There is a cautious reluctance among residents of Waiakabra, a small village south of Guyana’s capital, to speak with the media. But once they do, they have a lot to say.
Much of it doesn’t align with the narrative that Guyana’s oil – discovered by ExxonMobil in 2015 – has made the country one of the fastest-growing economies in the world, with GDP growth of over 43 per cent in 2024.
“We keep hearing about this oil, but where is all this money going?” asks Yanick, a 26-year-old landscaper, who says he is struggling to make ends meet. “We just hear that the government is investing in infrastructure, but you can’t survive on cement and stones.”
Next door, Arleen, a 31-year-old housewife, says the high cost of living has become extremely challenging for her family. “Someone needs to look into pricing in the shops and provide more support for communities.”
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Scelon, who is busy cutting hair in his pop-up barber shop, says his village has been forgotten and the only way to get by is to hustle for extra work. “The government has to address the cost of living, look into poor neighbourhoods like this one,” he says. “We just want the country to benefit from the development it deserves.”
Guyanese voters will have their say on government policy on Monday, when presidential and parliamentary elections will decide if president Irfaan Ali’s People’s Progressive Party (PPP) stays in power in the South American country of 830,000 people.
The PPP is expected to prevail, although opposition parties, including A Partnership for National Unity and Alliance for Change, will hope to benefit from disillusioned voters.
These voices of frustration are a common theme reported by independent newspaper Stabroek News in its weekly cost-of-living series. By speaking with ordinary Guyanese about their day-to-day costs, the publisher has tapped into a topic at the heart of political debate as voters head to the polls.
Anand Persaud, editor-in-chief of Stabroek News, says the series shows signs that Guyana is experiencing both the “Dutch Disease”, whereby a significant increase in a country’s wealth leads to a decline in other sectors, and the “Resource Curse”, when a country rich in natural resources has a worse economic outcome than resource-scarce nations.
“That is, even though you’re getting richer, people down the bottom are getting poorer,” he says at his newspaper’s offices in Georgetown.
“That’s what we’re seeing in our cost-of-living series, which is why we’ve been doing it religiously every week. People trying to figure out if they can afford three meals a day, support a disabled family member or find a job. These stories expose this big gulf between an ‘oil Guyana’ and a ‘non-oil’ Guyana, and how they’re not really meshing.”
Red Thread, a non-governmental women’s grassroots organisation, also sees a stark disconnect between oil wealth and people’s day-to-day living.
“We notice that prices in the market have gone sky high,” says Wintress White. “We find it hard to believe that we’re living in an oil-rich country when people cannot afford to eat. In our last budget, the government announced $1.3 trillion but allocated more funds to infrastructure and roads than to the welfare of people. We find this ridiculous.”
Guyana’s 2016 Production Sharing Agreement with ExxonMobil and its partners, granting tax exemptions to the oil companies, has been widely criticised as it deprives the state of significant revenue while ExxonMobil and its partners benefit from tax credits in their home countries.
“What is so amazing is that here in Guyana, if a person earns over a certain amount of money, they’re asked to pay tax,” says White. “Yet, Exxon and its partners are being granted tax exemptions and they are making so much money.”
Of course, the oil and gas industry is creating jobs – there are about 6,200 working directly for or supporting the sector, according to ExxonMobil Guyana. Along with infrastructure investments, such as the creation of a new sustainable city, Silica City, and the construction of a new Demerara Harbour Bridge in the capital, the government is providing a range of cash grants to citizens. It also has announced ambitious increases in public assistance as part of its re-election manifesto. However, many say it’s not enough.
“Cash grants are not necessary,” says Joy Marcus of Red Thread. “What is necessary is for the government to improve its services. Once the services are improved, then there’s no need for that cash grant.”
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Political scientist Prof Ivelaw Griffith warns against the government putting money in every citizen’s pocket as their cut of the oil money. “It will have a domino effect on work ethic and inflation in the country,” he says. “That’s a harsh reality and something that is not very comfortable to tell people.”
Griffith believes it’s a matter of time before people begin to see the benefits of infrastructure development. “It can’t be either the individual citizen getting the cash or the society getting infrastructure,” he says. “It’s got to be both. And both take time.”
For lawyer Melinda Janki, who represents ordinary Guyanese people in bringing public interest litigation against the State of Guyana, ExxonMobil and its partners, the “booming Guyana” narrative based solely on GDP figures needs to stop, so people can understand the true impact of oil.
Firstly, because the numbers fail to account for oil revenues going to ExxonMobil and its partners. Secondly, because “it’s an out-of-date measurement”, as evidenced by the World Bank’s Beyond GDP agenda aimed at identifying a better way to measure wealth.
A survey involving Waiakabra residents might just paint a more accurate picture until the Guyanese people use their vote as their voice on Monday.
- Additional reporting by Subhana Shiwmangal
- This reporting was supported by the Simon Cumbers Media Fund
