LETTER: Caribbean Leaders | A Failure To Launch

Across the length and breadth of the Caribbean our new leaders have consistently failed  to emulate or even equal past leaders like Michael Manley, Eric Williams, Vere Bird, Eugenia Charles or the pinnacle, Alexander Bustamante. Speaking lastly of an icon who was imprisoned by the British for principle not profit.Peter Polack

West Indian leaders are now more prone to find themselves being investigated not for a pro-independence movement but corruption, illicit enrichment and immoral behavior.

At about the same time that the British Virgin Islands had a prominent citizen appointed to the Privy Council it’s former premier Andrew Fahie was convicted and sentenced for conspiring to import cocaine while he was Premier in 2022.

Jamaican Prime Minister Andrew Holness saw his declared wealth rocket from J$350,000 to J$160 Million without a full,complete and public explanation as to source and details of this economic miracle.He has now spent the last few years fighting the Integrity Commission without the simplest of remedies, go gospel with the voters in what has become a pivotal election year.

The Cayman Islands has seen a former premier convicted for assaulting a woman and is now facing extended proceedings for sexual assault. Curiously, the Cayman Islands,newly removed from the FATF grey list, will not allow copies of their Register of Interests of the political and other handmaidens of their nearly billion dollar economy to be subject to oversight or verification.

The beleaguered Turks and Caicos Islands have been home to what has possibly become the longest Caribbean corruption inquiry involving a former premier arrested in 2012 with a British administered trial reaching only half point after starting in 2024.

Perhaps a new model for the future can be found in the political crossfire of corruption allegations in Trinidad and Tobago which saw the Keith Rowley led government of Trinidad and Tobago passing a whistleblower bill to protect corruption fighters.A possible blowback saw Rowley himself being recently flagged in Antigua by authorities for unexplained reasons that necessitated the intervention of Antiguan Prime Minister Gaston Browne.

No list would be complete without the Roosevelt Skerrit government of Dominica which became repeatedly involved in the corruption of economic passports and the diplomatic appointment of a fugitive as Ambassador to Malaysia. To further the decline of what has become the notorious Dominica passport, Prime Minister Skerrit  now proposes to grant citizenship to displaced Palestinians.

Perhaps the answer lies in the stellar performance and example of Mia Mottley who leads the Caribbean’s newest republic of Barbados. Eloquently outspoken on the world stage, she would surely have been endorsed by her predecessor, Sir Grantley Adams.

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery that mediocrity can pay to greatness according to Oscar Wilde.

By Peter Polack