The Ministry of Natural Resources takes this opportunity to respond to yet another false post by the proprietor of Kaieteur News and TikToker, Glenn Lall, who has made a number of outrageous, unsubstantiated statements (pulled out of thin air, no doubt) about Guyana’s oil and gas sector. Below are the Ministry’s responses to three of the claims made:
● “No oil-rich country on earth accepts exploration costs as their expenses. Not Trinidad. Not Brazil. Not Belize. Not Venezuela. Not Suriname. Except Guyana.”
Glenn Lall’s assertion is factually incorrect. In reality, many oil-producing nations, including those he mentioned, employ production sharing contracts (PSCs) that incorporate cost recovery mechanisms. These allow oil companies to recoup exploration expenses from a portion of the produced oil.
The cost recovery mechanism in petroleum contracts is a standard international practice, not unique to Guyana. Such provisions are designed to attract investment by allowing companies to recoup their substantial upfront costs, thereby facilitating the development of a country’s oil resources.
● “We are paying Exxon more to search for oil, than we are earning from it. [In other words] Exxon is taking out way more money searching for oil than what we are getting from profits and royalties.”
This is getting ridiculous. The oil companies’ financial statements, where their exploration costs are disclosed, are a matter of public record. These clearly show that Glenn’s claim is false. In 2023, Guyana’s revenues from royalties and profit oil (US$1.6 billion) were more than four times greater than the exploration costs reported by ExxonMobil, Hess, and CNOOC, in their financial statements.
● “Every day, search or no search, find or no find, Exxon can hand us bills, bills that we can’t verify, and Exxon tek out this money before handing we profits.”
Exxon cannot submit bills for exploration if no exploration has taken place. The petroleum agreements are clear: only legitimate, contractually allowed costs can be recovered.
Glenn also claims that the bills submitted by Exxon cannot be verified. This is equally untrue. The petroleum agreements expressly provide for cost audits, and the Government of Guyana has contracted multiple independent audits to verify the accuracy of the expenses submitted by the oil companies. These audits are conducted by specialised firms with expertise in upstream petroleum accounting, and the process includes detailed reviews to ensure all claimed costs are legitimate.
The Kaieteur News proprietor and his TikTok account have become repositories for sensational, misleading, and rank-false information on the oil and gas sector in Guyana. The entire media corps of this country should be concerned that this newspaper continues to disgrace the tenets of journalism.
We challenge Glenn Lall to name the experts and sources he relied on for the statements mentioned above, lest he be assumed to simply be a manufacturer of fake news for his own amusement, at the expense of this country’s people.
The Ministry will continue to bring factual information to the public regarding its management of the oil and gas sector and all the work it is doing to ensure that Guyanese get the most benefits from the sector.
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