I have always held that citizenship cannot be sold and never even tried to understand the fine arguments by those involved in and promoting the business of selling passports.
I have never accepted that anyone from anywhere, who can afford, will simply buy citizenship in my homeland, including the right to vote and access to incentives unavailable to John and June Lucian.
I’ve watched small private jets line-up at and fly-out quickly from airports of some islands with CIPs on Election Day, flying-in families of buyers of Caribbean passports to vote in airport lounges – and each time asked myself what if one vote by any of them could change a result in one constituency and affect the entire outcome.
I’ve told everyone who’ll listen that I would “probably consider considering” anything about the scheme “only if non-nationals who bought passports cannot vote…” – only to be told by a friendly legal savant that “Just like Whole Chicken is not Chicken Backs, Citizenship is Whole and can’t be broken in parts…’”
But, knowing what Saint Lucia faced at the time it launched its CIP program and what was on the global horizon for small island states in a bigger world where less get more and more get less, I had to try walking a mile in the shoes of those leaders of the time.
Saint Lucia and the Windward Islands had lost the vital preferential banana market in UK, the price of sugar was no-loner sweet, rice fetched paddy prices, – and the likes of Saint Lucia were only left with Tourism and Rum.
The islands tried offering Offshore Tax protection and selling Financial Services, but were hammered by the likes of the European Union on behalf of Britain, which competes in these same sectors in its Caribbean colonies.
Indeed, the UK and US have long also been in the CIP business, selling passports to super-rich Chinese, Indian, Russian and other Nouveau Riche billionaires willing to pay millions for passports — with citizenship.
But since the Caribbean’s CIP passports are selling for pennies and the rich nations are selling for millions of US dollars, the Europe and the US started targeting the region’s programs for penalization.
There are always those from faraway places, not necessarily also very rich but who need and will do anything to buy passports and citizenship for reasons other than holiday travel.
Enough was also happening (even though revealed after-the-fact) to indicate there were fugitives from justice also interested in the protection other countries’ passports gave them.
That crooked aspect of the trade will never die, as it’s quite lucrative, requiring much-greater levels of Due Diligence to stem the flow of suspect applicants.
In 2015, when Saint Lucia launched its CIP, the then Dr Kenny D. Anthony administration set high bars: applicants were to prove a net worth of (at least) US $3 million, a limit of 500 sales per year and strict Due Diligence.
In 2016, the Allen Chastanet administration broke-down all the barriers: removed the 500-limit, eliminated the high Net-Worth requirement – and lowered the price to $100,000.
The Chastanet administration was accused by PMs of other Caribbean CIP jurisdictions of trying to cut throats by “Racing to the bottom” and even embarked on a regional and international ‘CIP Sale’, from Trinidad & Tobago to Jamaica — and everywhere beyond.
Five years later, the Pierre administration introduced mandatory interviews, increased Due Diligence and engaged with other OECS member-states for a regional approach to CIPs.
Any reality check will revel a properly-run CIP can be a fat cash cow for cash-strapped small-island nations, even with middle-income economies – which the bigger competitors in London and Washington also well-know.
No such scheme is impregnable and fraudsters — many assisted by lawyers — will always try to find ways to cut corners to get around regulations.
But even with my maintained position, I would not punish all Peters for one Paul, since the number of instances of violations are far-less than those who follow the rules.
The political opposition will naturally oppose for opposing sake and have been advocating the CIP’s end.
But really, how many Saint Lucians apply visas to travel annually, vis-à-vis the number who benefit from the many national programs funded by an with CIP earnings?
The EU and US feel free to have their own passports-for-sale programs and offshore tax havens in the Caribbean, but insist the Caribbean’s sovereign nations cannot do likewise – and like stronger competitors, they are making it clear they want the whole hog.
They have now joined forces to force all Caribbean states with CIP programs to shut them down and leave the global turf to their billionaire ‘Golden Visas’ — and Saint Lucia is just the beginning.
Some states will forcibly tailor their programs to suit the imperial demands, but, with or without CIP small Caribbean islands, like developing states and poor countries of the Global South, will continue to be victims of old and new schemes by the world’s richest nations.
This is especially so at this time when developing nations are discovering their worth and strength and starting to talk and act differently — as with the growing and expanding BRICS community, in particular.
The Caribbean Community (CARICOM) is still a far way from becoming or behaving like a federal state or a united political and/or economic union.
It therefore continues to be vulnerable to the new elements of the age-old divide-and-rule strategies used by the colonial powers, then and now, to keep the poorer and poorest poor.
But if all the region’s leaders buckle under pressure from London, Brussels and Washington and end-up up-ending or undermining their CIP programs in the way some have been forced to sing-and-dance differently on their decades-old healthy Cuban medical programs, it’ll only be yet-another move by Uncle Sam and Fortress Europe, to remind the world that: Colonialism and Imperialism know no borders and have no boundaries.