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As CARICOM marked its 40th anniversary on Thursday, Trinidad Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar said it was time for the movement to admit a new member.
“The ongoing reform process in the community must be one that will make CARICOM not only more efficient and effective but more relevant as well,” said Persad-Bissessar, who assumed the CARICOM Chairmanship earlier this week. “In this regard, may I urge you to consider expanding our membership to welcome the Dominican Republic into the CARICOM family.”
It’s not yet clear whether CARICOM Heads will agree, but the move could prove critical as the Dominican Republic increasingly allies itself both with Latin America and Central America. The Dominican Republic is currently an observer to CARICOM.
Indeed, the Dominican Republic has been an associate member of the Central American Integration System since 2004, and just last week became a full member state.
Persad-Bissessar’s words came as Dominican Republic President Danilo Medina was on hand in Port of Spain for the Heads of Government conference this week.
Her proposal came as the Heads of Government marked the 40th anniversary of the CARICOM integration movement, which was founded by the signing of the Treaty of Chaguaramas on July 4, 1973.
The DR has already applied to join, but few existing members want them, but are too polite to say so. DR with its 10 million people and its vibrant manufacturing and agricultural sectors, will swamp them. Only T&T enjoys a strong balance of trade with the DR. Hence their support for its entry. The feeling is that T&T already dominates trade in goods and services within CARICOM and allowing a nation which is even more powerful will be a disaster for the others. Only if Haiti advocates for the DR will this opposition go away.
Of course DRs recent brutality towards the great grand children of Haitians wo migrated there 60 years ago will not help, and will be used as an excuse. This given the strong affiliation (through guilt) that many in CARICOM feel towards Haiti, which is a CARICOM memberstate BTW. We all learned in history about the Haitian Revolution and the role that it played in ending slavery elsewhere in the Caribbean. The source of the guilt, because most nations fear illegal Haitian migration as much as the DR does). Though equally abhor the racist condemnations of Haitians by DR elites in the past.
DR will join the CARICOM community eventually, that is not a question. How long may be a better one to ask. I would love for an expert on Caribbean politics to respond on this. Until that time I'll give my unwarranted two cents. The rest of the CARICOM community was resistant to Haiti's inclusion due to the high population of the nation and the fact that it would make the most spoken language amongst the community de facto Creole. DR would make either the most spoken or second most spoken(Turks,Bahamas and DR all have significant Haitian populations) language in the community Spanish. No one besides Haiti would seem to like this outcome. Make no mistake though Santo Domingo is the powerhouse of the Antilles and will one day be a real International Hub for Caribbean trade and policy. Let them straighten out some civil rights issues & economic policies and they will boom.
DR will join the CARICOM community eventually, that is not a question. How long may be a better one to ask. I would love for an expert on Caribbean politics to respond on this. Until that time I'll give my unwarranted two cents. The rest of the CARICOM community was resistant to Haiti's inclusion due to the high population of the nation and the fact that it would make the most spoken language amongst the community de facto Creole. DR would make either the most spoken or second most spoken(Turks,Bahamas and DR all have significant Haitian populations) language in the community Spanish. No one besides Haiti would seem to like this outcome. Make no mistake though Santo Domingo is the powerhouse of the Antilles and will one day be a real International Hub for Caribbean trade and policy. Let them straighten out some civil rights issues & economic policies and they will boom.
Well as of now DR will not be allowed into CARICOM unless there is some resolution of this issue with the DR going back as far as 1929 to determine who has the right to citizenship and full residency rights in that country,
What ever people in the English speaking Caribbean think of Haiti and Haitians, and clearly the extreme poverty and backwardness of that nation is a concern, they understand Haitians more than they do Dominicans, so in any confict between these two groups they will side with the Haitian.
Now if the DR adjusts its actions to deal with CONTEMPORARY illegal Haitians and their IMMEDIATE Dominican born kids then there will be more sympathy for them. Clearly the richer nations like Tdad, Bdos and the Bahamas have anxiety about illegal entries by Jamaicans, Guyanese, and yes Haitians.
I really do not think that CARICOM is a huge priority for the DR any way. I don't see them thinking that the adjustments that they will have to make will be worthwhile.
The DR has much more poverty than do many countries in the Anglo phone Caribbean. Its population is much larger, and its labor force much more exploited.........leading to many having to seek work in other parts of the Caribbean (the Bahamas, Turks & Caicos, BVI, St Maarten, St Kitts/Nevis, Antigua, Trinidad, among others).
It isn't a shining star as you imagine it to be. It has 10 million when CARICOM (excluding Haiti) has 6.5 million.
What does the DR have to offer CARICOM? They don't identify with it, and there is already a free trade agreement with the DR, which is pretty under utilized.
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