One of the Caribbean's most vocal regionalists is worried about the future of CARICOM and the integration movement and said that if the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) collapses, CSME and the entire regional institution will fail.
I had a lengthy meeting with Sir Shridath Ramphal at his Barbados home, and he expressed grave concern about the pace of activities in the move towards Caribbean integration, for which he has been clamouring for five decades.He said the Heads of Government and CARICOM have to "recapture the vision that led a generation of Caribbean leaders to the understanding that we have to have functional unity -- if we are to meet the challenges of the 21st century... We have seen to have lost our way in governance at the regional level in economic integration which is the heartbeat of CARICOM... We have lost our inspiration within the developing world when we were once the leaders of the ACP (African, Caribbean and Pacific nations) and perhaps worst of all Caribbean people are losing faith in the political leadership of the region."
The old problem of implementation is still with us and, without implementation, decisions are meaningless, Sir Shridath stressed and cited the CSME, which he said has still not gotten off the ground after so many years.
Touching on the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ), the former three-term Commonwealth Secretary General said the CCJ is the central pillar of regional integration under the Treaty of Chagaraumas. He pointed out that the CCJ is essential to the functioning of the CSME because the CSME is a legal regime. He added that we have come to the limit and asked what can be done without law at a regional level.
He has joined with four other recipients of the region's highest award, the Order of Caribbean Community (OCC), in calling on the various governments to remove the Privy Council and accept the CCJ as the final court.
I recall in 1977 when Sir Shridath spoke at the graduation exercise of the University of the West Indies at St Augustine, when he received his honorary doctorate from the UWI, he made an impassioned plea for regional integration and pointed out that the English-speaking Caribbean, which has a population of less than five million, has the most prime ministers, presidents, ambassadors and high commissioners on the planet -- although the population is so small.
The Guyanese-born diplomat is a regionalist at heart and was a keen player in bringing an end to Ian Smith's Unilateral Declaration of Independence and institutional racism in Southern Rhodesia. He also spent much of his last five years as Commonwealth Secretary General, until 1990, in the struggle to end apartheid in South Africa. He had the satisfaction of playing a part in Nelson Mandela's release from prison in February 1990, and Namibia's independence the following month.
Sir Shridath with Oscar Ramjeet at his home in Barbados
September 8, 2010
