Selling Smoke at Wales

Dear Editor,

The Government invites millions in private capital into two energy ventures at Wales — yet the flagship project underpinning both remains mired in delays, darkened by allegations of corruption, and wrapped in a silence that should alarm every prospective investor and concerned citizen alike.

There is a particular kind of audacity that only governments seem capable of — the audacity of asking strangers to invest in a dream that its own architects have not yet been able to make real. The administration’s latest call for expressions of interest in the Guyana Ammonia and Urea Plant and the Guyana Gas Bottling and Logistics Company is, at its surface, a bold stroke of economic nationalism. Dig beneath the press release language, however, and one finds not solid ground, but a foundation riddled with unanswered questions, unresolved controversies, and delays that have become, to use the word plainly, intolerable.

Let us be precise about what is being offered. The government invites Guyanese nationals, diaspora investors, and interested parties worldwide to contribute between one and five million US dollars each into companies that will depend entirely on the Gas-to-Energy plant at Wales — a project that was once heralded as transformative, that was promised on multiple timelines, and that, as of this writing, has not been delivered. To solicit downstream investment before the upstream infrastructure is operational is not bold economic planning. It is, at best, premature. At worst, it risks becoming something far more troubling.

The Wales development has by now accumulated a history of its own — one that the government has been conspicuously reluctant to narrate in full. Procurement decisions surrounding the project have attracted scrutiny from media entities, civil society organisations, energy sector analysts, and opposition voices who have raised pointed questions about contract awards, cost escalations, and the opacity with which decisions have been made. These are not fringe allegations. They are documented concerns that circulate in public discourse precisely because official explanations have been insufficient or entirely absent.

And yet, into this atmosphere of unresolved doubt, the Office of the Prime Minister now extends an open hand to investors.^[1] The notice is carefully worded — assurances of a guaranteed ten percent annual return, a submission deadline of May 15, preference for Guyanese nationals. The language is reassuring. The context is anything but.

Consider what a prudent investor — one with genuine due diligence obligations — would need to know before committing even one million dollars to the gas bottling venture. They would need certainty that the NGL facility will be commissioned on schedule. They would need independent audits of project costs to date. They would need transparent governance structures for the proposed private companies. They would need credible answers to allegations that have never been formally addressed. None of these assurances appear in the government’s notice.

THE NUMBERS ON THE TABLE

• GAUP ESTIMATED COST – US$300 million — ammonia and urea production facility
• GGBLC ESTIMATED COST – US$40 million — gas bottling and logistics
• INVESTOR CAP (GAUP) – Up to US$5 million per investor
• INVESTOR CAP (GGBLC) – Up to US$1 million per investor
• PROMISED RETURN – 10% guaranteed annual return
• SUBMISSION DEADLINE – May 15, 2026
• POWER OUTPUT TARGET – Up to 300 megawatts from GtE plant

What the notice does offer is a revealing phrase: the government reminds applicants that “final terms and conditions may vary” and that authorities reserve the right to “accept or reject any submission and to modify or cancel the process at any stage.” One admires the candour of the disclaimer, even as one questions the wisdom of publishing it alongside a pitch for private capital. It is the fine print that says, in plain language: we do not yet know what we are doing.

The delays themselves deserve sharper language than they have received in official communications. They are not mere administrative hiccups. Each year of delay in commissioning the GtE plant represents a year in which Guyanese households and businesses continue to pay among the highest electricity rates in the Caribbean. It represents a year in which the industrial diversification promise — the fertiliser plants, the petrochemical ambitions, the manufacturing hub — remains precisely that: a promise.

“To solicit downstream investment before the upstream infrastructure is operational is not bold economic planning — it is asking the public to buy shares in a promise that the government itself has already broken, once, and then again.”

What compounds this conundrum is the structural nature of the contradiction the administration now courts. On one hand, the government has repeatedly cited the Wales development as evidence of its economic stewardship — a signature achievement-in-progress, a demonstration that Guyana’s oil revenues are being channelled into productive transformation. On the other hand, the project’s continued delays and its surrounding controversies have become, in opposition circles and among increasingly vocal civil society voices, a symbol of something quite different: of procurement irregularities left unaccounted for, of cost overruns normalised, of deadlines treated as decorative.

Inviting investor participation in this environment does not resolve that contradiction. It deepens it. Because now, private citizens — many of them ordinary Guyanese hoping to benefit from the country’s oil windfall — are being asked to put their money into enterprises whose viability rests entirely on a foundation that remains, at this hour, unbuilt and under a cloud.

There is also a governance question that this notice raises but does not answer: who will oversee these new private companies? What accountability mechanisms will protect minority investors who may collectively represent tens of millions of dollars in contributed capital? The notice says submissions must include “legal and beneficial ownership” details, a sensible requirement in the direction of transparency. But the government has not committed to equivalent transparency about its own stewardship of the GtE project — the very asset on which GAUP and GGBLC depend for their survival.

We do not write this as adversaries of the Gas-to-Energy vision. This media platform has long recognised the strategic logic of monetising natural gas for domestic industrial purposes rather than merely flaring it or exporting it unprocessed. The concept of a Wales hub — anchoring fertiliser production, reducing electricity costs, enabling new manufacturing — is sound. The national interest in seeing it succeed is real and widely shared.

But sound concepts require honest execution. They require that when delays occur, governments explain them fully rather than absorbing them into the background noise of bureaucratic time. They require that when allegations of impropriety surface around major public contracts, they are investigated rigorously and the findings made public. They require that investors — especially ordinary Guyanese nationals being asked to stake savings on a ten percent return — are given something more substantial than a deadline and a disclaimer.

The government has described this notice as a “preliminary expression of interest” with final terms still to come. We take that at face value. But preliminary or not, it sets an expectation in the market. It signals readiness. And that signal, in the current climate, is at minimum misleading and at maximum irresponsible — not because the Wales dream is unworthy, but because the Wales reality has not yet been honestly reckoned with.

Guyana has earned, through the extraordinary fortune of its offshore discoveries, a rare second chance to build something lasting for its people. That chance can still be seized. But not through the theatre of investor roadshows conducted over unfinished infrastructure. The administration owes this country — and any investor considering these ventures — a full accounting before the next signature is sought.

References

1. Office of the Prime Minister – Guyana Gas Bottling and Logistics Company; Call for EPC Proposals – Department of Public Information, Guyana — dpi.gov.gy ↩