Latest update April 7th, 2025 6:08 AM
Gonsalves notes CARICOM’s progress at 25th Intersessional
The Heads of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) yesterday opened their 25th Intersessional Meeting in St Vincent and the Grenadines where Dr. Ralph Gonsalves, acknowledged the numerous setbacks over the years
Dr. Gonsalves, in addressing the leaders, spoke of the failures particularly around freedom of movement of persons, good governance and implementation issues.
CARICOM Chairman Dr. Ralph Gonsalves, Prime Minister of St Vincent and the Grenadines greets Portia Simpson-Miller Prime Minister of Jamaica before the opening session of the 25th Intersessional Meeting of the Heads of Government at Buccament Bay.
“The accomplishments,” he said, “touch and concern functional cooperation, particularly in education, health, and citizenry security; trade and economic integration; freedom of movement of persons though still problematic; the coordination of public policy in the areas of renewable for energy, agriculture and tourism, air transport, financial services, and foreign affairs, and disputes-settlement through the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ).”
According to Dr. Gonsalves, there is still a great deal left to be done to realise the full fruition of the Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas.
“It is the frustrating, unfulfilled potential of CARICOM which prompts stinging critiques, including a justifiable sense in some quarters that this regional body is unequally yoked and thus allocates or distributes its benefits too unevenly.”
According to Dr. Gonsalves, neither the political leadership as a collective nor the populations as a whole, have an appetite for much more than what is currently on offer in the Treaty commitments.
“So, our political mandate is to ensure that what is fashioned in the Revised Treaty is implemented optimally…To achieve this we must first love and care for CARICOM; secondly, we must ensure that the organs of the Community work as intended and that its decisions are implemented in each nation-state of the Community; and thirdly, that the political leaders and populations in each nation-state possess the requisite political will for CARICOM’s optimal functioning, as structured.”
He noted, too, that frequently, CARICOM is lambasted for its failure or refusal to implement the decisions of its treaty-based institutions.
“Invariably, the CARICOM Secretariat is excoriated for this implementation deficit…However the Secretariat is not CARICOM; it is the central administrative instrument of CARICOM but it possesses no authority to compel enforcement of decisions of the various Councils of Ministers and the Heads of State and Government Conference.”
He said that in the absence of an Executive CARICOM Commission, buttressed by the requisite constitutional or legal authority, the central responsibility for the implementation of CARICOM’s decisions rests with the governments of the individual nation-states.
“Thus, each government is enjoined in its responsibility, nay its solemn obligation, to put appropriate institutional arrangements in its natural executive and administrative apparatuses to facilitate the speedy and efficacious implementation of CARICOM’s decisions.”
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