Caricom’s information fortress

One week ago, to the day, there was a vigorous, spontaneous round-robin involving a cadre of Caribbean journalists who monitor the Caricom process as closely as we can.

This followed a social media post and subsequent press release indicating that “the required majority” of leaders had agreed to the re-appointment of Dr Carla Barnett as Secretary-General of Caricom.

Both journalists who covered the February 24-26 Heads of Government inter-Sessional Meeting in St Kitts and Nevis, and those who had followed from some distance away, were somewhere between shocked and surprised that such a development could have occurred under usually efficient noses.

Caricom leaders as they met in St Kitts and Nevis in February

There had been the regular snooping, leaking, press conferencing, and typically sluggish release of the conference communiqué which, this time, was noteworthy for its amazingly platitudinous summary of a dramatically explosive Opening Ceremony.

Yes, there was word making the rounds beforehand that an SG vacancy was approaching. There had been a strong view in some quarters that the region should look elsewhere for leadership out of Turkeyen, Georgetown. But that’s not for this summit, some thought.

The extent to which such information remained surreptitiously (and unbelievably) guarded - purportedly against even official delegations - has been explored by others. The press corps was clueless. There have since been some bold assertions, especially from T&T.

I had meanwhile been advising colleagues beforehand that the Marco Rubio visit was important, but there were numerous other things that demanded equally prominent interrogation. “Please don’t make this all about Rubio,” was my admonition on repeat.

But nooo. Behind the bureaucratic fortifications of the process, while everyone was looking the other way, has now emerged at least one supposedly unlisted agenda item. And it has provided, in the dismal imagination of at least one politician, a basis for hyperbolically concluding that “irreparable damage” has been sustained by the regional movement because of the development.

As an aside, prior to such a declaration of terminal injury, it would have been worthwhile to have scanned the global landscape and paid attention to other integration efforts to witness growing cognitive dissonance regarding issues of institutional sustainability.

Within the EU individually nuanced postures related to migration, fiscal policy, Ukraine, Gaza, Trump and other issues have generated disquiet and signaled harmful possibilities. Ten years ago came Brexit.

The African Union and ECOWAS have had to confront violent conflicts - often across mutual borders - stern economic challenges, hunger, drought, and contestations over natural resources including water.

The Asian nations, via ASEAN, have cohered amid deadly instability in countries such as Myanmar, South China Sea disputes, and new and longstanding conflicts within and across national frontiers.

Then, everywhere, we have the groping hands of geo-political alignments and re-alignments in the face of imperialistic overreach. Yet, integrated thought and action generally persist as decided points of first territorial contact. None of these integration movements has disappeared.

So now, what about the contested re-appointment of the Caricom Secretary-General bears the flavour of irreversibility/terminality?

Get over that and we can focus on the underlying conditions that have led to the current imbroglio/s. For, they have brought abrupt attention to simmering issues that have for too long remained the exclusive preserve of a bureaucratic fortress surrounded by political moats.

Such matters include, but are not restricted to, financing arrangements to facilitate the work of the Caricom Secretariat and related institutions. T&T’s agitated, nit-picking alarm on the matter suggests something remains amiss. And it is.

But these things are only available for propagandistic exploitation and intemperate outbursts because they reside in the realm of official secrecy - in the “classified” binders of officials and countries.

So, what had remained “behind the scenes” is now emerging in bits and manipulated pieces. The fact is, the cost of integration has increased, and the share of the bill, given changing economic circumstances in Member States, needs to be reformulated. T&T, as a major contributor, is understandably peeved – whatever its net financial gains.

Of course, we may wish to investigate the details of the rising costs. The Caricom Secretariat bill, I am told, has grown by close to 25% over recent years. Why? How? What? Who???

No doubt, everywhere, factors such as domestic and external conflict, declines in global development financing, and structural limitations – especially among small, vulnerable economies - have all contributed to difficulties in containing existing budgets.

But we deserve the details. We are the ones paying financially … and emotionally, each time we hear “the end is nigh!” or whenever the information fortress is somehow breached.