The Tribune

THE US Vice President Kamala Harris came to The Bahamas last week for considerably less than a day to meet with Caricom leaders. As promoted by the US Embassy in Nassau: “The Vice President’s trip delivers on the Biden-Harris Administration’s commitment to advance cooperation with the Caribbean, pursue shared prosperity and security, and celebrate the common bonds between our nations.

“The Vice President is travelling to The Bahamas during Caribbean-American Heritage Month and will celebrate the longstanding people-to-people ties between the Caribbean and the United States.”

“US Embassy Nassau’s Chargé d’Affaires, Usha Pitts praised the timing of the visit. ‘Vice President Harris will be the highest-ranking US government official to visit The Bahamas since Independence in 1973. Her visit commemorates not just 50 years of Bahamian Independence, but also 50 years of enduring partnership between our two nations,’ said Chargé Pitts.”

Despite the public relations by US, Bahamian and Caribbean officials, and the pomp, somewhat limited circumstance, short duration and outsized security blanket of such a visit, what did the very brief visit achieve?

Along with other Caribbean states, The Bahamas has historic, generally warm, and long-term ties with the United States of America. We share a maritime border, mutual values and concerns as democratic nations, and family and other bonds.

As a small developing state we do not expect the same “special” relationship as that of the US and UK. But with such geographic proximity and our steady support of US interests, neither do we expect to be taken for granted as we have been.

If The Bahamas was not serving as Chair of Caricom, it is likely that we would not have seen such a high-profile visit for many more decades. That it took half a century and a regional meeting for a several hour visit is revealing and embarrassing.

The Vice President did not really “visit” The Bahamas per se. She was here for a Caricom meeting, with the country as mostly a backdrop as the US seeks to counter the influence of China in the region and globally.

Despite the big production, the visit seemed fairly empty. Was it not possible for Ms. Harris to at least make the effort and stay in The Bahamas for one full day and overnight to take more time with Caricom leaders and to meet more Bahamians? Why is our region constantly treated as an afterthought?

While the US describes The Bahamas as a friend, there has been general neglect and mostly indifference by the superpower of its smaller neighbour, which it sees in mostly circumscribed security terms.

Few Bahamians realised that it was Caribbean-American Heritage month in the US. The inclusion of that reference in the Embassy statement felt somewhat patronising, especially given the brevity of the visit, while parts of the statement had the quality of irony a Calypsonian might tease with good humour.

Ms. Harris announced a 100 million dollar aid package for Caricom. For reference and comparison the cost of the new US embassy cum fortress downtown Nassau is a $310m complex.

The package, while a movement in the right direction, is a pittance in terms of US resources and the needs of the region as we confront the ravages already being felt by climate change.

As noted by US officials: the meeting built “on the US-Caribbean Partnership to Address the Climate Crisis 2030 (PAC 2030), launched by the Vice President and Caribbean leaders in Los Angeles at the Summit of the Americas”.

As reported in The Nassau Guardian, the Vice President promised to “lead a diplomatic campaign to push for the reform of multilateral development banks, in order to improve low-cost financing to Caribbean countries”.

This is critical cum existential as Caribbean nations struggle with huge debt burdens, increasingly higher interest payments, and the difficulty of funding essential infrastructure, criminal justice, social development, and climate resilience and mitigation projects.

But the proof will be in what is negotiated and when with multilateral finance agencies. Those who have worked this brief before in foreign and finance ministries in the region are not holding their proverbial breaths.

Further, given the history of pledges by developed states, including the US, we will see whether the 100 million materialises and in what form. Recall the billions in assistance promised by the US and others as a part of the Paris Climate Accords.

And recall all the aid The Bahamas was promised in the aftermath of Hurricane Dorian.

The “years of enduring partnership between our two nations” touted by the well-regarded Ms Pitts includes the 11 years in which the US has embarrassingly failed to have an ambassador in residence in The Bahamas.

How did we get here and what is the future of US-Caricom relations generally, and US-Bahamas relations in particular? First a little bit of history and more in subsequent columns.

And a clue: Were it not for the vigorous presence of the People’s Republic of China in the region, would the US be making the catch-up moves it could and should have made decades ago?

Recall those colourful and cartoonish caricature maps of various countries, depicting nations or regions with an image that supposedly captured the essence or sense of place of a particular area.

Such a map of the United States might be illustrated with a Hollywood camera and the Golden Gate Bridge representing California; Florida, with palm trees and oranges; the Statue of Liberty for New York; oil rigs and cacti for Texas, and so on.

From the viewpoint of most Americans, including its political and business elite, what might a caricature map of the contemporary Caribbean look like?

Perhaps images of Fidel Castro or Che Guevara, with a communist emblem, alongside rum and cigars representing Cuba, migrants on boats for Haiti, images depicting marijuana and reggae for Jamaica, and sandy beaches with jade and aqua waters, coconuts and tropical drinks like daiquiris for the rest of Caribbean archipelago “lazing” from The Bahamas to Aruba.

Most Americans see the Caribbean as a tropical paradise, with natives insouciantly enjoying warm ocean waters and breezes, and where very little happens. A friend recalls working at a major resort and queried if the staff lived in houses or went to school.

Another friend, who owns a resort wear store for tourists, said she has frequently and condescendingly been praised for how well she speaks English. She recounts the general ignorance of many of her American customers, black and white, about The Bahamas and the Caribbean.

More Americans only realised The Bahamas was a separate country when they had to get passports after 9/11. The slick advertising of Caribbean destinations adds to the stock postcard-like mentality that views the region as a place for holidaying where nothing else really happens.

The West Indies has been romanticised for centuries. Many writers have chronicled the caricaturing of the region and the dismissal of its various peoples as a monolithic mass of blacks and Hispanics, with little agency or seriousness of purpose.

The silky tone of Harry Belafonte, who popularised and crooned Jamaica Farewell, became the background music for the tropes and one-dimensional images most non-West Indians still have of the region.

“Down the way

Where the nights are gay

And the sun shines daily on the mountaintop

I took a trip on a sailing ship

And when I reached Jamaica I made a stop

“But I’m sad to say I’m on my way

Won’t be back for many a day

My heart is down

My head is turning around

I had to leave a little girl in Kingston town …

Whatever happened to that “little girl” or woman who “did get leave” in Kingston Town? What was her life story? What was her ancestry? What was her family like, her dreams, her profession? Where are her descendants?

Were any of them part of the Caribbean Diaspora, like Vice President Harris’s father who is Jamaican, as well as generations of Americans and others who have excelled globally.

Despite Bob Marley’s emancipatory fervor, most North Americans are lulled by the hypnotic simplicity of Three Little Birds, as they imagine themselves on a beach escaping the daily grind and stress of the metropole.

“Don’t worry about a thing

‘Cause every little thing, gonna be all right.”

The West Indies is in their imagining a stress - and anxiety-free zone, where the twin legacies of slavery and colonialism are long gone. Most people, including most Americans and Bahamians, are generally ill-informed of the world past their own geographic confines.

But how does the American political class view the Caribbean today, especially from the perches and suites of the White House, Capitol Hill, the State, Defence, Justice and other departments and agencies?

Certainly, the leaders of the American superpower should have a more informed and sophisticated understanding of the region.

While some US officials may view the Caribbean as somewhat more than sun, sand, sea, their views of the region have been one-dimensional for decades, lacking in layers, texture and some granularity.

There remains a vast ignorance of the Caribbean by government, political, military, business and media elites, who once saw the region through the lens of the Cold War and who now view it shortsightedly as mostly a battleground with China.

More Next Week.

(Front Porch is now available in podcast on The Tribune website under the Editorial Section).