Historical first Local Content Bill passed
– five years overdue says Finance Minister
-Guyanese, local companies to now gain from procurement, contracts in oil and gas sector as enshrined in law
Senior Finance Minister Dr. Ashni Singh during his presentation to the National Assembly on the Local Content Bill in support of his colleague Minister of Natural Resources, Vickram Bharat, said that the Local Content Law is five years overdue. The Minister reiterated that the former administration- A Partnership for National Unity/Alliance for Change (APNU/AFC) made no moves to provide legislation to allow for Guyanese to benefit from the oil and gas sector for all that time and therefore no more time should be lost to allow for this as each day that the Bill is delayed, Guyanese would lose out on benefits as the operators in the sector will, on the contrary, not delay continuing to do business. He asserted therefore that any party going forward in delaying the process of the ground-breaking legislation is also delaying benefits to Guyanese citizens and Guyanese businesses-legislation which should have been enacted by the opposition while in Government since 2015.
The Bill stipulates that by the end of 2022 all licencees, operators and contractors operating in the oil and gas sector must be buying a minimum percentage (as listed for each category) of business or service from Guyanese Nationals and Guyanese businesses.
“For every day that we quibble, oil and gas companies in Guyana are procuring goods and services without obligation to procure those goods and services from Guyanese businesses and so one cannot possibly in good conscience and with a straight face and credible voice come to this House and say that one is concerned about Guyanese nationals and Guyanese companies getting business from the oil and gas sector but then simultaneously engage in every tactic and strategy that one possibly can to delay the enactment of this Bill,” the Finance Minister told the National Assembly.
“Even if this Bill went to a Select Committee and came out of that committee after a month, during the course of that month, oil and gas companies would have rented office space, they would have purchased accommodating services, they would have done pipe-welding , they would have done local advertising, procured local legal services, accounting services and Guyanese companies and Guyanese nationals would have missed out,” Dr. Singh explained further.
As such, the Finance Minister in response to members of the Opposition accusing Government of attempting to have the Bill passed ‘in a hurry’ responded in the affirmative that specifically for the above reasons, it needed to be done as quickly as possible so that Guyanese would no longer miss out on the opportunities they should have had for some time.
“We want to get it into law in a hurry because we want Guyanese landlords to be able to rent their accommodation, we want Guyanese welders to be able to get welding business, we want Guyanese accounting firms to get accounting business …so yes! We did it in a hurry,” Dr. Singh said.
The ground-breaking Local Content Bill was later passed in the National Assembly after much attempts to stall its passage earlier in the day by the main Opposition and other groups including a minor protest by a small number of Opposition supporters outside of the Arthur Chung Conference Centre (ACCC). The passage of this Bill occurred after Government made efforts to include more recommendations even after a full year of consultations with stakeholders including the Guyana Bar Association, Civil Society, Opposition parties and the private sector among others. Meanwhile, after inviting the main Opposition to meet for yet another consultation to include further recommendations before the Bill’s debate, Government awaited the Opposition’s arrival at the meeting but in more attempts to stall the process, the main Opposition members did not turn up.
The private sector had lauded the Government for presenting the long-awaited legislation after it was presented to the National Assembly on December 16. The passage of the Local Content Bill marks the first time that such a Bill was passed since the previous A Partnership for National Unity/Alliance for Change (APNU/AFC) Government made no attempt to take the legislation forward as concerned Guyanese clamored for years to have their rights in the sector recognized while a mere Local Content Policy continued in only its crafting stages for a number of years. The new Bill passed today will ensure that Guyanese citizens can be first and foremost for consideration in terms of contracts and other procurement benefits from the country’s oil and gas industry.