As the English-speaking Caribbean continues to endure its multi-faceted socio-economic challenges made worse in recent times by the scourge of the global COVID-19 pandemic, Vice Chancellor of the University of the West Indies Sir Hilary Beckles is calling for a payback for the historic contribution made by the English-speaking countries of the region to the development of the hemisphere.
“The Caribbean has given a great deal to this hemisphere, it has given a great deal to this world. It is now the time for this hemisphere and this region to reciprocate and give to the Caribbean what it deserves and what it has a right to, which is an economic ‘leg up’ at a moment of growing despair,” the Caribbean academic said during the recent Organization of American States (OAS) virtual discussion to mark Pan American Day.
In his presentation Sir Hilary underlined some of the socio-economic challenges currently confronting the Caribbean, not least those associated with climate change, even as he asserted that the region is now entitled to expect that the broader hemisphere will now reciprocate the historic gestures which the Caribbean had made.
Apart from noting that the “Caribbean world is where globalization started,” Professor Beckles cited junctions in the history of the hemisphere at which the Caribbean had made important interventions to support other countries during their interludes of challenge.
“We say this hemisphere needs to stand up for us. We stood up for this hemisphere. We always remember when the revolution of Latin America was taking place, when all the great movements of Venezuela through to Colombia, all those movements were taking place. It was Haiti that sent troops and resources and finances to promote the Independence movement of Latin America. The Caribbean at the time was at the centre of that process. It gave its full support to Bolívar and so Haiti was having the energy and the resources to support the Bolívar revolution,” Sir Hilary told the virtual forum.
In calling for an “economic leg up” for the Caribbean, the Barbadian academic said that the Caribbean having “given a great deal to this hemisphere… it is now time for this hemisphere… to reciprocate and give to the Caribbean what it deserves and what it has a right to… at a moment of growing despair.”
And in what will be seen as a less than muted criticism of what is sometimes regarded as the indifference of the rest of the hemisphere to the current developmental challenges confronting the region, Sir Hilary asserted that “the global community, indeed the hemispheric community, is not as sensitive to the economic dislocation and decline issues facing the Caribbean as they should be… there is still a perception somehow in the hemispheric and global community that the Caribbean is not entitled to a special carve-out based upon what they have had to go through…” the Caribbean academic contended.
