‘Caricomesse’ and Political Unification

THE EDITOR: The traditional difficulties hitherto demonstrated by our Honourable PM Manning to respond to and effectively preside over the challenging daily vagaries of our domestic affairs with due confidence and sagacity encroached on the conduct of our sub-regional foreign relations at the recently concluded 14th Inter-Sessional Meeting of the HOG Conference. In all honesty I felt that TT’s Caricom standing/image was unnecessarily tarnished from careless diplomacy, lack of pre-planning consultations, premature tabling of the issue of political unification on the agenda and regrettably by a voluminous UWI non-paper.

Was there not clear, unambiguous evidence since the recent Cuban visit that PM Patterson of Jamaica was not interested in any discussions on Caribbean political unification? After all the CSME, the precursor to political unification was not expected to come into force and effect until 2005. Time was not of the essence. The minimum one expected from the GORTT was the conduct of the necessary round-robin consultations to determine the political feasibility of tabling the issue and not imposing a fait accompli. Or was PM Manning using the expected negative Caricom riposte on political unification to justify and accelerate his planned, almost obsessive mini-Federation with St Vincent or “any other Caricom state” for which he has no mandate hitherto to prosecute from Trinbagonians. What are the benefits of graduating from economic integration (CSME) to political unification (Caribbean Union) surrounded by a disintegrative Caribbean Sea? One needs to conduct a sociology of the Caribbean Sea.

As a Trini to the bone I was palpably embarrassed seeing the TV images of two senior Caricom Prime Ministers, notably Patterson and Arthur, scheduling their own media conference and making patently undiplomatic and uncomplimentary remarks on TT’s virtual non-proposal for political unification (the notorious UWI Non-Paper). PM Manning and his advisers must appreciate their imperative to take pre-emptive action to insulate and safeguard Trinbagonians from exposure to Caricomesse and insults. To hear PM Patterson describe TT’s political unification proposal as a “... no ball” from which he was not going to be caught out was undiplomatic posturing. What was worse was hearing PM Arthur of Barbados impute that the unification initiative was a “... song that has an enchanting melody but no lyrics”. No opportunity should have been given for these Prime Ministers to borrow imageries drawn from two areas of national successes to lambaste us while enjoying our diplomatic hospitality.

Are we not in a Carnival season witnessing a rich harvest of soca/chutney in which both sweet melodies and lyrics are in full flight? Have not Ganga’s men peaked without no balls with two successive outright victories? In a very sarcastic vein PM Patterson found the Manning’s unification proposal such a compelling beneficial move for Caricom that he was willing to act as a facilitator/vector but not as a participant. For Jamaica a “community of sovereign states” (CSME) was its integration limit. In fact I concluded that PM’s Arthur and Patterson were trying to outdo each other in their common agenda to denigrate the Manning Initiative III. Is there more in the Caricom mortar than the pestle?

STEPHEN KANGAL Caroni