ACCRA, Ghana, CMC – St. Kitts and Nevis Prime Minister Dr. Terrance Drew has arrived here at the start of an official state visit aimed at strengthening diplomatic, cultural, and economic ties with the African country.
Prime Minister Drew, who is also the chairman of the 15-member Caribbean Community (CARICOM) grouping, told a luncheon held in his honour on Wednesday that he hoped his visit would benefit the people of both the Caribbean and Ghana.
“I said to one diplomat, all that is happening now, the time has called for it, and our generation has the responsibility to respond. So let us work together to continue to build the relationship between Africa and the Caribbean,” he told the luncheon attended by President John Dramani Mahama.
Drew said that the Caribbean would be part of the efforts by Ghana in moving a resolution at the United Nations on reparation, “which I deem to be extremely timely and profound, and that is to place on record the historical tragedy of slavery and colonisation as one of the most, if not the most, heinous crimes ever committed by humanity against itself.
“And so I want to thank you, Mr. President, for your tremendous leadership as far as this is concerned, and you can count on us for strong and full support. I am now the Chair of CARICOM, which comprises all the countries in the Caribbean region… and I have, of course, considered it my responsibility to get CARICOM on board. The deliberations have started, and so I wanted to place that on record.
“My visit here on another level is really coming back home. As I drove through Ghana, I couldn’t tell the difference between being in St. Kitts and Nevis and being in Ghana. It’s profound. It’s revealing. You have to experience it to know it. Each person I see looks like somebody I know,” Prime Minister Drew said.
Prime Minister Drew, who will also be the guest of honour at Ghana’s 69th anniversary of independence on March 6, said that his visit “gives us the opportunity for our peoples to connect and the tangible opportunities that can come from that connection.
“In terms of our people-to-people connection, why should our people have to go to the north to get to the south or to get to Ghana? There should be direct communication between Ghana and West Africa, and between Ghana and the Caribbean, and between Ghana and St. Kitts and Nevis, so that our people don’t have to travel anywhere else to connect among ourselves.
“And that is why I welcome today the signing of the MOU for visa-free access for ordinary citizens or citizens who own ordinary passports,” Prime Minister Drew said, adding, “This will connect us tremendously”.
He said that another area of cooperation will be in the exchange of labour, saying, “I have heard that Ghana has a surplus of healthcare professionals, and the Caribbean has a dearth of healthcare professionals.
“Isn’t it good that you have these well-trained health professionals here in Ghana, and we have a scarcity of healthcare professionals?” Drew said, noting that “we already have several Ghanaian nurses who have come to St. Kitts and Nevis.
“They started to work, I think, within the last three to four weeks, and I can say to you without a doubt that they are well-received, they are well-trained, the people have received them well, and I’ve been asked to ask His Excellency, the President, for more Ghanaian nurses.
“And so after this visit, we will have, to some extent, or at least in a framework of nurses coming to St. Kitts and Nevis, in a greater quantity this year. Already, that is a tangible benefit for both countries, one supplying skilled labour and for our services with respect to healthcare being upgraded and being delivered to our people.”
Prime Minister Drew said that these are the type of collaborations that “we can do among ourselves and make ourselves self-sufficient as the African continent and as the Caribbean and in the framework as well of South-South cooperation”.
Drew also announced that the national choir of St. Kitts and Nevis is to visit Ghana for a cultural extravaganza,” and presenting our own culture to our people here in Ghana”.
He said that it will also be important to take this relationship between the Caribbean and Africa to the next level,” where our people would benefit tangibly and significantly.
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