No more plundering, no more exploitation

Oct 11, 2026 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

(Kaieteur News) – Rev. Jim Jones, who led more than 900 Americans to their deaths in a mass murder-suicide in Guyana in 1978, had a sign behind his throne that read: “Those who cannot remember the past, are condemned to repeat it.”

That warning is particularly relevant to Guyana today. We seem determined to repeat the mistakes of the past, even as our natural resources promise to make us one of the wealthiest countries in the hemisphere. But this time, the warning is coming from an unexpected quarter. It is not merely a domestic critic sounding the alarm. It is António Guterres, the outgoing Secretary-General of the United Nations, who recently called for an end to the exploitation and plundering of natural resources that fail to deliver meaningful benefits to producing countries and their people.