She reported, among the highlights of relations with Brazil, the commissioning of the Brazilian-financed Takutu Bridge and the projected establishment of a consulate in Boa Vista. With Venezuela, it was the Venezuelan-financed project for rehabilitation and integration of homeless persons and the projected establishment of a consulate in Puerto Ordaz. With Suriname, it was the re-warming of a cold case over a previous administration’s plan to invade to Guyana’s New River Triangle several years ago which never materialised. With the Caribbean Community, she said Guyana’s role was “one where we remain committed to the integration process…”
She seemed not to have seen the big picture. The lesson of continental and regional security is that, nowadays, national security is no longer national security. The purpose of frontier relations is more about preserving internal, rather than external, security. The Minister, however, did not seem inclined to make the connection between foreign policy and national security.
The significance of the borders that divide Guyana’s national territory from the frontier states has been altered over the past two decades. External and internal policy, national security and international security are all now inter-connected. The way to deal with internal security is the way to deal with external security − especially the threats posed by narco-trafficking, gun-running, money-laundering, illegal immigration and organised crime. In all of these cases, the route to national security is through international co-operation. Hence, the importance of a competent corps of diplomats who can connect the dots.
The trans-national threat of organised crime to Guyana should lead to transnational co-operation with neighbouring states. Everyday domestic security problems − such as the crimes committed with handguns which, most likely, come from Brazil; trafficking in cocaine from Colombia; trafficking in contraband fuel from Venezuela; and ‘backtracking’ and the smuggling of raw gold and diamonds to Suriname − reveal the new ways in which the borders that once defined the state have become meaningless to this country’s criminal cartels. Takuba Lodge seems not to have comprehended the changing security challenges.
Foreign policy should contribute to the construction of a cooperative community that emphasises the necessity of solidarity with those outside of national borders. Continental and Caribbean cooperation is essential to the preservation of Guyana’s security. It is the task of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to understand this and seize this opportunity to conceptualise the two organisations − the Caribbean Community and the Union of South American States − as components in a system of international cooperation whose political force would emerge directly out of the common struggle for security.
The Minister has a lot to learn about these essential elements of foreign policy. It is a pity that her contribution to the foreign policy debate in the National Assembly was used in part as an opportunity to launch an incautious invective against her predecessors. Claiming that the greater part of Guyana’s history “was not used wisely, resulting in the country regressing in the 1970s and 1980s,” she lamented “the precious time that was squandered in those early years.”
She should eschew criticisms which can invite comparisons between the performance of former Foreign Ministers − such as Shridath Ramphal and Rashleigh Jackson who served in the 1970s and 1980s and had a very good grasp of both foreign policy and national security − with her own. The results of this line of reasoning may not necessarily be to her advantage.
