CARIFTA championships highlight Caribbean, but…Whose caribbean?

In spite of the CARIFTA athletics championships for junior athletes in the Caribbean, it is not often, if ever, that we have had the opportunity not only to listen to live coverage but to actually see the performances live via television or the Internet.

All praises to those who afforded us this privilege thereby enriching our 2022 Easter experience. What an opportunity offered to our young athletes and a showcase to the world of Caribbean talent!

The annual CARIFTA championships has been the hatchery of Caribbean athletic excellence and it is via this medium that those who later put the region on the international stage first blossomed. The names of Usain Bolt, Kirani James and the outstanding bevy of female stars including Bahamian Shaune Miller-Uibo stand out in this regard. Our own Kineke Alexander also came to regional attention via this channel.

The CARIFTA Games 2022 continued in this trend, in spite of the disruptions of the last two years due to the Covid pandemic. What it again reinforced was the importance of sport in Caribbean development, not just as a sporting pastime but as a vital avenue for shaping future careers. Would the world ever have head of Usain Bolt, Brian Lara, Dwight Yorke or Shelley-Ann Fraser- Pryce had it not been for sport?

Parents of young athletes who demonstrate both talent and ambition to develop it, should pay special attention. There is still the old attitude of not seeing sport and athletic development as being complementary, but very often considering young people who demonstrate commitment to training and excellence as “wasting time”. The results prove otherwise. Indeed, sport, particularly track and field, has proven to be a most valuable channel for providing opportunities for young athletes to access tertiary education, particularly at US universities and colleges. Our own experiences with Adonal Foyle, Sancho Lyttle, and Sophia Young for instance, demonstrate this amply.

The successful return of the CARIFTA championships in 2022 confirmed the rich reservoir of Caribbean talent from the South American mainland, right through the Caribbean sea to mainland Belize, and bordering the North American continent as in the case of the Bahamas and Bermuda. There is breadth and depth in the Caribbean talent pool, and it can only be enriched by the cultural and sporting exchanges and experiences offered by the CARIFTA games.

However much as sport was the focus of the Games, one must not ignore any ancillary, but equally important issues that arise. Thus, in viewing the Opening ceremony, I could not help but be struck by a major political obstacle to Caribbean development. By my calculation, fully half of the 26 competing teams had flags and anthems which belong to European nations. The reason? They are still colonies of European nations, more than 60 years after the United Nations Declaration on the right to independence for all nations.
For the purpose of clarity, we should name them: Aruba and Curacao (Dutch); Martinique, Guadeloupe and Cayenne (French); St Martin (shared by the French and Dutch); The US Virgin Islands; and Britain’s colonial residue in Bermuda, the British Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands, Montserrat, Anguilla and the Turks and Caicos Islands.
Although I was aware of the colonial status, I have hardly ever been so graphically struck by it as in seeing the colonial flags, coats of arms and in hearing the foreign anthems. I do hope that something is not wrong with me and that there are others as concerned about this situation as I am.
The colonisers are quite clever in retaining control ranging from France, which stubbornly insists that Martinique, Guadeloupe and Cayenne, thousands of miles away from France, are “parts of France”, to British, Dutch and US manoeuvres to pretend that their Caribbean colonies are in that position by choice and free will.

That is not to say that there are not substantial numbers of people within these colonial territories who are still prepared to hold on to the coattails of the colonial masters, convinced that there is economic benefit in doing so, and lacking the self-confidence to contemplate being in charge of their own affairs. Indeed, I am convinced that if we in SVG had held a referendum in 1979 about independence, the “NO’ vote may well have triumphed as it did in the infamous constitutional referendum 30 years later.

Even under slavery, there were slaves who were so brainwashed as to oppose emancipation and freedom. In the USA today, there are prominent black people, in politics and other fields who hold on to the Republican party which is busy denying black people in southern states in particular, the right to vote – in the 21st century!

So, as we bask in the demonstration of Caribbean talent, what do we think? That our young people can compete with all else in the sporting field, but are not good enough to govern ourselves and forge relationships with all, including former colonial masters, based on mutual interest and respect?
What does CARICOM think of this situation? How are we to achieve credibility in our demand for reparations when we are comfortable with the colonial flag flying over half of our territories? Where is our self-respect and worth?

WHOSE CARIBBEAN IS THIS?

Renwick Rose is a community activist and social commentator.