Tuesday, April 21, 2009A New Era & Negotiation Tactics Have Evolved

Portia Harrigan Visionary Leadership Provides Much Needed Hope

The Summit of the Americas convened in Trinidad and Tobago on Friday evening under a cloud of criticism and doubt by many in the Trinidadian society. Prime Minister Patrick Manning had been accused of being extremely irresponsible for having taken on the summit at such a high price tag in a time of economic uncertainty. “No one will ever know the actual cost,” said one critic. “The Prime Minister is spending too much of the taxpayers money for something from which we will never see any real benefit,” he added.

Having watched the opening and closing ceremonies in their entirety, I could not disagree more. The benefits to the twin island republic should be tremendous. This was an unprecedented opportunity to display to the world on international television all that Trinidad has to offer and it was precisely because of this, that the island had to be portrayed in all its splendour. The world has now seen that the country is capable of hosting world class conferences: the culture is rich and the food diverse and outstanding. Security concerns can be met and the leader is in his element on the world stage. As we say here, he can play in Hong Kong and as he stated in his response to the question posed to him regarding cost, the potential foreign investment benefits could be huge. Not only will Trinidad and Tobago benefit from this display, but I expect that the rest of the Caribbean can too. I almost burst with pride as I listened to the presentations of Dean Barrow of Belize and Patrick Manning of Trinidad and Tobago, particularly coming after President Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua, who rambled on pointlessly for an hour on the evil past of America, rather than capitalizing on new opportunities to engage the United States in a new relationship. Ortega’s performance was a true manifestation of a politician rather than a leader, long past his prime. He cannot with this disposition, lead Nicaragua to any meaningful accomplishments for we are now in a new time, a new era and negotiation tactics have likewise evolved.

The world is changing exponentially and rather than being mired in the past, we need to recognize the need for us to revolutionize our way of thinking, in order to capitalize on the many opportunities that lie ahead of us. What has been holding us back as a people too is our inability to embrace our past for what it was and use it as a springboard to create a position of power for ourselves. This is the only surety that history will not repeat itself. The Jewish People have been extraordinarily successful at this and as Simon Peres said in an interview with the BBC about two years ago, “being consumed with history, disallows you the opportunity to realize your future.” Barack Obama’s response to Ortega was similar. “We are not here to focus on the past which is of no use, but rather on the future.”

Barrow and Manning were a testament of the kind of place the Caribbean can be if we move past petty politics and seek leadership; leadership, reflective of the times we now find ourselves in. They both spoke to the future with such eloquence and depth. It was clear that they thought extensively and methodically about what we need, not only as individual islands, but as a region of one Caribbean people. As they both articulated, what we need to do now as a region to be prepared for the new economy is a total restructuring. Let’s face it, the global economy will not return to what it was and so we must prepare ourselves for what will be an even more competitive environment, “THE NEW ECONOMY” or find ourselves even further marginalized. We must take on the responsibility of fighting crime, which indirectly does affect our GDP; we must develop our resources, focus significantly on education and the development of our infrastructure. We will achieve nothing by harking back to slavery and discrimination in this new era. As Obama bluntly stated in his opening remarks, he cannot be held responsible for occurrences prior to his birth, and unfortunately, many others feel the same. We must now face our challenges head on and rather than seeing every stranger as an enemy, we need to develop strategic partnerships that will assist in advancing our cause. Notwithstanding their respective challenges, we need leaders like Barrow and Manning throughout every corner of the region. Leaders, who are willing to make the tough decisions, speak truth to power, to listen, to plan and develop policies for the betterment of all.

This is the first time the summit was being hosted by the Caribbean and Trinidad has done us proud. The cultural presentation was world class, equal in relative terms to the opening of the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, China. It was well conceived, flawlessly executed and included all of the people of Trinidad; African, Indian, Hispanic; absolutely breathtaking. That presentation further defined that one of our greatest assets in our preparation for the new economy is our culture. Our greatest asset is our people, and there must be an exerted effort to develop our human resources so that we are globally competitive, not only in tourism and financial services, but also in science and technology, in engineering and construction and the performing arts.

For obvious reasons, the BVI was not represented at the Summit of the Americas, but should we be seeking special dispensation from the UK government for the interests of dependent territories in the hemisphere to be aptly represented at meetings of this nature? Let us embrace the best and brightest among us, regardless of origin; the small man and the not so small man and convene a summit on the future of the British Virgin Islands. It is time for us through visionary leadership, to develop a plan for the next twenty five years for our country and yes while it is true that we are currently in the troughs of deep economic challenges, there is no time like now for us to reflect and conceive of new ideas and a new direction for these beautiful Virgin Islands.

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