After the perhaps too-optimistic hopes of the 60s, and after Carifta, the Caribbean territories find themselves once again forging a unity of no small significance.

In January this year the Caricom Single Market (CSM) was launched with six Caricom members, including Trinidad and Tobago, signing the declaration. At the 27th Meeting of the Conference of the Heads of Government of the Caribbean Community in St Kitts, another six, Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, St Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia and St Vincent and the Grenadines, members of the OECS, joined.

At the launch of the CSM, Secretary-General Edwin Carrington described the agreement, which allows for the free movement of certain categories of skilled workers, as “a new dawn, long hoped for, but well worth the waiting”.

This month’s meeting touched on a wide range of topics as the region’s leaders listened to reports, took decisions and signed various agreements.

Crime and Security, Health and HIV/AIDS, Agriculture, Youth and the World Cup Cricket 2007 were among the various subjects discussed during the proceedings. But it was the CSM and the Caricom Single Market and Economy (CSME), which will provide for a common regional economy in 2008, which were at the top of the agenda.

These declarations, in a natural way, open the door to much more. They deal with the region’s human resource; they will affect the lives and freedoms of its people. Professor Norman Girvan of the Institute of International Relations of the University of the West Indies cautioned, prior to the St Kitts talks, that the CSME “must evolve rapidly into more than just an economic community; it must be designed and implemented as a social, environmental and cultural community”.

Haiti back in Caricom

The heads of government in the region have the opportunity of affecting the region in far-reaching ways. It has to be for them though more than a matter of “leaving a legacy” or “making an indelible mark”. Thankfully, there are indications that the leaders do sense the importance of the present moment.

Prime Minister of St Kitts and Nevis Dr Denzil Douglas declared at this month’s meeting that the objective of all governmental activity within the Community “should be the improving of conditions of our citizens”.

Jamaican Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller seemed to be reading from the same script: “Let whatever we do, whatever decisions we take be done to bring about an enhancement in the welfare of our people”. Prime Minister Patrick Manning warned at the opening of the talks that without the free movement of people within the region “our integration process will stagnate and decline”.

It was heartening also to see the body’s response to Haitian President René Preval, welcoming him and Haiti back into Caricom, having been satisfied that the people of Haiti had legitimised the present government, through its elections.

Caricom is not without its ambiguities. But then, the whole process towards integration is about getting rid of the ambiguities. This work will take time.

One matter though seems most pressing. It is the need for the average citizen to learn more about all that is taking place within the organisation.

The Trinidad and Tobago CSME website is a step in the right direction, but it is not enough. It would be ironic for the Caricom leaders to speak so well about the welfare of the region’s peoples and not to take the people along with them.