Media Conference sets up group to monitor recommendations
THE third annual Caribbean Media Conference just ended here has established a monitoring committee to oversee implementation of recommendations. At the last two sessions held Sunday within scenic Emerald Tower Resort along Soesdyke-Linden Highway, delegates agreed to the proposal for the group to do follow-up work ahead of the next caucus in Grenada. The unanimously adopted proposition was put forward by Jamaica talk show host, Ms Barbara Gloudon, who suggested the committee comprise a representative from each of the three countries which hosted such conferences - including Jamaica and Trinidad. Former United Nations adviser, Mr Hugh Cholomondeley will chair the grouping and it would remain in place until the formation of an organising committee for the May 3, 2001 occasion. Gloudon had also identified Mr Oliver Clarke of Jamaica `Gleaner' to fund the venture but he declined, offering instead to help in the acquisition. Commonwealth Press Union delegate, Mr Mark Robinson offered the monitors use of CPU facilities - set up in Barbados for its October biennial conference - to carry out their mid-year assessment. The participants, from Anguilla, Antigua, Belize, Barbados, Cuba, Grenada, Jamaica, Monsterrat, St Lucia, St Maarten, Canada, United States (U.S.) and United Kingdom (UK), had, earlier, listened to two dynamic presentations `Intellectual Property - Can copyright be protected' by Ms Allison Demas and `Media and Sports Coverage - The state of play' by Mr Chris Dehring, Chief Marketing Executive of West Indies Cricket Board (WICB). Demas is an attorney-at-law specialising in entertainment Law and President of the Copyright Organisation of Trinidad and Tobago. Of the other speakers, Guyana's Minister of Culture, Youth and Sport, Ms Gail Teixeira outlined her Government's position on intellectual property. Gleaner Editor-in-Chief, Mr Wyvoyln Gager disclosed a plan, by some who took part in the three-day meeting, to establish a Caribbean Media Network website as a possible resource centre for regional editors and journalists. Other suggestions mooted at the forum were for future conferences to focus discussions not only on television and print journalists but on radio announcers and allow secondary school and communications students to be involved throughout. More sport disciplines should be on the agenda as well, some said.
Arthur says... CSME cannot succeed without free movement of people BARBADOS Prime Minister Owen Arthur pushed for the establishment of the proposed Caribbean Court of Justice when he spoke at the media conference here last week. He said the institution is needed to deal with disputes arising from the revised Treaty of Chaguaramas. "Without a Caribbean Court of Justice to interpret Community law and settle disputes arising from the new Treaty of Chaguaramas, a Caribbean Single Market and Economy and the entire Caribbean integration process will experience only profound difficulty in succeeding," Arthur argued at the Le Meridien Pegasus Hotel forum. Delivering the keynote address on the topic `Peril, Potential and Prospects: The Caribbean Environment, Barbados', he said the initiative and desire to create the Court predates `Pratt and Morgan', the landmark Jamaica case on execution of the death penalty. "It is essential that the debate within the Region about the purposes of the Court be set within its appropriate historic and conceptual context," Arthur told the distinguished gathering of mainly politicians, journalists and media house owners. He said it is important for the vital functions to be executed by the tribunal in underpinning regional development be understood by all. Arthur posited that the Caribbean can only meaningfully operate in the new global society if human resource development is placed in the forefront of efforts to mould a new Caribbean society. The Barbadian Prime Minister declared that a new urgency and energy is required of regional universities and all other institutions associated with developing the human capacities of the Caribbean. Arthur referred to attempts at facilitating the free movement of people within as another thrust towards the Caribbean Single Market and Economy (CSME). He recalled that, in his last and "most graphic" speech, Barbados National Hero and former Prime Minister Errol Barrow said the people of the Caribbean had already made the free movement of people a reality, despite the opposition of their governments. "The creation of a single Caribbean economy cannot succeed unless the people of the Caribbean can move freely in their region to develop the Caribbean society, each in accordance with his or her own ability," Arthur warned. He said his Government is "determined to honour our obligations to enable Caribbean citizens to work and settle in Barbados." "We have seen and benefited from the fact that since 1997, almost 500 Caribbean citizens have moved to Barbados under the new arrangement and have helped to propel the development of the Barbadian society," he reported, while urging a similar trend in the rest of the Caribbean.
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