The offer by the Cuban government of 350 scholarships to Guyanese students over a period of five years is generous and welcome. It is understood that l00 will be awarded next year. The government of Guyana will determine the areas where training is vital to the needs of the country, these will include medicine, civil engineering, agriculture and sciences. In the medical field, according to a GINA press release, the emphasis will be on the training of specialists. The scholarships will be open to students all over Guyana including the hinterland communities and the process of selection will have to be put in place fairly soon if the first awardees are to start next September in Cuba.

The criteria and qualifications required for selection have not yet been identified and whether the scholarships entail a commitment to work for a while for the government of Guyana, which would seem to be a reasonable requirement. Cuba's achievements in the health sector are widely recognised and we need cardiologists, radiologists, cancer specialists and anaesthesiologists.

The most cursory manpower needs survey will also reveal the shortage of engineers in the areas of roads and sea defences, and agricultural scientists. The government should have a fair idea of the needs of its ministries and agencies but should also consult the business sector and the university community who will be aware of the gaps that now exist.

Guyana stands to benefit from this offer in several technical and professional fields and it is a tribute to the Cuban educational system that it is capable of accommodating an influx of this magnitude.

Cuba has of course helped Guyana before, most notably with the supply of doctors for the medical service. In the early sixties, when the cold war was in full swing, it had provided gasoline for a beleaguered PPP government. However, the later Burnham government had more than amicable relations with Cuba and both the main parties have accepted Cuba as a friend and ally.

Democrats in the Caribbean have on the whole an ambivalent relationship to Cuba. They admire the way it has stood up at different times to the American eagle and the Russian bear. The lesson they drew from the Cuban experience after the American embargo was imposed was that during the cold war there was no middle way in this hemisphere, and many understood and sympathised with the dilemma Cuba faced and applauded its considerable achievements. Yet Cuba remains a one party dictatorship without the basic freedoms of expression, movement and association that are a traditional part of our lives. Continuing American hostility has made it more difficult to liberalise. Many feel that if the embargo had been lifted the resumption of normal trade and other relationships with America would have created a much more favourable atmosphere for gradual change.

Cuba survived the sudden loss of Soviet support a decade ago but remains in a kind of no-man's land. It is accepted in the Caribbean and increasingly by Europe but remains subject to the American embargo, which has been maintained despite an overwhelmingly negative vote in the United Nations General Assembly. Unfortunately, American foreign policy on Cuba is still largely driven by the pressures generated by the Cuban exile community in Florida and the possible significance of that community for the vote in elections. Whether that is the same since the Elian Gonsalvez episode is another matter as many felt the exile community overplayed its hand and lost a lot of sympathy.

President Fidel Castro is still widely admired in the West Indies but the average West Indian could not live in a Cuba where the traditional freedoms do not exist,(more than forty years after the revolution).

Cuba continues to be a friend to Guyana and other Caribbean territories and the relationship with Caricom is increasingly cordial. While continuing to welcome Cuba as a Caribbean brother the member states of Caricom have already delicately raised concerns about democracy and freedom, given their own commitment to a Social Charter which embodies several basic human rights. And America, too, should be urged to revisit and remove the archaic embargo and to help restore normal relations.