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SUNDAY EXXON’S RECORDS AND EMAILS BEFORE 2015 VANISH – US COURT TOLD – GUYANA US$460M PRE-CONTRACT COSTS IN LIMBO A troubling disappearance of records vital to New York’s investigation of oil giant, ExxonMobil, could lead the New York Supreme Court to assume that those files held content which could have been damaging to Exxon’s case, and its record on climate change. It has also led a Canadabased engineer to question the implications the deletion of those files could have on Guyana’s ability to verify the US$460M pre-contract costs that the oil company has hoisted onto the backs of the Guyanese people. Guyana is still to verify the accuracy of that amount. In the New York case, the company has been sued by that US state for allegedly misrepresenting the cost of climate change on its operations. A court document seen by Kaieteur News said that the state had requested, by way of a subpoena, documents from ExxonMobil, at the outset of its investigation in 2015. The company’s then Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and Chairman, Rex Tillerson, was the custodian of those documents, including emails which the state thought it necessary to peruse. When the New York Attorney General’s office brought to the court’s attention an email account used by Tillerson – wayne.tracker@exxonmobil.com
Kaieteur News
– ExxonMobil revealed that it failed to preserve any emails from that account before August 18, 2015, the document states. The deletion from the “Tracker Account” was reportedly caused by the company’s failure to disable its automatic “file sweep” deletion program for the Tracker account, despite the fact that the company was able to successfully turn off that program for every other custodian, after the subpoena was served. The development has caused engineer, Darshanand Khusial, to question whether the documents were really accidentally deleted, arguing that a company as large and as rich as ExxonMobil is very unlikely to use such a faulty program to handle the automatic deletion of its documents, which just so happen to be vital to New York’s investigation. He further argued that even if the contents of that email account were deleted, a company like ExxonMobil would typically keep all records backed up on offline disks which a faulty program could not reach. “Recall that the precontract costs up to December 2015 was US$460 million and those costs have been incurred as far back as 1999,” Khusial wrote in a letter to this publication. In his experience, having worked at IBM (one of the world’s largest and oldest technology firms), deletion programs like the one employed by ExxonMobil are usually employed companywide, not just for emails controlled by the company’s executives. So the engineer poses the question – If this ‘file sweep’ program employed by
ExxonMobil is blindly deleting files before August 2015, then how will ExxonMobil prove its share of the US$460M precontract costs? I’M DISAPPOINTED; I HAVE NOT DONE ENOUGH – PRESIDENT GRANGER “I have been very much disappointed that we haven’t been able to bring matters to prosecution… not only corruption matters but also matters of crime and murder.” These were the words of President Granger during an interview with Kaieteur Radio recently as he responded a question relating to the inability of the Special Organised Crime Unit (SOCU) to find success in prosecuting major corruption crimes. Granger explained that SOCU is also a branch of the police force and his that government had inherited a corrupt police force that needed to be reformed. The president said that the reason why a number these cases have not been solved or brought to justice is because the process of reformation is still ongoing. “The process of reform has not been completed.” “As a result files have disappeared with key evidences and there have been cases where policemen have been biased,” explained Granger. The president said that his government wants to bring justice but with key evidence missing and law men not being honest, convictions cannot be made. Granger stated that it is important for the Guyana Police Force (GPF) to be capable enough to get the evidence, brings the cases to
court and have the persons responsible for various atrocities prosecuted. However, due to the state of SOCU and the state of the police force, the going has been tough. The President explained that there are some cases where witnesses have been killed. But little has been achieved to find out who killed the witnesses and because of this, cases go unsolved and cold. A few examples of such cases, explained the president, – the killing of Kaieteur News pressmen and the slaughter of the former Minister of Agriculture, Satyadeow Sawh and his siblings. The president concluded: “We have not been able to go forward and as fast as we should.” A number of significant cases including senior officials of the Guyana Rice Development Board have been thrown out in the courts. GAWU WARNS… NICIL SELLING OUT SKELDON ASSETS The Guyana Agricultural and General Workers Union (GAWU) is warning of an intended sale of certain assets belonging to the Skeldon estate by the National Industrial and Commercial Investments Limited (NICIL) Special Purpose Unit (NICILSPU). GAWU has warned of NICIL/SPU selling out assets below market prices. Through newspaper advertisements announcing the sale, the union learnt of the sale of ‘unserviceable’ motor vehicles and motorcycles. The union said it has
Sunday November 10, 2019
raised concerns about previous sales of movable items from the sugar estates which appear to have been sold at “basement prices”. The sugar union is arguing that the very assets could have been divested at superior prices. The union is also unsure whether the sale prices resembled the valuation carried out on the assets. Even on the scrap iron sales, the union holds the same view that higher prices could have been affixed, positing that one buyer who bought the assets from the Wales factory made a considerable profit. The union is calling on the Government to ensure that the sale of the sugar assets is transparent and above reproach. MARK ON WINDSCREEN CONFIRMS CAR BELONGS TO MISSING COURT WITNESS BURNT BODY BELIEVED TO BE MY SON – MOM The torched car found on Friday last is confirmed to be that of the key murder witness, Collin Rodney. This is according to his mother, Jacqueline Hunter, who broke the news to this publication yesterday. The woman said that she was told by police officials that they found number markings on the windshield of the vehicle which matches with the registration number, PRR 1076, of her son’s car. Hunter also mentioned that she journeyed to Berbice to a funeral parlour where she was shown the burnt body which was found in the trunk of the car.
She said that DNA testing is likely to be conducted to confirm if it is that of her son. Once the testing and a post mortem examination are conducted, the body will be handed over to the family. One week after Collin Rodney went missing, the burnt remains of a body in the trunk of a torched car was found. The gruesome discovery was made at around 13:00 hrs on Friday last at a desolate and swampy area at Letter T, M a h a i c o n y, E a s t C o a s t Demerara. A senior police official told Kaieteur News that an anonymous caller contacted ranks at the Weldaad Police Station between 14:00hrs and 17:00hrs to say that a car was on fire at the Letter Kenny backlands; an area that is surrounded by coconut estates and rice fields. Upon arrival at the scene, the official said that they came across a badly burnt vehicle, which appeared to be a Toyota Allion. A stench was emanating from the vehicle. On opening the trunk, the ranks came across the horrible sight of a corpse, which had been burnt beyond recognition. Crime scene ranks from Georgetown also scoured the scene. They eventually assisted in placing the remains in a bag. The corpse was then taken to a funeral parlor. Thirty-six-year-old Rodney of 70 Joseph Pollydore Street, Lodge and (Continued on page 33)