FRANKLIN JOHNSTON

Our private sector is rightly annoyed. Minister Shaw and Samuda are in stealth mode and leave JMA to fight what is really their political battle. Political unions of states are hard to manage. President Obama is head of a federal government of 50 states and they just gave him a *la*hdy nose. World applause is good but a leader must please his people first. These unions can't please everyone - worse our CSME as it is poor, lacks critical mass; we are destitute and distant from the core. Unions require their federal HQ to have strategic stockpiles. We are CSME's distant border. Georgetown, like DC, is capital of a union, but DC has federal assets all over its domain, quite separate from each state's assets - not so Guyana. Trinidad should be the CSME's hub for the EC, being close to them; we at the far border should be CSME's north Atlantic hub and have some federal jobs, troops, food, transport, stores, etc. But CSME is too poor, so it won't happen.

The case of Irish cheese is instructive. Ireland is giving all citizens a free block of cheese to boost morale and nutrition, given the awful taxes, job losses and poverty. It is Irish cheese and the EU pays Irish farmers for it. Can CSME help us like this? St Vincent de Paul charity says, "Half the calls we take are about food and energy". Fr Ho Lung might say this applies to us here too. Can Caricom give a Xmas gift to the 11m Haitians? (No cholera here please!) What nutritional food like cheese do we produce in the quantity that CSME could buy to give to our 3m people? None! We hide behind debt, but debt is no barrier to local food production. We destroyed our dairy industry with subsidised imports. Ireland is the sixth most indebted nation but it produces food. Japan, first with debt of 225 per cent of GDP is the second biggest economy. Debt doesn't stop them. The JLP grows our debt mountain, but Minister Tufton has no local food to give each citizen a Christmas hamper in this hard time. We are work-shy people with visionless, selfish leaders! Tufton says we produced more food than last year. It means little as he did not tell us in advance what were the national targets. No Christmas hamper for him either!

Can Caricom survive our truculence? Do we bully Kamla because she is a woman? Why do we buy Trini goods? Buy elsewhere! We carry a grudge, but Kamla did not mess up Jamaica - we did. Why not tell Bruce to do for JMA what she does for her manufacturers?

Humanitarian relief is not the same as building assistance. Kamla gave unconditional humanitarian aid to St Vincent and St Lucia (water, food, mattresses, etc). She got a request for housing materials and said "If we are giving assistance...for housing...then we may be able to use T&T builders so that whatever assistance is given redounds back in some measure to the people of T&T." This is sense! If she buys these from the USA and donates them, why can't Trini contractors build the houses? The sheer hypocrisy of her critics! This is what the US, UK and Canada do here and not once did PSOJ, JMA, the media or Cabinet ask them to use our consultants, contractors or architects. The IMCJ - local consultants - asked Cabinet to get US aid projects to use our experts; ministers ignored them, yet criticise PM Kamla. Where did we get the sense of entitlement? This means three things: First, we are only team players when we lead the team; next, the "don" culture has reached business - intimidate when you can't compete; third, we "get uppity" only with Caricom partners, we dare not say a word to the US or UK who give with long strings attached and our trade deficit is larger with them than with Caricom!

Now, let me share some tit-bits from the EU as it is the model for CSME. Caricom's food strategy is based on a crop focus for a member. The EU model of subsidy and stockpile works, as for the US federal government. They are now eroding their food mountain as the cold war is over. The EU model means members produce more and get paid. Subsidy, stockpile and dispersal on demand is the route to food security for us and for CSME!

Recently the EU directed that prisoners be given the vote and PM Cameron is "furious" as the British have other views. Would we tolerate edicts like this from Guyana? Many Brits oppose the EU and we must oppose CSME unless it works for us. Britain kept its currency, control of its economy and there is a UK Independence Party (UKIP) with 13 MEPs in the European Parliament, working to take Britain out of the EU. The fact that rich EU members had to pay for Greece's mistakes to save their own economies proves a point. CSME is a distraction for our economy. With the energy we spend to cuss Trini we could find new markets. Let's be like Britain in the EU; control our economy but ride with CSME? What about an Independence party? Food for thought, my friend!

Barry Chevannes

Barry was a revolutionary. He envisioned a just Jamaica and worked at it. I can't dispel the feeling that were he a politician he would have been airlifted abroad to benefit from cutting-edge medicine, and would still be with us. He was our special one; driven by Jesuit ideals; alumnus of the Social Action Centre - the "Kane" crucible of brain-led revolution, championing growth and fairness - other alumni serve in all walks of life. His concern for the disadvantaged, his soft-spoken intellect and quiet activism were impressive. He was of the original Abeng family and did saffron our activism with music. Barry was my beloved friend. We proved that "my father's house" can hold "many mansions" - one old VW van held many families; wife Paulette, daughters Amba and Abena are mine too, his vision my cause. Stay strong, he is now in his mansion! Live on, Barry!

Dr Franklin Johnston is an international project manager with Teape-Johnston Consultants currently on assignment in the UK. franklinjohnston@hotmail.com