Parting Shots

by Matthew Parris

  Low Calibre of Canadian Politicians

  One result is that the calibre of Canadian politicians is low. The level of debate in the House of Commons is correspondingly low; the majority of Canadian ministers are unimpressive and a few we have found frankly bizarre …

  But Canadian politicians look after their own – and one another. When, for example, Mr Jamieson (a Liberal) goes home from London, he tells me that a helicopter, provided by the provincial (Conservative) government (at the taxpayers’ expense) is at the airport to fly him to his country house in Newfoundland. Ministers and the Leader of the Opposition have free passes on Air Canada – which most of the candidates for the Liberal leadership have been using shamelessly to campaign across the country …

  Canadian Characteristics

  Canadians are a moderate, comfortable people. Not surprisingly, they share many characteristics with ourselves. In a world where we have to deal with the Qadhafis, Khomeinis and indeed the Shamirs1, and with many others who are happy to ride roughshod over our interests, it seems to me sensible to cultivate decent and reasonable people like this, quite apart from the fact they have such close historic ties with us and dispose of such immense natural resources. Canadians are mildly nationalistic (but perhaps less shrilly so than Australians), very sensitive, especially to any expressed or implied British sneers about Canada as ‘boring’, and perhaps somewhat lacking in self-confidence. Mr Charles Richie2 said not long ago: ‘We are not the same type of country as Britain – our country is based on accommodation, compromise, and conciliation – and I think that is reflected to some extent in the manner in which we conduct our foreign policy.’ My late Chinese colleague, a perceptive man, told us that he thought the friendliest Canadians were in Alberta, Saskatchewan and the Atlantic provinces, and this has been our impression. The most difficult, prickly and unforthcoming are undoubtedly some of those who work for the Federal Government in Ottawa.

  Canadians go to church more than we do but their lives are no longer subjected to a stern Presbyterian moral code. About 35% of Canadian marriages end in divorce. One big difference from the United Kingdom is that there is very little here of that strong public opinion which has so far exacted a price from public men or women who fall below accepted standards. The Canadian public expects very little of politicians and tends to shrug its shoulders when the press or television report another scandal. Memories are short. Even ministers who resign after serious misdemeanours, such as forging signatures and trying to influence judges, reappear in Cabinet after the briefest of absences.

  Absence of Competition

  One does not encounter here the ferocious competition of talent that takes place in the United Kingdom. Many gifted Canadians still seek wider opportunities elsewhere … Anyone who is even moderately good at what they do – in literature, the theatre, ski-ing or whatever – tends to become a national figure. Even some Canadian representatives overseas … are written up in the newspapers, and anyone who stands out at all from the crowd tends to be praised to the skies and given the Order of Canada at once.

  1. Shamirs: Yitzhak Shamir, Prime Minister of Israel (1983–4 and 1986–92).

  2. Mr Charles Richie: Canadian High Commissioner to the United Kingdom (1967-71).

  Nicaragua

  ‘The average Nicaraguan is one of the most dishonest, unreliable, violent and alcoholic of the Latin Americans’

  ROGER PINSENT, HM AMBASSADOR TO NICARAGUA, JULY 1967

  More from Pinsent’s despatch can be found on p. 300.

  LAST GLANCE AT NICARAGUA

  Mr Pinsent to Mr Brown. (Received 7 July)

  (No. 13. Confidential) Managua,

  10 June 1967.

  Sir,

  I have the honour to submit in this despatch my impressions of Nicaragua on leaving the country. I regret that there was not time to complete it before I left, owing to the political and social turmoil of the last few weeks …

  I did not submit a report on my first impressions of Nicaragua after my arrival at the end of 1963 … partly … because my first impressions would probably have been too unfavourable to print. In this report therefore I will try to give a balanced view of the country and people as seen on departure …

  … [T]he approaches to the towns are squalid to a degree that shocks the visitor from Europe or the more sophisticated countries of South America. On arrival we unwittingly caused some offence by enquiring the name of the first village we passed through on leaving the airport, which turned out to be the capital city of Managua. The present Embassy residence on its windy cliff edge looking towards Lake Managua has, if little else, perhaps the finest prospect of all Managua; it happens also to be on the high road to Costa Rica.

  These contrasts go right through Nicaraguan life. If ever there was a country where the private affluence of the few is flaunted in face of the public squalor of the many, it is Nicaragua. It is distressing that still to-day after thirty years of Somocismo,1 which has undoubtedly brought stability and prosperity to the country as a whole, the conditions of living for the vast majority of Nicaraguans are little less than sordid: over half the population have no proper housing, little in the way of medical services and the sketchiest form of education. And while the country is undoubtedly progressing … the average Nicaraguan, like Thursday’s child, has far to go before reaching the standard of even his South American brothers. Even Government offices, with a few exceptions, exhibit a squalor only comparable to certain ‘third rooms’2 in the Foreign Office. Yet, in spite of the low standard of education and general illiteracy, Nicaragua must have one of the highest standards of poetry in Latin America and has as its national hero the poet Ruben Dario, who is considered by many authorities to be possibly the greatest of all Hispano-American poets.

