Wednesday, March 30, 2011

CARICOM again

I am happy to see that the Jamaican government is sending a high level team down to Barbados to conduct a criminal investigation into the finger rape of Ms. Myrie.

I suppose it had to come to that for as foreign minister Dr. Baugh said in parliament, Jamaicans have been complaining for years about the treatment they receive in other Caricom territories.

I think the problem with Caricom is that it is a "school tie" affair being vociferously promoted by graduates of the UWI who dominate the politics in the region, but who because of the red carpet treatment and sweet talk they get from their colleagues in other territories, forget that the UWI graduate population in the region is no more than 1% if that much.

In reality, how can Caricom work in a region where we know so little about each other? Listen every cricket season how many people refer to Guyana as a small island and while Jamaicans can tell you who Obama and Hilary Clinton are, most have't got a clue who Ralph Gonzalves or Stephenson King is. In fact the only relationship we have with the others who the British lumped as the " West Indies" is an almost useless cricket team!

Talk about a relic of colonialism!

I am prepared to bet that a cost benefit analysis on CARICOM would show that Jamaica has been taken to the cleaners and the private sector stymied instead of helped by our involvement in this organisation.
What the "school tie" activists are trying to do is to overthrow the decision of the Jamaican people which was registered in the referendum in 1961. When are Jamaican taxpayers going to say enough is enough?

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