Dear Editor,
I have read with great interest the editorial of the Stabroek News of July 2, 2019, headlined ‘West Indies…Out!’
I, like the author of the editorial, am truly distressed at the performance of the team. I think this feeling is widespread throughout the region.
After all, we were the King of Cricket for a long time.
While I think that the editorial has made some good points, I do not think that those are the main reasons for the decline of our cricket. I do not believe the problem is with the cricketers.
As for the training and resources part, the countries that comprise the West Indies were always poorer than most of the other cricketing giants yet in the past we outplayed them easily. Therefore, that cannot be the main reason.
In my view too, if we examine the players individually you would see that they compare very well with the other teams. We have the best all-rounder in the world in Andre Russell. The team is teeming with talent; each is a match winner. So it is not a shortage of talent.
The performance of the West Indies team reflects the wider situation in our region. It has its roots in the failure of the regional integration process. It is a problem of regional developments since independence.
It is apposite to note that the West Indies team began its ascendency in world cricket during the 1950s. At that time, we had one colonial master and one burning ambition, to be free and independent. That was the glue that bound us tightly as a united region.
In that period, we had the emergence of giants like George Headley, the three Ws, Ramadhin and Valentine. Also emerging closer to the end of colonialism were giants like our own Rohan Kanhai, Garfield Sobers, Wesley Hall, Basil Butcher and Joe Solomon among others.
The common struggle found expression in our cricket team. Thus, we rose to the very top of the cricketing world, we destroyed the best. Calypsos, poems and dances were done to celebrate our great exploits on the world arena.
That strong feeling of unity of purpose carried over in the early post-independence era. Thus, we had the Sobers/ Kanhai, Hall/Griffith period, the Clive Lloyd and Vivian Richards period of the late 1960s and 1970s.
Since then our cricket began to decline.
This coincided with each country having its own government with their own separate interests. The individual interests of the Caricom states have become more important to each of the regional states than the collective interest of the community.
At one time we had some solidarity on international affairs. That had given us quite a bit of clout. We were punching way above our weight on the world stage. That, too, has been greatly eroded, more and more we are taking separate and individual positions. It is clear that on international affairs our solidarity has been broken.
We had hoped that trade would have brought us closer, but the figures would show that we hardly trade with each other. Where we do we always seems to have some problem, example, the issue of Jamaica’s meat patties entering Trinidad some years ago. We still import almost all our food from outside our region and our individual exports are not with each other.
The free movement of people is often honoured in the breach. Some countries keep deporting Caricom citizens from their shores. The mentality is that they are protecting their people from other Caricom citizens.
Some of the citizens of our states are stigmatized and treated with less respect than people from outside our region.
The regional institutions are not gaining in strength and influence. Indeed, some see Caricom institutions as inferior and do not want to be a part of them. The colonial mentality still lingers among many of our leaders and that is influencing many of our people.
A case in point is the Caribbean Court of Justice. The history of that Court would show that it is an institution of very high standards, a high quality body.
Yet, after more than fifty years of independence many of the Caricom states are still clinging to the Privy Council. This is not a case of the Privy Council fighting to keep them, just the opposite. That body is encouraging them to leave and join the CCJ.
However, many continue to want to belong to the Privy Council instead of its own CCJ. This is not a matter of quality; it is a case of mentality.
The same can be said of other Caricom institutions to one degree or the other. At Caricom conferences we hear high platitudes. A lot of this is playing to the gallery they hardly get translated into reality.
Real unity is not developing, at least not fast enough. The issues that separate us seem far stronger than the issues that unite us as a region.
It appears to me that while the Caricom leaders often express deep concern about West Indies Cricket they are not dealing with the root cause but only the symptoms.
West Indies cricket will rise again as we find common grounds to unite the people of the region.
If, however, the centrifugal forces continue to grow, West Indies Cricket will not revive. It may continue for a while with mediocre performances, with the occasional flash of brilliance, but without real things to unite us West Indies cricket will perish.
The fault is not with our players; it is with us as a region.
Yours faithfully,
Donald Ramotar
Former President
