#BTEditorial – The unravelling of democracy

The Caribbean has had a rich history of grassroots leaders who did not, for the main, come from the underprivileged class, but they understood the times they were in.

They empathised with the masses, and took action to raise them out of their conditions and to ride on their collective voices to bring about political and economic change.

The emergence of charismatic men like Sir Hugh Springer, Sir Grantley Adams, Errol Barrow, Michael Manley, Forbes Burnham, and Eric Williams taught us that even men of means in their times, who were often trained in the bowels of the colonial metropole, were still very much in touch with the needs of their people.

Also in the mix were many trade union heads who straddled politics and labour activism.

We do not seek to suggest that these politicians’ ambitions were purely altruistic. They sought power, yes. For in the pre-independence era, one could do little to achieve change without the backstop of political power to propel you.

But we have also experienced some protagonists who tested the social democratic traditions and norms. They pushed the envelope. In Dominica, there was Patrick John who sought to overthrow Prime Minister Dame Eugenia Charles in 1980.

In Grenada, Eric Gairy was described as an authoritarian ruler who ruled with an iron fist supported by a gang of thugs known as the Mongoose Gang. Their human rights abuses led to the popular uprising that brought Maurice Bishop to power.

In Jamaica, the spectra of Michael Manley’s too-close-for-comfort alignment with the communist regime in Cuba, made the Americans nervous.

Some historians suggest there was strong evidence to support allegations that the Americans were behind efforts to undermine the Manley administration and their unseen hand was involved in flooding Jamaican streets with illegal guns, contributing to social instability in that country.

In Guyana, there were long-running questions and suspicions about the freeness and fairness of elections during the reign of President Forbes Burnham.

As his popularity waned in the highly divisive and racial polarizing that exists in that South American/Caribbean Community (CARICOM) country, the allegations increased.

With the Cold War between the United States and Soviet Union, the political activities occurring in America’s backyard, meant that we in the Caribbean were of major geopolitical relevance.

That is not so much the case today, and so the level of aid and other assistance to the region, pales in comparison to what existed in 70s, 80s and 90s.

The Right Excellent Errol Barrow, our first Prime Minister, said in his most poignant speech to the United Nations in 1966 as  we were admitted to the international body of nations, we should be wary of some political alignments.

“We shall not involve ourselves in sterile ideological wranglings because we are exponents not of the diplomacy of power, but of the diplomacy of peace and prosperity.

“We will not regard any great power as necessarily right in a given dispute unless we are convinced of this, yet at the same time we will not view the great powers with perennial suspicion merely on account of their size, their wealth, or their nuclear potential. We will be friends of all, satellites of none,” the Barbadian national hero declared.

Having perched itself as the world’s watchdog for determining democratic standards and mores, it is pitiful to watch the slow-motion dismantling of even the simplest of democratic traditions in the United States.

Under the leadership of former President Donald Trump, and the “Trumpism” that he has left behind, the US has been transforming into a country that few are recognising.

The right of Americans, particularly people of colour and those who support the Democratic party, to vote is being challenged by Trump’s allies, who are willing to sacrifice truth and principle on the altar of pure political power by members of the Republican party.

The armed riot and attack on the US Capitol in Washington on January 6, 2020, represents a terrible stain on America and a major dent in the country’s credibility.

Trump and his enablers have put American democracy to the test and his inciting of followers to violently seek to return him to power after he was rejected by the majority of Americans at the polls, was the culmination of four years of lies and “alternative facts”.

For those here who may be disillusioned by what is taking place right before our eyes and may be questioning the legitimacy of what you have been led to believe, our first prime minister also left some advice for his people to ponder.

He urged us: “We in the West Indies should not be afraid to speak our minds. I think that we in the West Indies should not be looking around for somebody to lead and work out our own political and economic philosophy, and I do not think that it pays any West Indian politician to either look too rapidly in the direction of Europe or Asiatic countries for our basic philosophies of life.”