> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.lacaribenanews.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # A Guyanese Minister Said Oil Will Not Get Guyana There. Then She Asked Why Nobody Is Investing in Lethem. - URL: https://www.lacaribenanews.com/guyana-rodrigues-lethem-investment-oil-will-not-take-us-there-2026/ - Published: 2026-10-15T14:56:10.000Z - Updated: 2026-10-16T21:05:50.000Z - Description: Tourism, Industry and Commerce Minister Susan Rodrigues told a Guyana Manufacturing and Services Association panel on 13 October 2026 that oil and gas will not deliver prosperity alone, and said she is baffled that more private investment is not going to Lethem on the Brazilian border. - Author: Theon Alleyne - Tags: Wire, business, Guyana, Brazil, Infrastructure **Quick summary:** Tourism, Industry and Commerce Minister Susan Rodrigues told a Guyana Manufacturing and Services Association panel on 13 October 2026 that oil and gas will not deliver prosperity alone, and said she is baffled that more private investment is not going to Lethem, the Region Nine township on the Brazilian border. By LCN Business Desk Three voices in three oil and gas economies made the same argument on Tuesday 13 October 2026\. Two of them were reported from Paramaribo and Port of Spain in [Suriname Set Conditions, Trinidad Set a Target](https://www.lacaribenanews.com/trinidad-hosein-ttma-non-energy-exports-target-suriname-same-day-2026/). The third was in Georgetown, and she is a serving minister in the country furthest into production. "Prosperity must come to the home of every single Guyanese person, and oil and gas is not going to take us there, or at least, it's not going to take us there alone," Susan Rodrigues said. ## What else did the Minister say? That she cannot understand why the money is not arriving. Rodrigues was speaking at a panel discussion hosted by the Guyana Manufacturing and Services Association. Her subject was Lethem, the township in Region Nine, Upper Takutu-Upper Essequibo, that sits on the border with Brazil. "It baffles me why we don't have more investment in Lethem," she said. "The transformation that will take place in Region Nine is unimaginable, and I'm surprised that more people are not flocking to Region Nine and making investments in Lethem in particular." She put it to the room as a closing window. "This is your time to make your investments; investments will become more expensive in the future. This is the time to start." On what she is protecting, she was specific: "we are protecting fiercely these other sectors, our agricultural sector, our manufacturing sector, and our tourism sector, encouraging private investment in education and in healthcare, and improving the infrastructure landscape and improving connectivity, because we have to build a resilient economy." ## What has the state already put there? An airport site, an incubator, a hospital and a road. | Public investment named at Lethem | | | ----------------------------------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | New regional airport | A site of some 2,000 hectares, planned as a gateway for tourism, trade and regional connectivity | | Business incubator and agro-processing facility | $181 million, recently commissioned | | Lethem Regional Hospital | Under construction. Two operating theatres, a modern emergency department with a procedure room for minor surgeries, digital and portable X-ray, a CT scanner, three ultrasound machines, laboratory services, specialised outpatient clinics, pharmacy, two dialysis chairs, a digital health control room, a paediatric unit, an intensive care unit and a maternity wing | | Road to Brazil | Works on the first section nearing completion, on a network the report puts at an estimated 50,000 travellers | Source: Guyana Times, 15 October 2026, reporting the Minister's remarks at the GMSA panel. The hospital is being built in part for people who are not Guyanese: residents of Brazil already cross the border to use services available in the township. The road it connects to has been bad enough that heavily laden lorries frequently toppled off the roadway, and deteriorated bridges required boards to be aligned by hand before a crossing. ## So why is the private money not coming? The Minister did not say, and nothing in her remarks sets out a reason. She described the opportunity, the infrastructure and the timing. What she did not offer was an account of what is holding investors back, and the report carries no response from any investor or business body. ## What does the road to Lethem actually look like? Two contracted sections, and a long unpaved remainder. "Works on the first section nearing completion" describes the Linden to Mabura Hill upgrade, a 121-kilometre stretch carrying a US$190 million contract that has run through more than one Brazilian contractor. In April 2026 100 of its 121 kilometres were paved. A revised completion date of 23 August 2026 passed, and by