FEBRUARY is significant to several Caribbean Community (CARICOM) nations.
Grenada and Saint Luca observed Independence anniversaries on February 7 and 22, respectively; Guyana observed another Republic anniversary on February 23; Surinam observed the anniversary of its 1980 military coup on February 25; and Haiti marked another year since the latest political and socio-economic upheavals that continue to haunt the world’s first Black Republic.
After six decades of Independence, the eternal links between global changes is now more evident across Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) than ever, with ex-colonies that changed flags without a fight finding themselves not-much-less dependent on the former colonial powers.
Britain, France, The Netherlands and the USA still maintain over a dozen colonies in the Caribbean under various guises — from ‘associated states’ to ‘overseas territories’ — each and all under direct rule from European and US capitals.
These include: Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands (USVI), the British Virgin Islands (BVI), Turks & Caicos Islands, Cayman Islands, Montserrat and Anguilla, Netherlands Antilles and France’s ‘Overseas Departments’ in Martinique, Guadeloupe and French Guiana.
Meanwhile, Caribbean nations still largely depend on tourism and exports, trade and industry, on commercial terms designed to better serve the private multinational companies and interests in Europe and North America.
Traditional export crops — from bananas and bauxite to rice, rum and sugar – have run into long-term difficulties with traditional markets, increasing competition between neighbouring states depending on similar external markets.
Recent regime change in Washington has also quickly underlined the universal truth that the world is a shared planet, where anything or everything done anywhere has repercussions elsewhere.
Presently, Europe competes with the USA to attract wealthy Chinese and Russian capital while President Donald Trump has introduced a ‘Gold Card’ – a $5million Citizenship by Investment (CBI) programme offering a faster track for the world’s ultra-rich.
El Salvador set out to be Latin America’s crypto capital, but President Trump sees a similar role for the USA — while also talking about extending America’s global footprint to Panama and Canada, Greenland and Gaza – and now Ukraine.
Trump suspended US foreign aid for 90 days and removed the ability of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) to allocate $40 billion annually.
Europe joins Washington to oppose the growing BRICS alliance representing the world’s most people and natural resources and jointly competing with China for LAC attention, the former seeking to rival Beijing’s Belt & Road Initiative (BRI) projects with its own Global Gateway investment programme.
The USA invested over $1.04 trillion in the LAC region in the two decades between 2000 and 2020 while China has invested over $160 Billion over the same period.
But Washington continues treating China as a geopolitical and economic competitor instead of a fellow development investor in what the USA still considers ‘America’s Backyard’.
Since 2000, Caribbean nations have experimented with and competed on everything from nature tourism and offshore financial services to e-commerce and sale of citizenship.
But almost every such step has been met with largely restrictive regulatory procedures set by Europe and North America, including competition for hiding assets of the world’s super-rich.
LAC nations are also among the poor Small Island Developing States (SIDS) again abandoned by the super-rich G-7 nations, this time over Loss and Damage payments due to accelerated Climate Change, as guilty nations continue monetizing adaptability and weaponizing accessibility through abandonment of alternative energy strategies and returning to full use of fossil fuels and nuclear power.
Now, the US is seeking to outlaw vital Cuban international medical assistance, including in the LAC region.
The Caribbean’s energy sector has not fared well over the decades, but in the new global scenario, the Caribbean is now home to more energy players, between them controlling the most certified unexplored or undeveloped energy reserves on the planet.
Trinidad & Tobago’s rich oil revenues are no longer, while most CARICOM nations remain indebted to Venezuela for Petrocaribe energy supplies now no longer available (thanks to consistent US pressure from the Clinton, Obama, Biden and Trump administrations, successively).
Guyana has emerged as the region’s biggest oil-based economy – also the world’s fastest-growing and contributing greatly to overall improvements in LAC performance figures, followed by Venezuela.
However, two American companies – Exxon and Chevron — are presently having different experiences in Guyana and Venezuela: the latter now choked by sanctions reimposed by Trump and the former now possibly subject to Washington’s new 25% tariffs on exports to the US.
Guyana is taking early steps to share its new national income with citizens; Jamaica is cooperating with Trinidad & Tobago while Port of Spain is also seeking deeper energy cooperation with Caracas; Surinam is working with France’s Total Energies and shaping-up to also become a future major Caribbean energy supplier.
Guyana, Surinam and Venezuela (as neighbours in the Guiana Shield) with Trinidad & Tobago and Jamaica, are now better-placed to play bigger roles on the regional and international energy platforms, fulfilling earlier regional dreams of an energy-free Caribbean in a free-trade Zone of Peace.
The Guyana-Venezuela disconnect over Essequibo clouds a golden opportunity for common arrowheads from Georgetown and Caracas, supported by existing and future regional energy producers (including Grenada), to help resolve the LAC region’s energy needs and lessen its dependence on traditional suppliers from Europe and North America (BP, Shell, ExxonMobil, Chevron, Total Energies, etc.)
In this scenario, CARICOM, the Bolivarian Alliance for Our America (ALBA), the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) and other entities genuinely interested in developing the next stage of Caribbean economic independence now urgently need to abandon their observatory and side-line positions on the Guyana-Venezuela matter.
Instead, they should more actively seek, find and offer solutions within existing communications and collaborative bilateral and multilateral mechanisms, urgently aiming to lower heated escalations and heighten possibilities of joint and/or collaborative approaches in areas not in dispute between the two neighbouring major regional players.
Now is the time!