Caricom's 2004 Agenda - 'No Luxury of Time'
By Rickey Singh
Guyana Chronicle
January 4, 2004
EDWIN CARRINGTON, Secretary General of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) said it well, as perhaps it should be, when we spoke on New Year's eve:
"We do not have the luxury of time on our side and, therefore, operationalising the Caribbean Single Market and Economy (CSME)), along with the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ), must be realised in 2004 to generate and maintain the required momentum in the regional economic integration process ".
In the thinking of Carrington, the chief public servant of the Community, primary challenges to be faced, regionally, this year, would be to have significant aspects of the single market aspect of the CSME in place, and "seen to be delivering benefits to the people...
"They (the people) have to begin to feel the benefits of regional integration and not only to learn of the arrangements and mechanisms we talk about", said Carrington, who also considers as important challenges for 2004 having relevant initiatives and arrangements at state level to deal with pressing problems of crime and security.
The ongoing political crisis in Haiti also looms large on CARICOM's agenda for 2004.
A new initiative by the Community was reportedly underway, as 2003 was drawing to a close, for a special meeting in a CARICOM state involving key Haitian players - government and opposition - as well as representatives of the Community with hopes of arresting that elusive practical solution.
Overcoming some of their own challenging domestic political divisions is also to be addressed by member states like Jamaica, Guyana and Trinidad and Tobago.
In the cases of Jamaica and Guyana, discussions at the highest level, that were taking place in 2003, are expected to continue in 2004 - hopefully with a greater sense of determination to find common ground.
Trinidad and CCJ
But it is in Trinidad and Tobago that the need for dialogue between government and opposition is extremely urgent, as it has disturbing implications also for CARICOM, so far as it relates to the creation of the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ).
For the government of Prime Minister Patrick Manning, 2004 must be the year when it achieves a breakthrough with the parliamentary opposition led by Basdeo Panday on vital legislative measures.
These require the government's capacity to strike a compromise for securing opposition support for passage of the long delayed Police Reform Bill, and also approval of legislation to facilitate Trinidad and Tobago in having the CCJ as its final appellate court in place of the Privy Council in London.
In both cases, Panday's United National Congress has linked support to the government's preparedness to pursue overall constitutional reform. Since neither legislation can be approved without the required majority votes in the House of Representatives - which means backing from opposition MPs - then, in the national interest, both Manning and Panday must find a practical compromise, with at least a written agreement, in principle, on the time frame for the launch of constitutional reform.
Inauguration of the CCJ, already postponed from last month, is now scheduled for April 2004 in Port-of-Spain.
It would be most embarrassing for CARICOM as a whole should the CCJ, which is to be headquartered in Port-of-Spain, be launched without Trinidad and Tobago being able, at the outset, to access it as its final appeal court.
Following what Dr Richard Bernal, Director General of the Caribbean Regional Negotiating Machinery (CRNM) described as "a good year in 2003 in our negotiations", 2004 is the year when negotiations on external trade and economic relations would be intensified on three related fronts: These would involve:
External Negotiations, Haiti
The World Trade Organisation (WTO) meeting in Puebla, Mexico, focused on recovering from the collapse of last year's Cancun ministerial meeting; the launch of negotiations with the European Union on a Regional Economic Partnership Agreement (REPA), in the context of the Cotonou EU-ACP Convention; and a resumed round of negotiations on the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA).
For the inaugural launch of the meeting on the EU-REPA arrangement, the intention is to have it in Jamaica, whose Prime Minister, P.J. Patterson, heads the CARICOM Prime Ministerial Sub-Committee on External Economic Negotiations. It is hoped that the EU's Trade Commissioner, Pascal Lamy, himself would be present for the occasion.
While pressing ahead, on a consensual basis, for best possible concessions in WTO and FTAA negotiations, the CARICOM bloc of states would be conscious of the need to avoid any further default in CSME-readiness.
Perhaps the single most challenging regional political issue to be confronted by the Community, remains helping to resolve the political crisis in Haiti which is progressively deteriorating.
Even that is, as that poorest of nation in the Caribbean-Latin American region is caught up with official arrangements to mark its 200th anniversary that makes it the oldest independent nation in the Western Hemisphere.
At his recent surprise 20-minute meeting with President George Bush that took place during a scheduled meeting with National Security Adviser Condoleeza Rice at The White House - Prime Minister Manning was reportedly asked for his government's assistance in resolving the Haitian political crisis.
Well meaning as such a request may be, the Bush administration - which has been doing precious little for Haiti - should know that CARICOM as a whole has been jointly involved with the OAS to bring an end to the political impasse between President Jean Bertrand Aristide's administration and opposition parties and civil society organisations over arrangements to ensure free and fair elections, and democratic governance in Port-au-Prince.
Prime Minister Perry Christie of The Bahamas was scheduled to be the only CARICOM leader in Port-of-Prince last week for the official launch of Haiti's 200th Independence anniversary celebrations, intended to involve year-long activities for 2004.
Prime Minister Patterson, current chairman of CARICOM, was originally expected to head a Community team, but in his absence, there would be The Bahamas' Christie.
So far as deepening the regional economic integration process is concerned, all 12 of the CARICOM member countries that are party to the revised Treaty of Chaguaramas, were expected to have completed on New Year's Eve arrangements for the removal of all legal and administrative restrictions for participation in the CSME
Meeting that deadline is critical to the inauguration of the CSME for which Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago and Barbados hope to be in operational readiness in 2004 - As indicated at last year's CARICOM Summit in Montego Bay.
Other member states, including Guyana, are working to be in CSME-readiness in 2005 - ahead of the expected launch of the FTAA.