CARICOM cannot function as an organisation for sitting Governments while opposition voices and ordinary citizens are denied recourse.
This is according to Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar as she chastised the regional body for failing to acknowledge or respond to a letter she wrote to the Secretariat in 2022 while she was Opposition Leader.
Recalling that the letter stemmed from the October 2022 “kidnapping” of a T&T citizen from another CARICOM state, Mrs. Persad-Bissessar said the unresolved abduction remains a stain on the region’s integrity and a signal that CARICOM may be prioritising Governments over the people it serves.
“To date, that was 2022. I have not had a response from the Secretariat. So, I say to CARICOM, that response, non-response, it may be the result of poor management, lax accountability, or, most concerning, that one ceases to be recognised by the Secretariat as a member citizen of CARICOM when not in Government. And so I want to reaffirm that the CARICOM should be the voice for all, not just for the governing parties, not just for those in the Caribbean who form Government parties.”
The Prime Minister also noted that alleged cross-border political meddling has created deep fractures within the community.
“CARICOM governments and their political parties who actively involve themselves in the domestic and political affairs of member states, the sister or brother parties, cannot then expect that when we come together, that we must hug up each other when in the last election gone, you sent your missives, you sent your people from your party to openly campaign against another political party. I’m sorry I have to share this, but it hurt me a lot when I saw what transpired within the last set of elections in the CARICOM. So CARICOM Governments, if we are to hug up each other and cooperate, it cannot be that last week, you sent your person down to St. Vincent or to Jamaica or to wherever you sent your political persons, not technocrats, you sent them down to campaign.”