Losing Beal
Editorial
We believe Mr Kit Nascimento is right, the cancellation of the Beal spaceport investment project was a severe loss to Guyana. It was a large investment, it positioned us to be a player in the future of the development of the commercial space industry and, as he put it, it had the potential to be "a major tourist attraction in a mosquito infested otherwise unattractive swamp land where a few hardy families struggle against the odds to make ends meet". There were aspects of the deal that left a lot to be desired, such as the price of the land and the amount to be earned from the launching of satellites. But though important, in the overall scheme of things the benefits outweighed this. It would have put us firmly on the map, it would have shown other investors that we are ready to do business, it would have created some momentum. The Omai and Barama investments made under then President Desmond Hoyte had attracted similar criticism. We had supported those investments and had argued, as we still do, that they provided jobs, they created economic activity which impacted directly and indirectly on the rest of the economy, they earned foreign exchange and they helped Guyana to break out of that profound depression into which it had sunk after the disastrous experiment with nationalisation and state ownership which had led to falling production and lower real wages. They were an indication of our desire to change course and move forward. In the same spirit we supported the privatisation of the telephone company and the electricity corporation. Both were in a dreadful mess, both have improved with privatisation. Telecommunications today are infinitely superior to the horror we had become accustomed to and though the deal made with ATN by Mr Hoyte can undoubtedly be criticised, as it has been by knowledgeable critics like Mr Tyndall, in the broader picture it was an important step forward. Similarly, we believe that private management and ownership of the electricity utility will eventually be to our benefit despite the difficulties that continue, partly due to the very high oil prices that now obtain. There is still a kind of knee jerk criticism to be found to new foreign investment, particularly on the part of the political party out of power at the time of that investment. So it was in the Hoyte era when every deal was portrayed by the then opposition PPP as a sell out of national interests. So it is today in the Jagdeo presidency when every initiative is vilified and pilloried. The ultimate result of this beggar-my-neighbour political backstabbing is to create a climate in which investors will feel uneasy and unwelcome, their bona fides always in issue. We need investment, local and foreign, to provide jobs and create wealth. Our problem is that there has been far too little investment. The criticism of this and other governments should focus more on the investments they failed to secure by a combination of dithering, a lack of experience and, is one surprised, fear of criticism that they may have done a bad deal. No deal is perfect, though of course those engaged in negotiations must take advice and do the homework necessary to bargain efficiently and knowledgeably. Mr Nascimento expressed it well in the last paragraph of his letter: "The tragedy in all of this is that entrenched political immaturity, placing party interest before national interests, coupled with an extraordinary naivete about the demands we can make of potential private investors, who are not falling over themselves to come here, continues to make the people of our country the victims. The Beal investment was a very real opportunity lost and the only people laughing at us are the Venezuelans".
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