EDITORIAL

A region divided

It was not that long ago, indeed it was just after the occasion of a number of selected regional leaders meeting with the incumbent US President, Mr Donald Trump and other members of his administration, at his Mar-a-Lago Resort in Palm Beach, Florida, that we opined in this very space that we interpreted this meeting as a scarcely concealed attempt to divide the region on its declared united position on the optimal resolution of the ongoing Venezuelan crisis; a position that differs substantially from that of the Trump administration that appears to be hell-bent on regime change.

And while we did retain some degree of comfort from the assurance by Mr Allan Chastanet, the Prime Minister of St Lucia, of his continuing respect for CARICOM positions, the recently reported account in last Sunday’s issue of the Barbados Advocate of the regional voting patterns at an Organisation of American States (OAS) meeting, on whether to accept the nomination of a candidate supported by Snr. Juan Guaido as permanent representative to that organisation, bears cogent testimony of the existence of a schism within the grouping.

It is by now notorious that the US administration supports Snr. Guaido for the leadership of Venezuela over Snr Nicholas Maduro, currently the disputed de jure President. It is equally notorious that the region’s stance favours neither of these contenders over the other, preferring to maintain a stance of neutrality that would optimise a solution reached after structured dialogue between the two factions.

Nevertheless, at least four member states of CARICOM found it possible to support the nomination of the Guaido candidate, unsurprisingly a number of who were at the earlier Mar-a-Lago meeting.

The St Lucian Foreign Affairs Minister, Ms Sarah Flood Beaubrun, subsequently defended the affirmative vote of her jurisdiction on the basis that the National Assembly, headed by Guaido is “the only democratic institution presently in Venezuela” and that it is concerned that the Maduro regime “continues to stifle democracy”.

Notably, some of her language appeared scarcely supportive of the CARICOM declared stance of neutrality. According to her, “We should not be quiet to unconstitutional efforts to maintain an illegitimate grip on power –despite the loud clamouring of a country’s people and the international community for new and open elections…”

St Lucia was joined in its affirmation of the Guaido candidate by Haiti, Jamaica and The Bahamas while Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, St Vincent and the Grenadines and Suriname voted against.

In the region, and certainly in Barbados, the foreign relations of the nation are rarely, if ever, a matter for public discourse. It is as if the people have uncritically ceded this important aspect of our governance to the executive. Hence, there is never public discussion of our voting patterns in international bodies, or of the treaties to which we might become signatory or even of our shibboleth “friends of all, satellites of none” and its relevance and meaning in today’s world. This is a pity.

It might be of interest, for what it is worth, to note that Barbados, together with Guyana, St Kitts-Nevis, and Trinidad & Tobago found it prudent to abstain on the vote. We are not at all clear as to what this abstention signifies.

We wish all of our readers a blessed Eastertide.

Barbados Advocate

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