Caribbean Heads Of Government Acknowledge Strides, Share Vision For CARICOM’S Development
GREATER GEORGETOWN, Guyana – The Thirtieth Meeting of the Conference of Heads of Government of the Caribbean Community (CARICOOM) opened Thursday evening at the National Cultural Centre in Georgetown, Guyana, with Heads of Government acknowledging the strides the integration movement had made and sharing their vision for the future of the Community.
The common threads running through the five speeches were the global economic and financial crisis, climate change and the necessity for strong leadership and a collaborative approach to steer the Community to further growth and development.
His Excellency Bharrat Jagdeo, President of the Republic of Guyana who assumed the Chairmanship of the Conference of Heads of Government on July 1, 2009 stressed that there was “no alternative to integration” and urged the Community to consider the European Union which continued to pursue higher forms of integration.
His Excellency Bharrat Jagdeo
President Jagdeo called on his colleague Heads of Government to preserve the popular faith in the cause of the integration movement, pointing out that the goals of the Community were more relevant now than in 1973.
He made a clarion call for charting transformational pathways to development and pursuing them relentlessly, and also urged the Region to utilize the opportunities that presented themselves in this time of economic and financial crisis.
Those who spoke before President Jagdeo were the Hon. Dean Barrow, Prime Minister of Belize and immediate past Chairman of the Conference of Heads of Government, the Hon. Tillman Thomas, Prime Minister of Grenada, the Hon. Baldwin Spencer, Prime Minister of Antigua and Barbuda, and His Excellency Edwin Carrington, Secretary-General of CARICOM.
Noting that the Community was at a watershed moment in its history, Prime Minister Spencer said the challenges placed the Region at the crossroads of surviving or perishing. He called for swift and coordinated action to enable the community to realise a vibrant future for its citizens.
And while he warned that the challenges ahead were great, he acknowledged that they were not insurmountable.
Prime Minister Thomas pointed out that while the external environment had forced a number of Member States to review their commitments, the Community needed to stick to the spirit of Grand Anse and have a consolidated regional approach to issues.
He acknowledged that the Region was responding positively to a plethora of challenges and called for a re-examination of priorities that would ultimately ensure the future of the Caribbean people.
In his remarks, Secretary-General Carrington referred to the 1989 Grande Anse Declaration and Work Programme for the Advancement of the Integration Process and pointed out that the spirit of cooperation and solidarity, the need to work expeditiously together, the need to deepen the integration process and strengthen CARICOM in all its dimension was today as urgent if not more so, that it was 20 years ago.
“The challenges that those visionary leaders confronted then and sought to overcome have, if anything, intensified. And though the world has changed significantly since then and the instruments they may have resorted to may need to be reviewed, and even changed, that objective of responding to the challenges together, and no less importantly, grasping the opportunities, has not,” Secretary-General Carrington said.
The Opening Ceremony featured the conferral of the Order of the Caribbean Community (OCC), the Community’s highest honour, on the Most Honourable Percival Patterson, former Prime Minister of Jamaica. Presentations were also made to the winners of the 10K CARICOM Road Race which was staged on Sunday 28 June 2009 in Georgetown. President Jagdeo presented the trophy to Guyana’s Cleveland Forde, while Secretary-General Carrington presented Shermin Lasaldo’s trophy to the Hon Patrick Manning, Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago. Ms. Lasaldo was unable to attend the function.
Ahead of the Opening Ceremony Thursday evening, which was carried live in Guyana and across the Region via the Caribbean Media Corporation (CMC), the Heads of Government met in Caucus for more than three hours at the Guyana International Conference Centre.
