Regional security
The euphoria of Cricket World Cup has evaporated. And so, it seems, has enthusiasm for the sort of regional security cooperation that helped to make that event successful.
Was it too good to last? It was in an uncommon surge of legislative creativity and administrative vitality two years ago that nine scattered mini-states of the Caribbean Community unhesitatingly and unanimously agreed on a comprehensive Framework for the Management of Crime and Security in the region. The states passed several new laws through their national assemblies and parliaments and erected the magnificent architecture of joint agencies and task forces. They then executed the complex International Cricket Council Cricket World Cup competition in 2007 without a serious breach of security. But that was cricket!
- President Jagdeo addresses ACCP meeting
The lessons of the arduous preparation and subsequent successful execution of the security operations for the cricket competition should not be wasted. They did produce a template for regional security cooperation for major international events in the region. That experience contributed in no small measure to the security operations for the recent 5th Summit of the Americas in Trinidad and Tobago and, it is anticipated, there will be similar regional approaches to security operations for the Commonwealth Heads of Government Conference, also to be held in Trinidad and Tobago in November this year, and the International Cricket Council’s Champions Trophy, next year.
Regional security cooperation, however, must move beyond mere events management. Now that the sun has set on the new stadiums and the applause has subsided, member states seem to have exhausted their enthusiasm for security cooperation. There needs to be fresh thinking and new resolve to move away from chronic ‘adhocery’, however successful, and place these splendid short-term security expedients on a permanent organisational footing. The quotidian crimes of gang violence, gun-running and narco-trafficking, alas, are as virulent as ever but prime ministers who control their national treasuries and ministers who are responsible for security and law enforcement seem to have shifted from collaborating to conferencing.
Within the last eight weeks, for example, CARICOM states have contrived to convene at least four major security conferences − the 24th Annual Meeting of the Association of Caribbean Commissioners of Police held under the theme, “Police Reform: an Imperative for Quality Service,” on May 11 in Georgetown; the 8th Meeting of the Council of Ministers Responsible for Security and Law Enforcement on May 21 in Paramaribo; the Annual Conference of Heads of Special Branch of the Caribbean, under the theme “Securing Regional Security through Improved Techniques for Monitoring Economic and Social Stability,” on June 5 in Georgetown; and the Conference On Youth, Crime And Violence, under the theme “Confronting the Challenges of Youth Crime and Violence in Society: Defining a Multi-Sectoral Response,” on June 22 in Basseterre. Each conference generated its own copious minutes and matters arising which, no doubt, address important issues. The question is, how much action will be taken to implement the conference decisions and recommendations in months to come?
Strategy
It seems evident that CARICOM might have contemplated a security structure but is still to agree on a strategy. Edward Greene, CARICOM’s Assistant Secretary-General, told the Association of Caribbean Commissioners of Police conference that, while there has been some training and capacity-building of the law-enforcement and protective services, “it is increasingly being recognised that the key to a sustainable programme rests with the construction and implementation of crime prevention strategies.” This, he thought, would require a new approach to partnerships between the police and other stakeholders in the public service, private sector, civil society, the schools and youth movements and faith-based organizations. He also saw the need for “an alliance between the police and our research centres that provides analysis of trends and guidelines for behaviour change.”
Speaking at the same conference, Darwin Dottin, Barbados’s Commissioner of Police and current President of the Association of Caribbean Commissioners of Police, presented his own idea of what the security strategy should be. He said that, while he is not advocating a soft approach to crime, police forces in the region should be firm in the dispensation of their functions. He warned though that the matter of law enforcement should not be divorced from social conditions in communities. Law enforcement, governmental agencies and non-governmental agencies have to come up with an approach to deal with the very deep social problems. “A strict law enforcement approach is not going to work. If you continue to use force, you will continue to use force,” he thought.
The need for a common strategy was emphasized by Edwin Carrington, CARICOM’s Secretary-General. He told the Council of Ministers for Security and Law Enforcement that security and law enforcement ministers must re-double their efforts in fulfilling their mandate, chief of which was “promoting the development of a common regional security strategy.” This is intended to complement the national security strategies of member-states to give effect to this strategy by implementing legislation and treaties to deal with border security, maritime regulations, and a justice protection system.
More seriously, Carrington urged states to complete the unfinished business on the security agenda at the top of which was the legal arrangement to include security as the ‘fourth pillar’ of the Community. This requires the incorporation of the Council of Ministers for Security and Law Enforcement as an organ of the community and the Implementation Agency for Crime and Security as an institution into the revised Treaty of Chaguaramas. The relevant protocol is yet to be signed by at least six Member States. The drafting and ratification of the important legal framework for the implementation of the Advance Passenger Information System and the Advance Customs Information System and the development of the Regional Integrated Ballistic Information Network are still pending. Six states still had not yet signed the protocol to amend the Treaty to bring this into effect. Why is that so? Do the states see the need for a common strategy or are drifting absentmindedly in a sea of apathy?
Security
While governments dawdle, young people die. The challenge to the region is that while conferences meet and discuss matters, and while the Community designs impressive new security structures to manage the regional crime and security agenda, the reality was, as Carrington complained, that Caribbean societies are faced with “an on-going scourge that is decimating our young men at an alarming rate” in certain member-states.
At the regional conference on Youth, Crime and Violence in St. Kitts and Nevis, Albert Ramdin, Assistant Secretary General of the Organisation of American States, repeated warnings that the upsurge of crime in the region is major cause for concern and has to be addressed urgently by governments and other stakeholders. He warned that the growing prevalence and severity of crime in member states cannot be left unchecked. “If our countries are to progress toward sustained and sustainable development, the issue of crime and violence has to be faced head on.” Is anyone listening?
The lack of progress in advancing regional security cooperation seems to have arisen more from home-grown Caribbean apathy than from anything else. There has been no complaint about a lack of extra-regional cooperation and assistance. The Caribbean Community, United States and United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime Security Cooperation Programme, for example, have produced a draft five-year CARICOM Social and Development Crime Prevention Action Plan which focussed on crime prevention, violence reduction, rehabilitation and protection of the region’s environmental and economic resources. Strong institutions must be established to implement plans like this.
Divisions among CARICOM states over security issues will not magically vanish. But, at this time, there is much to be said for reaping the rewards of the security dividend and harnessing the momentum of the Cricket World Cup experience to erect a permanent mechanism for the coordination of security in the region. It should be clear, though, that a truly effective structure will emerge not from the endless cycle of conferences of powerless security officials and civil servants but only from the prime ministers’ willpower.