DON’T FORGET THE PROPAGANDA COSTS

The propaganda costs for the Alutrint smelter must also be shown to the public. When preparing the accounts of Alutrint, officials must include propaganda costs. The ultimate stakeholders, the public, must know how much it cost to make propaganda for a project which is ruinous to its health, economy and ecology. What are some of these propaganda costs?

The cost of food, drink and transport for bussing in partisan support to La Brea for public consultations.

The cost of thousands of “Build de Smelter” jerseys.

The cost of hundreds of full page newspaper ads telling of how nice smelter is.

The cost of the Alutrint newsletter, circulated by the tens of thousands.

The cost of television ads and documentaries of various lengths designed to make smelter look like serious development.

The cost of sponsorship of local organizations, events and persons, for example, football team, fetes, sports personalities.

The cost of thousands of fliers, the latest a pamphlet (14”x 8.5”) by the Member of Parliament for La Brea, and a colour advertisement (17”x 11”) for the radio program La Brea Today.

The cost of the La Brea Today feature on ten radio stations, twenty times per week, which has been running for a couple of weeks now.

The cost of seven environmental impact statements, disguised to look like real science, but are Alutrint-financed manifestos designed to hide the cost of negative impacts and propagate benefits.

The costs of symposia for Alutrint, one at Paria Suite and the other at UWI, designed to provide a rack for the Prime Minister to hang his smelter hat: at the end of these symposia, altering truth, he declared that the experts had said that smelter was good.

Whenever Alutrint, the National Gas Company, the National Energy Corporation, the Corporation Sole – Minister of Finance, the Minister of Energy, Professor Ken Julien, Philip Julien (Ag. Chief Executive Officer of Alutrint) decide to reveal the accounts of Alutrint, they must include these costs. Over the past three years all of the above entities have been sent requests, by Parliament and various publics, asking to see the accounts or economics of Alutrint. But no answer, just silence.

The people, the owners of Alutrint, are getting two dinner-mints for their dollar: one propaganda, the other silence. Both are costly. But the more tragic cost, is silence.

Sincerely

Wayne Kublalsingh