late September more than 120 kilometres were reported complete. A second section was contracted in September 2026: 30 kilometres of asphaltic concrete from Mabura Hill towards Kurupukari, against a G$7.6 billion budget allocation. | The corridor from the coast to Lethem | Length | Status | | ------------------------------------- | -------------------------------------- | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | Linden to Mabura Hill | 121 km | US$190m contract. More than 120 km reported complete by late September 2026, past a revised August deadline | | Mabura Hill towards Kurupukari | 30 km | Contract signed September 2026, G$7.6bn budgeted | | Kurupukari onward to Lethem | the remainder, several times the above | Mostly unpaved laterite, reported as often impassable in the rainy season where the road runs low | Sources: Guyana's Department of Public Information and the Caribbean Development Bank on the contract and financing; Kaieteur News, Stabroek News and INews Guyana on progress and the second contract. So an investor weighing Lethem is being asked to commit at the far end of a corridor of which roughly 150 kilometres is built or under contract, and the rest is laterite that floods. Forty-eight bridges have been completed along the wider corridor. The airport, the incubator and the hospital sit at the end of the part that is not finished. That is not an argument against investing there. It is the thing the sentence "works on the first section are nearing completion" does not tell a reader, and it is the first question any lender will ask. ## How does this sit against the rest of the week? It is the third version of the same argument on one Tuesday, and the only one from a government already banking the revenue. Suriname's President set four conditions and attached no measurement. Trinidad has a US$5 billion non-energy export target. Guyana has forty reserved service categories in statute, and the non-oil share of its economy is still falling: non-oil growth was 10.1 per cent in the first half of 2026 against 14.0 a year earlier, the full-year non-oil forecast was cut from 10.8 to 10.2, and petroleum reached 78.9 per cent of real GDP, as set out in [Guyana's Economy Grew 33.3 Per Cent](https://www.lacaribenanews.com/guyana-gdp-first-half-2026-oil-non-oil-mid-year-report/). Rodrigues is asking private capital to do the part the state cannot legislate. The sectors she named are the ones the archive has been following: agro-processing for export in [Umami's Guyana Plant](https://www.lacaribenanews.com/umami-guyana-qatar-agro-processing-export-2026/), certification as the gate to export markets in [Centaur Holdings and the Export Ladder](https://www.lacaribenanews.com/centaur-holdings-pomeroon-gnbs-certification-iso-export-ladder-2026/), and interior logistics in [The Bartica Ferry](https://www.lacaribenanews.com/bartica-ferry-reliability-interior-trade-logistics-guyana-2026/). ### What the title card shows Every data point on the article's title card, in text. - **$181 million.** The business incubator and agro-processing facility recently commissioned at Lethem. - **2,000 hectares.** The site named for the planned new regional airport. - **50,000 travellers.** The estimate given for current use of the road network linking the coast to the interior and on into Brazil. - **78.9 per cent.** Petroleum and gas as a share of Guyana's real GDP in the first half of 2026. - **13 October 2026.** The Tuesday on which the Minister spoke, the same day as the remarks reported from Paramaribo and Port of Spain. ## Frequently Asked Questions Who is Susan Rodrigues? Guyana's Minister of Tourism, Industry and Commerce. She was speaking at a panel discussion hosted by the Guyana Manufacturing and Services Association on 13 October 2026. What did she say about oil? "Prosperity must come to the home of every single Guyanese person, and oil and gas is not going to take us there, or at least, it's not going to take us there alone." What is at Lethem? A township in Region Nine on the border with Brazil. The report names a planned regional airport on a site of some 2,000 hectares, a $181 million business incubator and agro-processing facility recently commissioned, a regional hospital under construction, and road works whose first section is nearing completion. Why does the hospital matter beyond Guyana? Residents of Brazil already cross the border to use services available in the township, and the new facility is planned with that population in mind. Did the Minister explain the shortfall in investment? No. She described the opportunity and the timing. Nothing in her remarks sets out what is deterring investors, and the report carries no response from any investor or business body. ### Disclosure Theon Alleyne, the proprietor of La Caribeña News, is a Director of the Guyana Manufacturing and Services Association and Chair of its Services Sub-Sector. The panel discussion reported here was hosted by that association.