  In his excellent valedictory despatch No. 39 of the 23rd of July, 1963, my immediate predecessor, Mr. Patrick Johnston, opined that the Nicaraguan character probably acquired its main characteristics from the Andalusian heritage of the original Spanish colonisers. I regret that I do not entirely subscribe to this view. In my opinion, the Nicaraguans show little of the charm of the Andalusian Spaniard, and certainly lack his talent for music, art and spectacle … [T]he true Nicaraguan is a mestizo of mixed Spanish and Indian blood and his culture is the result of nearly five centuries of mestizaje. This mestizo culture has produced some remarkable poets … but it has also produced a large number of corrupt politicians. There is, I fear, no question but that the average Nicaraguan is one of the most dishonest, unreliable, violent and alcoholic of the Latin Americans – and after nearly 21 years of Latin American experience I feel I can speak with some authority on this subject. Their version of Spanish is quite the least attractive I have come across. The Nicaraguan prides himself on his hospitality and will provide it generously to his friends, probably with oceans of contraband liquor. But apart from a thin upper-crust of society most of whose members have been educated in the United States, Canada or Europe, and to whom my strictures do not apply, I must confess that the Nicaraguan generally is not an attractive character and appears to have little natural courtesy: he will not give way to women or children unless he knows them personally; and he exhibits all the worst features of ‘machismo’ or the demonstration of virility by competitive discourtesy. The late Argentine Ambassador to Nicaragua on arrival here about three years ago, having rarely left Buenos Aires in his life, remarked to me that this was ‘a country of savages’ and that Managua appeared to him to resemble what the city of Buenos Aires must have been like in the 1850s (at around the time when British engineers building the Argentine railways were liable to be attacked by Indians with bows and arrows). As a non-career diplomat he was even more outraged than other colleagues about some of the treatment meted out to the Diplomatic Corps in Nicaragua.

  I fear that this is a rather jaundiced view of the Nicaraguan character: it is true that we know many charming Nicaraguans who do not betray the more unpleasant characteristics outlined above; while the Nicaragu
an of the Atlantic coast, with his British and negro heritage, is quite different; gayer, better educated and more honest than those they describe as ‘them Spaniards from Managua’. There is no doubt also that the better Nicaraguan business man is energetic and full of ideas and initiative … But in matters of commerce the fault of the Nicaraguans is not just that they give too little and ask too much, but that they can be as sharp as the famous fresh-water sharks of Lake Nicaragua.

  1. Somocismo: President-Somoza-style dictatorship.

  2. ‘third rooms’: Third Secretaries (Matthew Parris was one) occupy the lowest rung on the Diplomatic Service career ladder. The third room – their domain – is generally a byword for undergraduate-style untidiness.

  ‘The standards of local efficiency are the lowest I have ever met’

  GEORGE WARR, HM AMBASSADOR TO NICARAGUA, JUNE 1970

  I do not gloss over the dark side. Managua is a very unattractive city and the persistence of the heat throughout the year can be very trying though the horrors of the climate are considerably mitigated by air-conditioning … Building the Embassy house, which I have done since I came here, was a prodigious labor for my wife and myself simply because the standards of local efficiency are the lowest I have ever met. But … [t]here are compensating factors … The most important of these is that there is no xenophobia, or as little as I have ever met. I have served in the USSR and in Turkey where inefficiency is often coupled inextricably with deliberate malice directed towards the foreigner. In Nicaragua the inefficiency is pure and all Nicaraguans suffer from it equally with foreigners.

  Honduras

  ‘The problem is what I call the “scavenger complex” of Honduran society’

  LAURENCE L’ESTRANGE, HM AMBASSADOR TO HONDURAS, APRIL 1972

  Soccer, which Mr L’Estrange mentions as a tension between Honduras and El Salvador, in fact precipitated war between the two countries. The four-day Football War of 1969 followed a pair of qualifying games between the two countries for the 1970 World Cup. Both games saw fans riot but, as L’Estrange records, the underlying dispute was over land, not football – specifically, Honduran efforts to evict the several hundred thousand El Salvadorean immigrant farmers within their borders. The fighting, though short, was brutal. The El Salvadorean Air Force, lacking heavy aircraft, dropped 100lb bombs out of adapted passenger jets. Honduras retaliated with napalm.

