Editorial | Mandate for CARICOM’s secretary general

Insofar as Carla Barnett’s appointment as secretary general (SG) of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) has excited attention in the region, it has been on two fronts. One is that she will be the first woman to hold that job in the community’s more than half a century of existence, inclusive of the period prior to its transition from the Caribbean Free Trade Area (CARIFTA). Further, she will be the first head of the secretariat from Belize, which is in Central America, and often perceived as distant, and economically disengaged, from the rest of the community.

Both of these factors are important. They, however, are not all, or even the most important if she is to have a successful stint as secretary general. Unlike any other SGs, she has to lead from the front, almost as though she enjoys supranational and executive authority. Or put another way, she has to reinterpret the job, speaking in a fashion as to publicly prod her bosses into action.

On the matter of the significance of her appointment in the context of regional integration, Dr Barnett told the Belizean online newspaper, The Guardian, of her hope that her accession will be a catalyst for Belizeans to be more interested in CARICOM, including seeking economic and other opportunities in the region. So does this newspaper. Should Belize, Central America’s only English-speaking country, begin to look more to its CARICOM partners to the southeast, across the Caribbean Sea, the engagement would likely be reciprocal. The upshot: enhanced trade and investment and improved likelihood of CARICOM achieving its raison d’etre – the creation of a genuine single market and economy.

MUCH TO GAIN FOR JAMAICA

From a geographic perspective, Jamaica would, potentially, have much to gain from Belize’s deeper integration into CARICOM. The Central American country which is just over 700 miles to our west. Apart from The Bahamas, which are not part of CARICOM’s single market arrangements. They, with Haiti, still attempting to find its way into the integration process, are the northernmost members of the regional economic grouping. There is the potential, therefore, for Jamaica/Belize northern CARICOM axis of sorts, into which draw, for some matters, Haiti and The Bahamas, as well as associate members, the Cayman Islands and Turks and Caicos Islands.

On the question of Dr Barnett’s gender, it is not an unimportant question why a woman has never before led CARICOM, or has been at the head of but few of the major regional institutions. None, for instance, has been president of the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB), which recently also installed a new head. It can’t be that no woman has been qualified. It is significant, perhaps, and indicative of the future, that two women were in contention for the secretary generalship.

The matter of gender notwithstanding, this newspaper’s greater concern is the skills Dr Barnett brings to the job, including how she frames her assignment, especially given the period she is assuming the position. With regard to her technical competence, there seems, on the face of it, little to question.

Dr Barnett is an economist and social scientist, who served as financial secretary and held other economy-related technical positions in Belize and at the CDB. She has also been a deputy secretary general of CARICOM, which should mean that she knows the lay of the land, and perhaps many of the leaders and officials with whom she will have to interact as secretary general. Notably, too, Dr Barnett was a senator in Belize and held ministerial jobs in her country. That, we hope, has equipped her with the technical skills which we feel are critical for the job at this time.

IMPLEMENTATION DEFICIT

In that Belize Guardian interview, Dr Barnett highlighted CARICOM’s implementation deficit – its bad habit of taking decisions that are either not, or only partially, implemented. So, her priority will be to focus on implementation, including how they are made. She is coming to the position at a time when this issue is not only on the agenda but with a mechanism for how CARICOM can transcend its inertia.

Dr Barnett won’t formally become secretary general until August 15, but she will be at this July’s heads of government summit when the leaders discuss the report of the Persaud Commission on how CARICOM can break out of its long economic malaise that has been worsened by the COVID-19 pandemic. While stressing the broad efficacy of regional cooperation, it argued that the community need not have to move in step on everything at the same time. It proposed that on some matters a proportion of members, perhaps five – a third of all members and nearly 40 per cent at heart of the community’s economic agreements – could move ahead on projects, once there were no objections. Other members would join at their pace, thus creating a multitrack CARICOM.

This is a sensible idea that should be embraced and publicly sold by Dr Barnett, which is part of our suggestion for her reinterpretations of the secretary general’s job. She should be engaged in public advocacy, even if that, at times, puts her ahead of, and at odds with leaders, who are lagging on implementation. Dr Barnett, in this regard, should approach the job as if she is in it for a single term and on a clear mission. She must be ready to coax and cajole and talk straight to the leaders. But at times she will have to speak directly to the Caribbean people. And she has to be prepared to be fired, if it comes to that.