Will the President surprise us on his return?

Jan 17, 2023 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

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Kaieteur News – Guyana’s President is not the incumbent Chairman of the Caribbean Community. As such, he has no authority to invite the Prime Minister of India to attend and to address this year’s Inter-Sessional Meeting of the Heads of Government of the Caribbean Community.

It is being reported in the media that the Guyanese President extended an invitation to Prime Minister Modi to attend the forthcoming Inter-sessional meeting of CARICOM heads which is scheduled for next month in the Bahamas. The Guyana Chronicle and the Press Office of the Government of India both reported this. There has been no denial or correction of this report by the Government of Guyana.

As far as is known, the incumbent head of CARICOM is President Chan Santokhi of Suriname whose term ends in February. If an invitation is to be extended, it has to be either from Santokhi or from the incoming Head from the Bahamas.

In any event, it is not usual for foreign Heads of State to be invited to an Inter-sessional Meeting which is usually held towards the end of February. Such meetings are intended to monitor the business of the Community in between the Regular Conferences. If Guyana is hosting an agricultural event for CARICOM in August of this year, then it may be within the prerogative of Ali, who is the CARICOM Lead on agriculture and food security, to extend such an invitation because this event will essentially be hosted in Guyana. But he certainly has no authority to invite Prime Minister Modi to address the next Inter-Sessional in February or for that matter the Regular Meeting in July of this year.

This is not the first time that controversy has erupted over purported statements made by Ali concerning the Caribbean Community. Previously, he had asked for the Brazilians to be included on the Ministerial Task Force on Agriculture which was established to push regional food security. This was an unprecedented request and one which was no doubt rebuffed.  President Ali meanwhile has been making the rounds in India. Following his interview in Guyana with Al Jazeera, he met while in India with at least three media agencies, WION ZEETV and NDTV.

But it has been quite a while since he has hosted a local Press Conference. It is hoped that when he returns, he will host such a Press Conference for the local media corps. Such an undertaking will allow him to report on the outcome of his trip of India. And it will also provide ample opportunity for him to provide an update on the status with the dismantling of the barriers to regional trade in agricultural products which had been high on the agenda of the Ministerial Task Force. Addressing a forum in Trinidad and Tobago in 2021, Ali had hinted that regional food barriers could be removed quickly. He should advise us of just how many barriers have been removed and how many newer ones have been erected since him assuming the Lead on agriculture and food security.

If he does muster the energy to host a press conference on his return from India, he may also wish to advise the nation on the extent to which the country has attained the targets which he announced at the Regional Agri-Invest Forum hosted in Guyana last year. At that activity, he announced initiatives which he said were aimed at helping to achieve the 25 by 2025 goal set by the Caribbean Community. For example, he announced that by 2025 Guyana intends to increase poultry production from 50,000 metric tonnes per annum to 90,000 metric tonnes; corn and soya from 4,300 metric tonnes to 35,000 metric tonnes; vegetables from 324,000 metric tonnes to 400,000 metric tonnes; and rice from 560,000 metric tonnes to 847,000 metric tonnes by 2025.

The nation needs a report on what is being done to achieve these targets. It is obvious that in relation to poultry that there has been some stagnation since poultry prices have increased above the increase in input costs for feed. In relation to corn and soya, the Brazilians and a consortium of local businesses were expected to increase corn and soya production but whether 35,000 metric tonnes by 2025 is achievable is left to be seen.

India in the meantime is being offered 200 acres of land in Guyana to cultivate millets. Why India with such extensive agricultural lands would want to come here to plant millets is something that is hard to comprehend. But our President has been known as man of surprises. Let us hope he will surprise the nation by hosting a press conference on his return. It is the one issue in which his usual enthusiasm has failed him.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of this newspaper and its affiliates.)

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• Caribbean Communi, CARICOM, Peeping Tom, President Chan Santokhi of Suriname, Prime Minister Modi

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