TIME TO ACKNOWLEDGE OUR REGION HAS A REFUGEE PROBLEM

Jun 11, 2017 Letters

Dear Editor,
Allow me space please, to help me share this open call to David Granger, President, Chairman, of the Caribbean Community, as well as all leaders of nations within the CARICOM group. Everywhere we look in Guyana these days, we see ‘foreigners’ – just people in search of a better life. Brazilians, Venezuelans, Chinese, Indians, none of those of Caribbean origin….many here illegally; yet there has been no deportation drive as intense as the current one to send Haitians back to the devastation of their homeland in the Caribbean.
These Haitians are Caribbean nationals who have been traumatized by a series of disasters. In October 2016 a category 4 hurricane, Matthew, struck the southern section of Haiti, ‘the bread basket’ of the country. Two of the five provinces – Grand-Anse and Sud were completely destroyed, centuries old trees flattened. Villagers now stare at miles and miles of open landscape with scarred trees and grass – the residue left by 150 miles per hour winds that totally wiped out farms with crops and 200,000 homes, to displace a million Haitians; the nation’s infrastructure was devastated…damages are estimated at approximately US $1.9 billion.
This is the background that gives rise to the current condition of the Haitian people who come here seeking refuge. Since ‘The Caribbean Community was organized ‘to promote economic integration and cooperation among its members to ensure that the benefits of integration are equitably shared, and to coordinate foreign policy.’ Is it unreasonable to expect that CARICOM leaders (especially the current Chairman, President David Granger in whose nation, Guyana, an obvious homegrown Haitian refugee crisis is gestating), would be more vocal and visible in response? CARICOM was established in 1973 with a mandate to coordinate economic policies and institute ‘SPECIAL PROJECTS FOR THE LESS-DEVELOPED COUNTRIES WITHIN ITS JURISDICTION’. Surely the community in collaboration with the UN could come up with imaginative ‘special projects’ to address this Haitian Refugee Resettlement Crisis?
Joan Cambridge

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