UNLESS the Caribbean Community Secretariat becomes better engaged in helping to educate citizens of the now 41-year-old regional economic integration movement, there could well develop a crisis of survival for the 15-member bloc of countries.

And to counter spreading cynicism and disenchantment, it is felt by some well-placed observers, who want Caricom to succeed, that there should be systematic sharing of skilled human resources and facilities located within the information and communication systems of member countries.

Against the backdrop of the latest so-called ‘war of words’ between Cabinet ministers of the governments of Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago last month, a senior official in Jamaica’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs found it necessary this past week to “advise” Jamaicans to ensure conformity with immigration requirements for travel, including private/holiday visits, or professional employment elsewhere in the Caribbean Community.

I have often been amused how representatives of governments of our Caribbean Community — officials and politicians — become active in dealing with elementary issues, like basic information-sharing, after the development of a problem in relation to hassle-free intra-regional travel for Caricom citizens and, relatedly, the right to live and work governed by established conventions.

For, with all the official rhetoric about ‘One Market, One Community, One People’, too often too many Caricom citizens find themselves being inconvenienced and, worse, treated as unwelcome visitors at ports of entry by those expected to behave with civility, having been sufficiently sensitised to their functions as immigration and Customs officers. Regrettably, some end up embarrassing their own professional colleagues by their attitudes.

Media and GIS

The region’s established media certainly have an obligation to sensitise citizens to their rights and responsibilities in dealing with immigration and Customs officials. Warts and all, I think both privately owned print and electronic enterprises generally seek to respond to this social obligation — though there remains room for improvement.

But government information/communication agencies certainly have a duty to routinely engage in basic information-sharing as part of their function, particularly in the face of ongoing disputes over freedom of intra-regional travel and, worse, crude handling of Caricom citizens at ports of entry in a community in which all five million citizens must feel that they belong.

There was a period when government information services (GIS) were recognised as reliable allies of the region’s print and electronic media — irrespective of ownership — in helping to sustain and advance the policies and programmes of Caricom, even as they appropriately focused also on informing and propagandising on behalf of governments.

Then, of course, ministers of information and communication had public profiles that associated them as functioning, along with their Community counterparts, to sustain interest in and commitment to specific regional objectives and programmes.

The pity is that such interest and commitment have not been sustained under changing governments and leadership and have resulted in fostering the impression of a lack of interest in the provision of timely, relevant information on the functioning of Caricom.

The present interest in timely information-sharing on policies and programmes pertaining to what remains central to successfuly attaining the objectives of Caricom as “One People of One Community” is now a sad contrast to what an earlier generation of visionary leaders were enthusiastic advocates of.

Food imports

Caricom citizens rightly keep lamenting the ever-rising cost of imported food — currently estimated at some US$5 billion annually — and wonder what objective factors are preventing this region from utilising the vast resources of Guyana and Belize, for example, to help provide the food we need. They feel there’s a sad lack of vision and political will at the leadership level.

Perhaps our primary Caricom decision-makers who head governments, as well as those involved with institutions and agencies serving the laudable objectives of the region’s integration movement, should better focus on encouraging attitudes, policies and programmes to help end frustration and bitterness among citizens.

There seems the need for a region-wide educational programme focused on the core features to freedom of intra-regional travel and the right to live and work under the terms of a Free Movement of Skills Certificate.

Also apparent is a need for reorientation of immigration and Customs officers to better enable them to efficiently and respectfully deal with visitors.

Perhaps, also, in the process, better use could be made of the networK of government information services (GIS) with an understanding that information and communication about Caricom is an important aspect of their work on behalf of a Community comprising 15 member countries.

Larger but quite relevant issues pertaining to intra-regional freedom of movement and bonding among Community nationals would be enlightened responses to improve air and sea transportation for people and trade in goods.

Trinidad and Tobago has often been in the news over restrictions on free intra-regional movement and claims of illegal migration. But varying problems continue to be unnecessarily encountered with other Community partner states at ports of entry that need to be speedily corrected to operate in tandem with region-wide policies and attitudes.

A crying need is to make Caricom more people-focused while continuing to address supporting critical trade and fiscal management challenges.

Rickey Singh is a Barbados-based noted Caribbean journalist.