  It might be asked why Honduras is so poor and what her prospects are. The answer is to be found by probing more deeply than accepting the obvious renowned lethargy of the people or the propaganda (often inspired by El Salvador) which makes the case that this is a potentially rich country whose resources, the people, are too lazy, ignorant, poor or too few to develop. The fact is that only 15% of the area of this largely perpendicular country is arable … The main natural resources are the lovely pine forests which thrive on the poor rocky soil, so that when these are plundered, as is occurring on an appalling scale, no worthwhile crop will grow in their place … Nor is the banana King any longer in this original Banana Republic. Export prices have dropped and costs of production have risen to such an extent that the contribution of that industry to the balance of trade and to the budget in the form of taxes has been steadily dropping …

  Honduras is also beset by enormous social problems. Outside the capital and the few large towns educational facilities are abysmally low and medical services distressingly inadequate, if they exist at all. The illegitimate birth rate is high by Latin American standards and seems to be rising. Alcoholism is a national problem and accounts for the ubiquity of Alcoholics Anonymous who seem able to do more about this problem than the church … [L]and tenure is … a great problem in a country where 1% of the farmers own 46% of the arable land … The key to the problem here is what I have come to call the ‘scavenger complex’ of Honduran society. As an example when a large landowner dies his estate immediately becomes vulnerable and years are spent by the executors recovering lands for the rightful heirs, litigation is endless and the courts are corrupt … [T]he exodus of the Salvadoreans was caused as much by the rising wave of propaganda over the first football match between the two countries as by the opportunity this gave to Hondurans to relieve the industrious Salvadoreans of their homes and farms, more so as the harvest was about to be gathered …

  Sir, I leave this post on retirement. It will be the second time I leave the Service and I therefore feel the more honoured to end my career as one of Her Majesty’s Ambassadors and pleased to have had the opportunity of doing so in an area with which I am so familiar. That it was beset by so many problems, insoluble as many of them continue to be, has been an exhilarating challenge. To meet it by cultivating the friendliest relations possible and by displaying a genuine sympathy in their predicament has evoked a satisfying response from Hondurans which belies their renowned dullness.

  Jamaica

  ‘The Caribbean islands are perhaps dangerous only to themselves’

  JOHN HENNINGS, HM HIGH COMMISSIONER TO JAMAICA, FEBRUARY 1976

  The Caribbean countries are not like many others in the world which, after a period of imperial rule, have rediscovered their own internal reverences. They are manufactured societies, and they have for long been dependent upon an external source for their law, their language, their institutions, their culture and even their officials. Dependence has become a habit, and little that has been generated locally is widely accepted as having a validity comparable with the erstwhile metropolitan influences. The self-conscious quest for identity, which can amuse and infuriate the outside observer, both reveals and masks this sense of uncertainty as to what the people of the Caribbean really are. It adds, too, to the difficulty of creating an acceptable autonomous system of government deriving its strength, its self-confidence and its ability to pursue wise, rather than populist, policies from the assurances of a mandate from a cohesively structured body politic. There are resemblances between the Caribbean situation and that of Latin America after the break-up of the Spanish Empire. The pity of it is that the countries of the Caribbean – small, black and certainly poor when weighed against their people’s aspirations – are also intrinsically unimportant, so that if disaster comes they alone will be hurt. The Caribbean islands, after all, are perhaps dangerous only to themselves.

  In a book which he wrote in 1859 after a visit to the West Indies, Anthony Trollope delivered himself of the cynical judgment that ‘If we could we would fain forget Jamaica altogether.’ In my time here, a number of Jamaicans, perhaps not altogether without self-pity, have alleged this loss of interest against us. Jamaicans have many endearing qualities – gaiety, colour, an enviable ability to live for the day – but they are hardly a serious-minded people, and, despite a patina of sophistication, their sense of values is that of a small parochial island society. Despite the many good things that do go on here, they seem content with much that is second-rate, in the values of their educational system, in work discipline and in economic output. The tropical climate and a hitherto uncomplicated economic structure connive at an easy-going way of life, and have perpetuated an improvident family system under which private promiscuity co-exists with the faithful outward observances of a metropolitan society of 50 years ago or more. And indeed many who note the inconsistency are often more concerned to defend the improvidences as a legacy of slavery or as the forerunner of the lately acquired permissiveness of the developed world than to reduce them as impediments to economic development and the creation of a modern cost-effective society.

  Jamaicans for all their charm – and it is great – can be demanding and costive friends. Their immigrants to Britain rightly demand acceptance, but they tend to argue that their hosts must take them as they are, and that the host society must adjust to them rather than they to it. In matters of trade, too, and in the concepts of the new international economic relationships to which they seek to persuade the developed world, it is difficult at times to suppress the thought that they cherish a persistent belief that what th
ey seek is their due as an act of atonement.

  Barbados

  ‘Government in the hands of … a half-naked intelligentsia’

  DAVID ROBERTS, HM HIGH COMMISSIONER TO BARBADOS, SEPTEMBER 1973

  At the time of the Changing of the Guard, I have the honour to report that I leave Barbados much as I found it. Indeed, to judge from the history of Barbados, things do not seem to change very much here, although each generation has lamented the decay in morals and foreseen the dissolution of society through the idleness and loose-living of the young. At my age I also incline to this view …

  … It is now the exception rather than the rule for a young and outstanding Barbadian to be educated at Oxford or Cambridge. Thus, through death, retirement or more lucrative employment, the generation of men who read greats, economics or law in the UK, acquired an affinity with our way of thinking and an acceptance of our social values, and came home to govern Barbados, will pass away. They will leave Government in the hands of young men educated at the University of the West Indies, from which a half-naked intelligentsia is already coming forward. The new generation