Caribbean integration and Caricom unity meant nothing for two young Tobagonians Daryll James and Donald Wills when they went to Guyana on December 11.
James, a professional footballer with Tobago United was going to play in a soccer tournament in Guyana, while Wills went for a short holiday with his good friend James.
However, their planned visit to the South American Caricom nation turned into a nightmare when they arrived at the Timheri airport in Guyana.
When James spoke to the Tobago News this week he was still visibly disturbed by the incident. He told the Tobago News that "when we arrived at the Guyanese airport, we were pulled over by customs officials who wanted to know how much money we had. We told them we had US$400 each and were going to be staying at a friend of ours who regularly visits us in Tobago and who was at the airport to meet us."
According to the Tobago Pro footballer, "the Guyanese Customs officials told us we had to have over $US1,000 to enter the country because that is how the Barbados Customs officials treating Guyanese when they go to Barbados."
Continuing to explain the horrors they experienced in Guyana, James revealed, "we were kept in a room for 11 hours and we were not allowed to make a phone call. We explained to the Guyanese officials that we had already paid TT$1,215 each for our ticket, but they did not care about that and after 11 hours, we were put on a flight back to Trinidad."
James said he found it strange that "at a time when Guyanese nationals were flooding all over Tobago and Trinidad, this was the type of bad treatment we had to undergo in fellow Caricom nations."
The two plan to report the incident to Caricom Ambassador Jerry Narace after the Christmas holidays.
Meanwhile the Caricom Single Market and the Economy (CSME) which comes on stream on Sunday would allow for the free movement of people within the region, but the two are questioning whether this would ever come to fruition.