So Britain voted last week to leave the European Economic Community (EEC). Immediately upon the result of the plebiscite being known, the English pound lost value on the international stock exchange. Does this mean that Britain might feel compelled to revisit its decision within a year?

Some Jamaicans who remain adamantly against any form of Caribbean unity might feel somehow vindicated by the results of the British referendum. But who will rejoice when the effects of the devalued British pound are felt in Jamaica? Will those who receive remittances and returning residents who receive pensions from England regret the ‘leave’ vote majority because a weakened pound buys less goods and services?

It has been said that in last Thursday’s referendum in Britain the electorate voted with their emotions rather than with their heads. One elderly British female voter in last Thursday’s referendum was asked why she voted against the European Union. Her reply was that Britain had won the world war to stop Germany from ruling the world yet that country was indirectly ruling them through the EEC.

It was Jesus Christ who said that the children of the world are more astute than the children of light (Luke 16: 8). Former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger quoted Lord Palmerston (later Viscount, 1784-1865) who said, “Nations have no permanent friends or allies, they only have permanent interests”, except that Kissinger substituted the word “allies” for “enemies”. All over the world, including Jamaica, politicians understand this. Indeed, they are known to come together in party unity to win elections and to maintain power, even when they detest each other.

However, it is not easy to explain the bigger picture to the ordinary man or woman in the street in any country. Some older British citizens are nostalgic for the old days when “the sun never set on the British Empire”. With colonies all over the world in different time zones, in any 24-hour day there was sunlight in at least one British colony. With the loss of its empire, by granting political independence to most of the colonies, Britain no longer has that level of influence. But again, that is not easy to explain to voters.

In the

Sunday Gleaner of June 26, 2016, former Prime Minister Bruce Golding wrote: “An immediate concern will be the loss of the UK in the councils of Europe where it has been our strongest advocate. Our historical relationship with the other European Union members is very shallow, and there is little reason to expect that they will be sympathetic to the plight of far-removed, small island developing states like us — too small to matter in the scheme of things and so vulnerable to exogenous shocks and natural disasters, which makes our development process akin to a ludo game”.

I speculate that the first phases of the Highway 2000 toll road completed in 2003 with financial assistance from Belgium might not have taken place had there been at least a 13-year-long delay in its implementation, especially after the Brexit referendum. And what of all the assistance Jamaica received from other European nations after Britain joined the EEC in 1973 and “talked up for us”?

Why weren’t Jamaicans informed about the role of Britain in our negotiations with the European Economic Community? By e-mail and cellphone we could have urged members of the Jamaican Diaspora in England to go out and solidly vote “Stay” in the referendum.

And the fact that we mashed up our own federation before we achieved political independence in 1962 is of absolutely no help to us now. Had we been a federation, then Trinidad’s oil would have been a tool in the negotiations up to this point where the world is moving away from oil to other types of energy. Had we still been a federation, and Trinidad’s oil part of the negotiations, then Brexit might not have mattered to us because Britain and the EEC needs oil to the extent that they still do, even as the world moves to alternate sources of energy.

In his article, Bruce Golding has indirectly given very good reasons we should not have abolished the West Indies Federation. While one island is “too small to matter in the scheme of things”, as Golding wrote, “unity is strength”. If the Caribbean was united, and aligned to other small nations in the world, can you imagine what we could achieve? Trinidad’s oil, Jamaica and Guyana’s bauxite, Caribbean tourism including Jamaica’s together with Jamaica’s known negotiation skills and diplomacy would make us collectively unstoppable in our socio-economic growth. Cane sugar, bananas, citrus and coconuts might have still been exported in large quantities.

Jamaicans are still confused about the choices that we had in the 1961 referendum to decide whether we should continue in the West Indies Federation. The choice was not between federation and political independence. It was between being part of a federal independent nation or a separate independent state. In the end, Jamaicans voted to “go it alone”, and even the ruling Norman Manley-led People’s National Party was divided on the issue.

Our new-found nationalism proved too strong to want to share our independence in a federation. Further, most Jamaican voters in 1961, being uneducated, did not understand the issues. Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) founder and first leader, Sir Alexander Bustamante, was not in favour of the federation, perhaps because it was very difficult for him to be the federal prime minister.

But in the JLP’s anti-referendum campaign for the September 19, 1961 referendum, the federation was seldom mentioned. Instead, local issues were brought up. The National Stadium, then under construction; the Ministry of Education building; and the dumping of the swamps of Negril to build hotels were called “a waste of money”.

If the exit of Britain from the EEC causes a continued devaluation of the British pound, and the effect that this will have on some of us, will Jamaicans now understand the need for Caribbean unity? We will see.

ekrubm765@yahoo.com