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Tough talk

by Barbados Today
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Prime Minister Mia Mottley

The Prime Minister yesterday used a global labour forum to denounce a “racist and xenophobic” world order, in which large and powerful nations contribute to the downfall of “dispensable”, small ones.

Before the International Labour Organisation in Geneva, Switzerland, the PM pleaded with world leaders to guard against a “multipolar” system, in which power and influence are confined to the hands of a few.

Referencing the current wave of migration confronting rich nations, she accused unnamed world leaders of practising hypocrisy.

“The world has made a pact that it is not prepared to protect those that are most vulnerable among the global community of nations.

“It is unfortunate because it reminds us of a world that was not prepared to see the most vulnerable of human beings a hundred years ago, namely the workers.

“It is also the global insecurity, the continued willingness to believe it is okay to move capital, but it’s not okay for people to move and hence mass migration of labour is unacceptable to a world whether for xenophobic, racial or other reasons,” she said.

Aiming at the threat posed by climate change, Mottley predicted that if the world failed to take note, developed countries could be further bombarded with “climate refugees”.

She declared: “Within our own region, we have seen more than two-thirds of the population of Montserrat leave because of a volcano.

“Two years ago we saw the whole island of Barbuda evacuated because of a hurricane. We have seen the country of Dominica lose 226 per cent of its GDP and significant dislocation of its population due to two hurricanes two years ago.

“We speak from event to event and from institution to institution and even though politics is the art of repetition, it appears that neither politics nor morality is having any meaningful impact on those whose actions and voices can make that significant difference to the climate difficulties that we did today.”

Mottley said she could not support a world, which is only prepared to protect the most powerful countries. She contended that core values of equity and justice were being eroded.

She said: “In spite of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and in spite of all who have died and all that we have fought for, that we should continue to think that it is okay to view a group of nations as dispensable or worse still, not to view them at all against the very threat that is perhaps the greatest threat since mankind has ever inhabited this earth.  It is perhaps the greatest, most unfortunate aspect of our global affairs today.” kareemsmith@barbadostoday.bb

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