Lisa Hanna Calls For Regional Unity
The COVID-19 pandemic has reemphasized the importance of unity and cohesiveness among CARICOM member states, according to Jamaican politician, Lisa Hanna.
During a recent interview, Lisa Hanna said over the last decade there has been an almost unrelenting push to be individualistic.
While she acknowledges the importance of individuality, Hanna said the future of the Caribbean hinges on fostering a spirit of togetherness.
"I’ve found in my lifetime and the different set of experiences that I’ve had, that you travel so much faster and further when you are working together.”
The self-professed regionalist said there is strength in numbers.
"I really want to see CARICOM rather than work individually, stay together because it’s harder to pick off 15 that’s working together versus 15 individually. CARICOM has a huge voice, we might be small in terms of population, GDP when you think about other populations but we punch way above our weight class. We have titans in this region and it saddens me that when we go to conferences now we’re not all for one and one for all.”
Hanna said the first step is to identify commonalities that could contribute to the economic growth of each CARICOM member state.
She said it is also important to recognize that as small island developing states, climate change poses a significant risk to our economies and those things we need to survive like tourism and agriculture.
The emphasis she said, should be placed on identifying the "best negotiating advantages for our reason in terms of trade".
She explained: "If we can look at the collective, then we can start to realize that we have more in common than anything else."
The parliamentary representative for South East St Ann opined that as a country whose imports far exceed its exports, Jamaica suffers from a significant trade imbalance.
"Trinidad is a little better off because they export more and they have different things that they do. We don’t have the kind of preferential trade agreements we used to have way back when and what happens is the larger countries tend to look at us as smaller nations and pick us off. So if we go forward and we recognize that you know, let's speak as one voice, Jamaica might have this, Trinidad might have this, and rather than just see ourselves individually, let's come together and see how we can support each other to make sure that our economies grow and that people have a livelihood."
"I don’t think in any circumstance that Barbados wants to see the annihilation of Jamaica and Jamaica wants to see the annihilation of Dominica, that is not it at all. The other thing that we need to do is truly speak on behalf of those of us who are more vulnerable. That is why we developed CARICOM."
According to Hanna, the last three years have been tumultuous for several reasons.
"Certainly over the last three years, it was tumultuous because of how we divided ourselves with the votes at the OAS, based on how we abstained from the Jerusalem vote in 2017, based on how when Pompeo came to Jamaica only some countries were invited from CARICOM and others weren’t. Based on the meeting with Trump, and so the major trading partner we have had which was the United States kicked us off, Jamaica followed down that road and it eroded the friendships that we had in CARICOM. Even now when you look at the vaccines, Jamaica is now, we’re alone. There was just a pattern of being isolationist that we developed also with the United States."
Hanna said CARICOM member states are too small to be isolationists.
She believes that an all-hands-on-deck approach will be needed to navigate the landscape after the pandemic and urged policymakers to band together to guarantee the best possible future for Caribbean people.
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