Remember these anti-oil names. Where are they now?

THE persons listed below (please remember their names) are Guyanese, some living in Guyana, some who have been out of Guyana for a long time now, who wrote a letter on November 17, 2022 in the Stabroek News requesting that Guyana get out of oil production immediately.
The letter was initially sent to President Ali on November 11, 2022 and was titled; “A fair deal for Guyana, a fair deal for the planet.”

I quote from the letter: “We are deeply concerned that the Government’s policy to pursue economic development based on oil and gas is bad for Guyana. Oil and gas production are an existential threat to Guyana.
“We cannot support government’s policy to produce oil and gas when every ton of greenhouse gas pollution helps to destroy our original ancestral home and cause loss of life in African countries. We call for a national moratorium on all petroleum operations in Guyana – offshore and onshore.
“This is to allow for us Guyanese, the owners and beneficiaries of all the oil and gas resources which are our patrimony, to collectively pause so as to take stock of the oil and gas situation, scientifically, fact-check the cumulative environmental and human impacts of oil and gas on our country.”
Here are the names:

Vanda Radzik, Alissa Trotz, Vidyaratha Kissoon, Karen de Souza, Pauline Melville, Christine Samwaroo, Danuta Radzik, Maya Trotz, Susan Collymore, Joy Marcus, Halima Khan, Vanessa Ross, Wintress White, Gary Girdhari, Nicole Cole, Abbyssinian Carto, Nigel Westmaas, Joan McDonald, Duane de Freitas, Akola Thompson, Joan Cambridge, Immaculata Casimero, Terry Roopnaraine, Colin Klautky, Earl John, Janette Bulkan, Sandy de Freitas, Sherlina Nageer, Jocelyn Dow, Elizabeth Deane-Hughes, Mosa Telford, Suraiya Ismail, Leila Jagdeo, Gerald Perreira, Romario Hastings, Paulette Allicock,

Daniel Allicock, Isabelle de Caires, Luke Daniels, Red Thread, Amerindian Peoples Association, South Rupununi District Council, The Breadfruit Collective, Makushi Research Unit.
Of those names listed above, here is the foreign status of those who want Guyana to get out of oil:
1 – Dr. Janet Bulkan serves the University of British Columbia.
2- Dr. Alissa Trotz serves the University of Toronto
3- Dr. Nigel Westmass serves Hamilton College in New York
4- Dr. Maya Trots serves the University of South Florida
5 – Isabelle DeCaires lives in her homeland of the UK where her son plays cricket in the county championship for Middlesex.
6 – Abyssinian Carto is of Rastafari orientation and lives in New York.
7 — Dr. Cary Gildarie lives in New York.
8 – Terry Roopnaraine lives in his homeland of the UK.
9 – Pauline Melville moved to the UK since the early 1950s.
10 – Christina Samaroo moved to New York in 2008
11 – Luke Daniels lives in the UK
I did not elaborate the time these people left Guyana. In a majority of cases, their foreign existence is between 15 and 45 years. Imagine you left Guyana 25 years and you want to decide for us who live here? There are two others who want Guyana to leave the oil in the ground that are not listed a signatories to the letter sent to President Ali.

One is Professor Percy Hintzen. He worked for 30 years at the University of California at Berkley where he retired but instead of coming home went on to live in Florida. The other one is Andre Brandli who never visited Guyana and works in Germany.
An important note: Mr. Gerald Perreira, whose name appears as a signatory, has withdrawn his name. Mr. Perreira is the leader of the small political party, “Organization For The Victory Of The People” and one of the longest serving Pan-Africanists in the Caribbean.
Mr. Perreira told me he does not agree with the position on oil by these “middle class folks” (his words) and regret signing the letter. Mr. Perreira related to me how his name came to be associated with the letter. Readers would not believe the deception that was used.

So in 2025 with the policy of President Trump to intensify oil drilling, where are these anti-oil Guyanese? They have the temerity to speak for the Guyanese people so why don’t they arrogate to themselves as they did with us, here in Guyana, the right to speak for the American people.
They live in the US where the fossil fuel industry will be expanded, so why don’t they tell Guyanese how they feel about the new American policy through a letter either in an American newspaper or in one of the four dailies in Guyana. The US Government at the beginning of 2025 pulled out of the Paris Climate Agreement. Will they write about that? Will Dr. Alissa Trotz tell us about that in her niche at Stabroek News titled “In The Diapora?” I hope so!

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.

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