Ambassador to CARICOM for Dominica Felix Gregoire has announced that the free movement of people, goods and services will be his main priority during his stint at the regional body.
Gregoire, who recently presented his credentials to CARICOM Secretary General Irwin LaRocque, told reporters on Monday morning that he pledges to make Dominicans more aware of the arrangements at CARICOM level.
“I have seen the need for pushing the integration movement to the benefit of our people because any program is designed to benefit the people, and I know that many people are not aware of the arrangements at the level of CARICOM and if you are not aware then you cannot take advantage of these arrangements,” he stated.
Gregoire noted further that the question of unity is another area of interest to him.
“If we are going to unify as one people in the Caribbean we should be unified at home as well. I am pledging to try to bring a level of unity amongst citizens of Dominica and by extension the CARICOM region,” he noted.
He said the question of equality and justice is also very critical. “We have least developed countries (LDC) and more developed countries (MDC) and the MDC’s are benefiting more than the LDC’s. We need to move toward equality,” he pointed out. “We need justice you cannot sign an arrangement for something to happen and then at the country level you will not put anything in place and when citizens come to your port of entry they are treated in a degrading way. We need to have justice.”
Gregoire stated that Dominicans should be respected at any port of entry and should get the benefits that have been agreed upon.
He added that at present CARICOM is undergoing a reform process which is expected to make the Secretariat more effective.
I am an advocate for OECS unity … CARICOM unity, well that is just a myth. Good luck with that!
Just another cushy government post. The biggest issue is really education: most Dominicans don’t know and don’t care about the workings or plans regarding OECS, CARICOM or even representations at the UN level. Secondly, if the respective governments, notably Barbados and Antigua for example implement nothing that is being agreed then there is nothing for us and its just a talk shop. How long have we been talking about freedom of movement know. So basic and fundamental? What do we have to show for that after all these conferences and talking heads? And how is Felix Gonna change that? Nuff said.
Good initiative.
good luck my brother, can’t you see we in the Caribbean are not getting any were? too much division, to much fighting, countries are looking down on each other,
don’t you relies that Dominica is the only one that is talking about this Caribbean Unity .
we are not one Caribbean believe or not.