 60 per cent, when split, is no more than 30 per cent coming to the NRF. Dear Dr. Adams, regardless of the size of the deductibles associated with production (cost oil), that which remains represents 100 per cent of “profit oil”, which has to be split 50/50. Further, the two per cent royalty is taken from the gross of production, and not an additional two per cent of profit. Therefore, the royalty fee will fluctuate as an overall percentage when juxtapositioned directly against profit oil, depending on the magnitude of cost oil.”
Craig also said that Adams got “egg” in his face by accusing the government of reneging on a promise to re-negotiate the current Stabroek Block Production Sharing Agreements (PSA).
“There is no record anywhere of a promise to renegotiate the PSA; it has been a firm and steadfast position of Granger’s PNC and the PPP/C, both in and out of government, to not force renegotiations,” the former AFC member wrote.