The golden days of Guyana's diplomacy are now part of a monograph compiled by former Foreign Minister, Rashleigh Jackson.
Jackson, also a former Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Permanent Representa-tive/Ambassador at the United Nations launched his monograph,Guyana's Dip-lomacy: Reflections of a Former Foreign Minister on Friday at the Hotel Tower.
Speaking at the launching Jackson said he had intended to launch the monograph on October 3, since the day is of particular significance to Guyana's foreign diplomacy and would have been fitting. That was the day on which the award was made in 1899 by an arbitration tribunal set up under the Treaty of Washington, and which settled the boundary between Venezuela and British Guiana.
He said that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs through Parliament should work towards commemorating October 3, as the whole nation could rally behind such a significant date.
Jackson told the gathering that if government did not pursue this idea civil society should commemorate the day.
Lloyd Searwar, former Senior Foreign Service Officer, spoke on the role played by Jackson as a diplomat and the objectives and structure of Guyana's diplomacy/foreign policy, as discussed in the monograph.
Searwar noted that Guyana had achieved recognition as regularly playing vanguard, activist roles. He recalled that after independence the country was regarded as a leader in the diplomacy of developing as well as non-aligned countries, one whose delegations could be expected to work hard to advance matters over a broad field, and whose delegates moreover were known to be prepared to take on important roles as chairmen or members of committees and drafting groups.
He explained that Jackson had played a leading role in those days of Guyana's diplomacy, heading the preparatory Secretariat at the Conference of Non-Aligned Foreign Ministers in Georgetown in 1972, which provided Guyana's diplomacy and its international impact with an enormous forward thrust.
Searwar pointed out that Jackson in particular faced the daunting task of ascertaining the facts and codifying the practices and conventions of the movement. He asserted that the movement was rehabilitated at the Georgetown meeting so that it could confidently face the challenges of a rapidly changing international system. He said further that there was one overarching objective at the time, namely the preservation of the territorial integrity of Guyana, and he added that the controversy which arose as a result of Venezuela's unwarranted claim threatened the very existence of our new state.
In addition, he said that the chapter on 'Relations with Venezuela' was an insightful, steadily relevant narrative which touches on all the issues involved in the difficult relationship and which policy-makers should always keep in mind.
He said that the chapter is also a case study which lists nearly all the elements involved in effective national diplomacy, including the essential need for scholarship; for mobilizing national consensus; for bearing in mind the implications of national development; for mobilizing the representation of external NGOs and the diplomatic resources of such bodies as Caricom and the Commonwealth; for coping with ambiguities involved in summit meetings and other diplomatic exchanges; and for how to pursue twin track diplomacy, on the one track resisting Venezuela's claim while on the other track, promoting economic and functional cooperation with Venezuela. The launching was well attended and was chaired by former Ambassador Rudy Collins. Jackson noted that the essays which constitute the book had first appeared as a series of articles in the Sunday Stabroek. He noted that the editor-in-chief of Stabroek News, David de Caires had been after him for years to write reminiscences about his career, and he had eventually succumbed.
The feature speaker was former Chancellor Keith Massiah, who noted that Jackson writes with passion and had composed an uncomplicated prose for his monograph. Mr David Granger, whose Free Press was responsible for the publication of the book also spoke, and tribute was paid by Ms Jocelyn Dow, a friend of Jackson, who noted that she was the only woman on the panel.