Byron Blake and Ohene Blake | Whither CARICOM and Cuba?

Marco Rubio, the United States Secretary of State, has fired the first salvo across the bow of Caribbean Community (CARICOM) countries in their relations with Cuba. This is personal for Cuban descendant Rubio, although his parents left Cuba before Fidel Castro came to power.

It is a Republican and Donald Trump’s mission. But it flies in the face of 51 years of positive relations since Barbados, Guyana, Jamaica, and Trinidad and Tobago jointly established diplomatic relations with Cuba in December 1972. There were some hiccups in the first part of the 1980s when a United States backed and supported Jamaica Labour Party government severed diplomatic relations with Cuba, but no other member state followed.

Rubio chose and framed an issue on which he thinks he would have the sympathy of labour-sensitive Caribbean governments as the tip of his spear. He is perhaps unaware that Caribbean governments are sensitive to the fact that, in Cuba, the State bears the full cost of education at all levels. This is a distinctly different system from that which obtains in the United States or in CARICOM where students, mainly through their parents and/or borrowing, invest significant sums in their education and professional training. That investment must be amortised.

Graduates sell their services to the highest bidder or those whose payment will go farthest towards amortising their investment. The government in that situation has no moral right to any portion of that salary except where it can establish that the full economic cost was not recovered. Yet, such governments impose taxes of 20 per cent, 25 per cent, 30 per cent, or even 35 per cent each year on the income of these graduates before they settle any expenditure, even the repayment of their student loans. Mr Rubio would not consider those governments to be exploitative. On the other hand, he considers that a Government like Cuba, which bears the full economic cost of the education and training of the graduates, to be exploitative. So exploitative that it deserves international condemnation and punishment.

ESCAPED RUBIO’S NOTICE

It might have escaped Rubio’s notice that under the arrangements for the engagement of the Cuban personnel, the recruiting Government is responsible for the living expenses of the recruited worker. Therefore, any amount retained for sharing with the Cuban Government is after the worker’s basic needs have been met. Further, the Cuban Government subsidises many of the basic needs of the recruited worker’s immediate family - parents and children. This includes healthcare and education. A recent study by Trevor Hamilton Associates, sponsored by IOM on diaspora remittances to Jamaica, revealed that expenses for families’ immediate needs, including food, health, and education, are regarded as obligatory. Diaspora members include nurses and teachers recruited by many States of the United States of America. In terms of conditions of work, we note that contracted Cuban health care workers in the CARICOM region enjoy the same conditions as unionised CARICOM healthcare professionals. If Rubio’s motive is the interest of the Cuban people, it might be better served by encouraging more engagements outside of Cuba.

The often-publicised long wait-time, lines, and even shortages being experienced in Cuba in recent times are not unknown in other countries.

The exploitation argument might not be the real rationale for this urgent policy by President Donald Trump’s Republican Government. The real rationale might well be in the 60-odd year-old United States unilateral embargo of Cuba. CARICOM Governments have voted against that embargo yearly in the United Nations.

Rubio might be unaware that the collaboration between CARICOM Countries and Cuba in areas of human development is much wider than in the employment of Cuban medical personnel. Since the 1970s, the Government of Cuba has made available to CARICOM States thousands of Scholarships for nationals to pursue studies, particularly in the fields of medicine, agriculture, and construction.

SCHOLARSHIPS

We found in 2010 that the number of scholarships offered by the Government of Cuba to the Government of Haiti for students to study medicine exceeded the number of scholarships offered by the Government of the United States to all CARICOM Countries for study in all disciplines. The experience of CARICOM countries is that all students who complete their course of study in Cuba return to their home country, while less than one-half of those who graduate in the United States return. The truth is that the Cuban system ensures that graduates return, while the United States system targets the brightest and best for recruitment.

CARICOM leaders envision the Caribbean as a zone of peace. Their perspective would be closer to that of former US Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, that the relations between Cuba and the United States will need to be peacefully resolved at some time. The Caribbean would hope sooner rather than later. Albright understood that while CARICOM cannot change the position of the United States and the United States cannot change the position of CARICOM.

CARICOM, which has good relations with both the United States and Cuba, can be an honest broker at the appropriate time. The regional grouping would wish to remain in that position.

On a slightly different issue, we highlight that CARICOM, as a community of small island and low-lying coastal states, is highly dependent on external trade. All but one recent oil-exporting Member run large negative trade balances with the United States. We trust that the United States will take that into account in its policy determinations. CARICOM states, like many states of the US, are very vulnerable to catastrophic weather-related events. We trust that collaborative activities will minimise future dislocations and pressures leading to uncontrolled movements of people.

Ambassador Byron Blake is former deputy permanent representative of Jamaica to the United Nations and former assistant secretary general of CARICOM. Ohene Blake is former deputy CEO of Trade Board Limited. Send feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com