Dominica’s Prime Minister Rooseveldt Skerritt has defended his government’s membership of the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA), pointing to the opportunities and programmes afforded through association with the organisation.

Speaking with reporters last Friday at the International Conference Centre Liliendaal, Greater Georgetown, the Prime Minister pointed out that there are unfortunately some in the world who would rather pay attention to big business and help the rich but at the same time there are some other leaders and countries in the world who are very concerned with the poor, the marginalised and the voiceless.

He stated that this is what ALBA has been addressing, pointing to the projects and the programmes in member states of ALBA, all of which respond to these challenges. “We have to be very careful about the ideological battle, and in the process our people suffer because we are afraid to take a stand and to associate and mingle and to integrate”.

“The only people who are going to suffer are the people who cannot go to the Parliament and shout, or who do not have the resources to influence the decisions of our countries,” Skerritt observed.

Questioned about whether CARICOM should have a common foreign policy, Prime Minister Skerritt said that this should only be on certain things and where consensus can be achieved. He added that every country has the right to take care of its citizens; and as a result, links and alliances that will bring the desired benefits to the people have to be forged.

“Everyone is elected to improve the lives of their people and you can’t go and say that because so and so didn’t support the particular view, you should not associate with a particular country and then your people suffer”, the Prime Minister stated.

Citing the position taken by U.S. President Barack Obama to engage the Muslim world in dialogue, the Dominican PM said that the same thing applies in this regard.

When questioned about some of the benefits that Dominica and other OECS states derive from its association with ALBA, Skerritt adamantly refused to answer stating that his government does not have to answer every question about is its association with the Hugo Chavez led free trade and integration initiative.

“We are an independent nation, we gained our independence in 1978 and that gives us a right to determine our own destiny, and we are not going to respond to every single question about our membership to ALBA” Skerritt asserted.

This view was however put down by Jamaica’s Prime Minister Bruce Golding, who, when questioned, said that the move by some CARICOM states to align themselves with organisations outside of the Community puts the sustainability of the region at stake. Explaining his position with an analogy to the family, Golding stated that if a family is having difficulties and challenges in creating the unity and oneness to make it function, then naturally other members of that family are going to be concerned.

“I become worried about the sustainability of the family if I see them going next door and finding greater comfort next door, because I believe their attention, the priority that they ought to give to getting our family working is going to diminish.

“I would say let’s get our family working properly before we start creating other difficulties. Because when you create other alliances, you assume other responsibilities and obligations which may very well cut across the obligations that we have at home,” Golding pointed out.

Further reaffirming his country’s commitment to the integration movement, the Jamaican PM said, “I see CARCIOM as a work in progress, I think it has been a slow and tedious process, but it is not something that we want to give up on”.

He stated that member states still have to ensure that there is a measurable distance between their declarations of commitment and assertion of the political will that must support that position.

However, Trinidad and Tobago’s PM, Patrick Manning, has pointed out that CARICOM should engage Venezuela in dialogue with regard to this issue, adding that this matter of alliance with ALBA is a new development that has to be examined.

“I, for one, would advocate some kind of dialogue between CARICOM and Venezuela on this matter; it may not be an impediment to the continued development of the Caribbean, I don’t think it would be”.

Asked if the present economic situation is the reason for these countries forging alliances with non-traditional partners for money, Manning said that the economic situation has had a lot to do with this, stating that there will be a lot of re-ordering of alliances in the world because of that.

“What you see in the Caribbean is a function of that, and is probably closer to home that you can see it more clearly, but it is happening elsewhere in the world”.

ALBA, spearheaded by President Hugo Chávez, former Cuban President Fidel Castro and, more recently, Evo Morales of Bolivia, is the first attempt at regional integration that is not based primarily on trade liberalization, but on a new vision of social welfare and equity.