The people are not dishonest!

Fri, Jul 16, 2010

Editor: As I read Wade Kojo Williams Sr’s piece printed in your July 9, 2010, edition of the Searchlight and reflected on Sir Ronald’s earlier piece claiming nothing wrong with genuine assistance from ALBA, I feel the urgent need to bring certain facts to the attention of the people so they can judge properly in this debate.{{more}} I must respond particularly to Kojo’s claim that, “St. Vincent and the Grenadines did not sign on to the military arrangements of ALBA or the SUCRE”. Is this really true when we consider the contents of the Bicentennial Manifesto of Caracas, signed April 19, 2010, by all heads of state of governments of ALBA, including our own SVG, represented by PM Gonsalves?

The manifesto above which I will cite can be found at the following address on the Internet: http://www.rnv.gov.ve/noticias/index.php?act=ST&f=31&t=125424. One can see it is the Venezuela government’s website reporting the news, since in Spanish it is headed “Gobierno Bolivariano de Venezuela-Ministerio de poder popular para la communicacion y la informacion – literally translated it means-the Bolivarian Government of Venezuela – Ministry of popular power for communication and information. The featured article is called “Rulers of ALBA-TCP signed Bicentennial Manifesto of Caracas” and it publishes “the complete text” of the manifesto. We have to believe we can trust it since it is coming from ALBA’s leading Country’s Government-Venezuela.

Nothing to do with Sucre?

The manifesto lists 2 ways for ALBA heads to “accelerate the process of consolidation of our independence.” Number 2 is entitled “The great historical challenge: to build an independent, developed and socialist economic base”. It explains the dissatisfaction with capitalism and describes the need to build “an alternative model of economic sovereignty” and construct and consolidate “…economic autonomy with a socialist perspective”. The following explanation is then given as the decided actions of ALBA,

“Therefore, we believe the time has come to consider taking an Economic Plan to raise into a larger dimension the Big-National projects and businesses, the Treaty of Commerce of the Peoples, the Sucre and the Bank of ALBA as elements to build a Common Economic Zone. In this sense, we decided to instruct the ALBA Economic Council, to designate a coordinator of economic policy that, in three months, would show, starting from a diagnosis of our countries and our region, a big Map of Sovereignty and Economic Independence where will be identified the strengths and weaknesses of our economies, will be analyzed the main opportunities of complementarity, and will be set out the actions to promote the union of our economies, under a socialist perspective. .The Economy Council of ALBA must propose, within 30 days, A PLAN TO ACCELERATE THE IMPLEMENTATION OF SUCRE and expand the development of Big-National businesses and THE BANK OF ALBA, on a larger scale that really impacts the current economic life of our countries.”

How could our PM sign this document where heads of ALBA agree to accelerate the implementation of the SUCRE, yet we are to believe that SVG’s involvement with ALBA has nothing to do with SUCRE? There is no point in the manifesto that makes any sort of exception for SVG and the other OECS countries when it comes to accepting SUCRE, so we accept what is written in the manifesto to be the true reflection.

No military arrangements?

The manifesto also makes certain statements that strongly constitute military arrangements in solidarity. The Number 1 way to create the new independence of ALBA includes “the fight against all forms of interventionsm and war” described below:

“The fight against interventionism, particularly by the military, and for the preservation and restoration of peace are components of the action of the ALBA countries in its relationship with the world. In that sense, the countries of ALBA will help preserve and maintain peace by forming alliances to strengthen their capacity to guarantee the national sovereignty of the peoples against foreign intervention, particularly against the occupation and military threats by the empire. On the other hand, will deploy all their efforts to preserve peace in all circumstances, offering their solidarity contribution to restore peace where conflicts prevail, favoring a political, peaceful and negotiated settlement of all differences, no matter how profound.”

The United States of America is typically referred to as the “empire” by Hugo Chavez. The only way ALBA Countries could strengthen their capacity against occupation and military threats is to be strong military-wise as well. They have signed to commit to forming alliances to this end. Yet we hear there are no military arrangements? What then is this? Once more, there is no mention of an exception for SVG. All this is compounded by the fact that the PM has never presented this document to us, although he signed it supposedly following a mandate we gave him. We have all right to be concerned and to express it without being wrongfully accused of seeking political mileage scaremongering. With the revelation above of the contents of the Bicentennial Manifesto of Caracas, we see just who is being dishonest about SVG’s involvement in ALBA re SUCRE and military arrangements, and it is not the people! Everybody, PLEASE READ THE MANIFESTO!

Anesia O. Baptiste
anesiarichards@gmail.com