TODAY IS MAY DAY, as it is traditionally called in Barbados, when workersand their unions reflect on their achievements or failures over the past year.
On balance, it was a mixed year for unionism as there was internal division for all to see.
It resulted from the break with tradition in selecting delegates to the International Labour Organization (ILO) meeting in Geneva. The reaction reflected a deep-rooted inability to accept change and unwillingness for compromise and consensus – the bedrock of negotiations and diplomacy.
The ILO’s primary objective is the promotion of social justice and internationally recognized human and labour rights. It helps to advance the economic and working conditions that give workers and business people a stake in lasting peace, prosperity and progress.
The immediate secession of the Barbados Workers’ Union from the umbrella body, the Congress of Trade Unions and Staff Associations of Barbados (CTUSAB)?has sent the wrong signals and in the current global climate goes against the grain of ILO conventions.
In other areas of conflict around the world, many leaders are signalling the need for caution and restraint in decision-making. In the case of Syria, British Prime Minister David Cameron has recognized that the fiasco of yesteryears could stall international efforts to act against the regime there.
World leaders have obviously learnt a lesson: not to take action after dossiers and intelligence input, until and unless there is glaring evidence to prove that chemical agents had been used. There shouldn’t be any over-selling of “intelligence” to push the world into another conflagration.
What Iraq is going through even after a decade of warfare, occupation and destruction should be more than enough to act as an eye-opener.
There could be a throwback to the 2006-2007 days if the sectarian conflict now in evidence in Iraq is not checked.
Iraq seems to be coming apart at the seams with a worsening of sectarian conflict. If such a scenario is to be prevented all factions must exercise restraint, and not play into the hands of those advocating violence. Mercifully, some top Shiite and Sunni clerics have come together and appealed for peace and sectarian harmony.
If this could happen in Iraq, certainly there is hope that there could be some resolution to the tripartite split in Barbados.
