Mark Wignall | Rubio’s visit was mainly about Guyanese oil

A Jamaican friend of mine, a veteran immigration lawyer with wide political contacts living in the United States (US), commented on the recent official visit of Marco Rubio to Jamaica. “I read what you and other Jamaicans wrote about the American Secretary of State’s visit.

“In reality, Jamaica was played like a fiddle by the US. The matter of the Cuban doctors is a red herring. As you are aware, the US has known about the Cuban doctors for decades. In the first Trump administration it was well known. Keep in mind that Rubio is Cuban and very much against the regime in Cuba. He knows all about Cuban doctors worldwide.

“Rubio and the administration put out the Cuban doctor’s narrative to unsettle the Jamaican Government, and it worked perfectly. During the closed meeting, Rubio told the government officials that he would not push the Cuban doctors issue but that Jamaica better be prepared to take a whole lot of deportees soon and with no pushback.

“The issue for the US is getting deportation numbers up to record levels so Trump can boast about it, and Jamaica was told not to be a stumbling block. The Government was so worried about the Cuban doctors [that] they agreed to all the demands about deportation flights and return of Jamaican deportees. As for the ‘goodies’ promised by Rubio, those were already in play from the Biden administration. The Trump team came with nothing new.

“One final point: Rubio’s real interest on his Caribbean visit was Guyana. The US wants Guyanese oil. Notice Rubio made clear if Venezuela invaded Guyana or took military action against Guyana, there would be consequences, and it would be ‘a bad day for Venezuela’. Jamaica was not of much interest to Rubio.”

AND HERE COME THE TARIFFS

A few years ago, prior to Trump, ‘normal’ in just about everything, including global trade across most democracies was the operative word. Well, all things normal is now hanging around outside the cemetery gates, seeking entrance and final interment. These are Trumpian times.

Guyana, with its oil wealth, has been lashed with a sizeable tariff of 38 per cent, probably in preparation for a shakedown. According to Trump, “Our country has been looted, pillaged, raped, and plundered” by other nations. Wow! And all this time, foolish me, I had it the other way around.

Exxon Mobil is now pumping around 650,000 barrels per day in Guyana. The plan is to double this by 2027. Guyana now has the world’s highest expected oil-production growth through 2035. With numbers like that, Trump/Exxon can lean on Guyana and return less of the lucrative petro dollars to the Guyanese people.

Trump is hoping for a ‘divide and rule’ response as individual countries in the Caribbean negotiate their 10% tariffs or separately navigate their way through any changes in their reciprocal numbers.

Dealing with tariffs is a highly complex matter, and the extent to which Trump’s foolish gambit impoverishes his own Americans, it means that US dollars that could be spent on Caribbean vacations will dry up. Not good for Jamaica at all.

CONSTRUCTION BOOM, TARIFFS AND ELUSIVE PROSPERITY

With the explosion in construction in Jamaica in the last decade, one factor stuck out. Jamaicans care little about the source of funding these uptown high rises, which may be from drugs, gunrunning, extortion. The prime minister (PM) has long touted the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) as a prosperity party. Prosperity for whom? The rich and the political class are doing well, but has the JLP really made an impact on the poor and neediest among us?

An impact that would shake up the voting public to give the PM his third term. The electorate is still mulling over that and asking what can be done to stretch a hundred dollars. In the supermarket, I am always looking out to purchase local produce. On that basis I can understand the reasoning behind imposing 10 per cent tariff on American- grown potatoes on huge farms to protect potatoes grown on two squares in Christiana.

Ever since the days of Eddie Seaga, it was explained to the Jamaican people that tariffs were not cast in stone and were, in fact, placed to increase productivity. That even if we knew that planting potatoes in South St Elizabeth could never, ever reap the same productivity rewards as doing it on 1,000 hectares on a farm in Utah.

Andrew Holness and Mark Golding would both want to wave a magic wand to assist them in determining how the highly professional nurses and junior doctors and the backbone of many communities - the teachers and the policemen and those in the artisan trades - will be voting on the day of reckoning.

It is useful to bear in mind that those individuals are not now grinning or smiling with happiness.

A few days ago, I was in a very blighted section of downtown Kingston. I was in conversation with a man who worked with the Criminal Court. “I hate to say this to you but it is reality. Way back, a spoiled breed came about down here, and their grandchildren are now running things. They scurry around in the nights and produce those who only know destructiveness, blight and criminality. No politician can change this, and I suspect that they have given up. It’s only empty words now.”

Mark Wignall is a political and public affairs analyst. Send feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com and mawigsr@gmail.com.