RAMPHAL CALLS FOR 'INSPIRED' CARICOM LEADERSHIP

-Forum of region's judicial officers
"The Caribbean Community is now our regional mansion within a global home. We have to make it more secure and habitable--through reaching goals like the CARICOM Single Market and Economy (CSME) and reaching them together...As CARICOM's political directorate meet in Georgetown next week for their 30th Summit they must demonstrate, credibly, that they still believe in Caribbean integration; that they care about securing it against risk; and that they are serious in their commitment to the objectives of the Treaty of Chaguaramas…" - Sir Shridath Ramphal

By Rickey Singh

THE Caribbean Community "is at risk" and requires focused and ‘inspired leadership’ to make it more "secure and habitable" to ensure our survival together…"

That was the stirring plea yesterday of Sir Shridath Ramphal, one of the key and distinguished players in the creation of CARICOM 36 years ago, as he addressed the inaugural Conference of the Association of Judicial Officers, hosted by the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) at the Hyatt Regency in Port-of-Spain.

Speaking on the central theme of the three-day conference: "Caribbean Judiciaries in an Era of Globalisation--Meeting the Challenges of the time", the former Chairman of The West Indian Commission, told participants:

"We have been warned that 'CARICOM is at risk'. So it is; and few are blameless. Political leaders, in particular, have to be less casual about CARICOM; less minimalist in their ambition for it; less negative in their vision of it...."

Prime Minister Bruce Golding is among those who have been pointing to the "risk" facing the 15-member Community in view of what he sees as conflicting issues that could prove harmful to regional unity.

Ramphal reminded the attendees at yesterday's start of the conference, among them heads of judiciaries and leading members of the region's legal profession, that CARICOM's "foundations have been built on our oneness; not on the geography of a dividing sea..."

It is also relevant, he feels, that all who claim commitment to sustaining the region's economic integration movement, to appreciate that the Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas "is not just embellished parchment".

Rather, stressed the former Chancellor of the University of the West Indies, the Revised Treaty "is the logic of that oneness in a world which threatens our separate survival....

"And the revised Treaty itself is not all, there is", declared Sir Shridath, a former long-serving Secretary General of the Commonwealth, "also international Conventions to which all CARICOM member states are parties that are relevant to our rights and obligations to each other as human beings, much less family..."

Speaking against the backdrop of public controversies involving some Heads of Government, scholars, social commentators and the region's media on critical issues like intra-regional free trade, free movement of Community nationals and specific issues pertaining to illegal immigrants, Sir Shridath, who now resides in Barbados, noted:

"The Caribbean Community is now our regional mansion within a global home. We have to make it more secure and habitable--through reaching goals like the CARICOM Single Market and Economy (CSME) and reaching them together...."

As CARICOM's political directorate meet in Georgetown next week for their 30th Summit", said the former Attorney General and Foreign Minister of Guyana, "they must demonstrate, credibly, that they still believe in Caribbean integration; that they care about securing it against risk; and that they are serious in their commitment to the objectives of the Treaty of Chaguaramas.."

Ramphal said he believes that the people of the Caribbean "yearn for that assurance from inspired leadership".

The inaugural conference of the CCJO, which concludes tomorrow (Saturday) has brought together, among others, the region's Chief Justices; Judges, Magistrates, Registrars and Executive Court Administrators.