Gail Alexan­der

Se­nior Po­lit­i­cal Re­porter

“Take your bless­ings in large dos­es. This must be a very spe­cial show­er,” was the ral­ly­ing cry by Prime Min­is­ter Kei­th Row­ley to fel­low Cari­com lead­ers yes­ter­day when tor­rents of rain de­scend­ed as they gath­ered in Ch­aguara­mas for a func­tion com­mem­o­rat­ing Cari­com’s birth there on Ju­ly 4, 1973.

Row­ley, host of Car­i­om’s 45th meet­ing and 50th an­niver­sary cel­e­bra­tions, al­so told his re­gion­al col­league, “Please pro­duce your buck­ets, no spoons, no forks ... ”

The Cari­com lead­ers did not let the rain stop them from par­tic­i­pat­ing in the pro­gramme on the grounds of the Ch­aguara­mas Con­ven­tion Cen­tre where six poui trees were plant­ed. The event was held at the lo­ca­tion where the Treaty of Ch­aguara­mas was signed by T&T’s Dr Er­ic Williams, Bar­ba­dos’s Er­rol Bar­row, Guyana’s Forbes Burn­ham and Ja­maica’s Michael Man­ley.

An­oth­er high­light of the cer­e­mo­ny was the seal­ing of a time cap­sule con­tain­ing let­ters by cur­rent lead­ers to fu­ture Cari­com lead­ers. It will be opened in 50 years.

It was the main event on the sec­ond day of the Cari­com lead­ers’ sum­mit and was wit­nessed by sev­er­al high pro­file guests, in­clud­ing South Ko­re­an Prime Min­is­ter Han Duck-soo, mem­bers of the diplo­mat­ic corps and oth­ers, who were seat­ed un­der a huge tent at the front of the Con­ven­tion Cen­tre.

The rain start­ed just as mem­bers of the T&T De­fence Force (TTDF) were hoist­ing the flags of Cari­com ter­ri­to­ries, but they held their po­si­tions next to the flag­poles for a while dur­ing the heavy down­pour. Mem­bers of the Reg­i­ment Band, who pro­vid­ed mu­si­cal ac­com­pa­ni­ment for the flag-hoist­ing, stood in the rain for the en­tire func­tion.

In­com­ing Cari­com chair­man, Prime Min­is­ter of Do­mini­ca Roo­sevelt Sker­rit, made ref­er­ence to the hur­ri­cane sea­son and the trop­i­cal wave that caused yes­ter­day’s in­clement weath­er dur­ing the cer­e­mo­ny, when he spoke about cli­mate change.

Row­ley not­ed that the lead­ers stood in yes­ter­day’s heavy rains on what is con­sid­ered “holy ground, Ch­aguara­mas.”

Re­count­ing state­ments by Cari­com’s founders, he said the com­mu­ni­ty should be for­ward look­ing.

Say­ing it was no ac­ci­dent that Cari­com’s seed was sown on Ju­ly 4, US In­de­pen­dence Day, at the site of an old US naval base, he added: “Hap­py In­de­pen­dence to the Unit­ed States.”

Row­ley said while Cari­com’s ac­com­plish­ments have been many the re­gion­al body al­so had to con­tend with its lim­i­ta­tions.

“Yet still here we are to­day, a fam­i­ly of na­tions re­plete with the wis­dom that comes from fac­ing those chal­lenges head on. We are stronger to­geth­er,” he said.

Items were placed in­to the time cap­sule by TTDF JAC of­fi­cer M Mod­este and Pri­vate A Smith and was then sealed with a lid bear­ing the Cari­com em­blem.

The pro­gramme’s host an­nounced that the tree plant­i­ng would be post­poned be­cause of the rains but soon af­ter said she was told that the Cari­com lead­ers were “go­ing to lead by ex­am­ple” and were will­ing to par­tic­i­pate in the ex­er­cise.

Row­ley crouched down, get­ting his hands in the dirt to fix the tree he was plant­i­ng. Ba­hamas Prime Min­is­ter Philip Davis shov­elled dirt on it and then Row­ley added more dirt. Guyana Pres­i­dent Dr Mo­hamed Ir­faan Ali got his hands in the dirt to plant an­oth­er tree.

Bar­ba­dos Prime Min­is­ter Mia Mot­t­ley, whose long sash got in the way when she bent down, re­moved it and hand­ed it to an of­fi­cer then con­tin­ued shov­el­ling.

As­sist­ing was Be­lize’s chief ex­ec­u­tive of­fi­cer in For­eign Af­fairs Amalia Mai, while An­tigua Prime Min­is­ter Gas­ton Browne ex­pert­ly mould­ed the tree all around.

Af­ter the tree plant­i­ngs were com­plet­ed, Ja­maican Prime Min­is­ter An­drew Hol­ness used rain­wa­ter falling from the tent to wash dirt off his hands. Montser­rat’s act­ing Pre­mier Samuel Joseph wiped the rain from his face with his hand.

A lone pro­test­er with a flag and sign seen on the West­ern Main Road some dis­tance from the Con­ven­tion Cen­tre was a mem­ber of a group who went to the Hy­att Reg­n­cy on Mon­day to de­liv­er let­ters to Cari­com lead­ers ask­ing for in­ter­na­tion­al ob­servers for T&T’s up­com­ing elec­tions.