It isn’t right to boast about what we are not. The author of the words of our National Anthem, Samuel Haynes, could have led Belize (British Honduras) into major bloodshed in 1919, but he chose to talk, to negotiate. It is because of people like him that up to a decade after our independence in 1981 we lived in a “tranquil haven”, a country that was the envy of our neighbors.

That country we knew, we barely recognize it now. For over two decades our homicide rate has been among the highest in the world. Belizeans desperately want their country back, and to that end they have turned from government to government, but they have all failed to return us to what we were before, failed to give us back the country we knew.

Belize City and the Belize District consistently have the highest murder rate. Data from the Belize Crime Observatory (BCO) put the 2021 murder rate in the Belize District at 51 per 100,000, while the rate in Belize City was 72.64. The rest of the country is far from safe, but considerably less dangerous than the Belize District and Belize City. In 2021 the murder rate in the Cayo District was 29.47; in Stann Creek, 21.17; in Toledo, 19.74; in Corozal, 9.70; and in Orange Walk, 7.38.

There isn’t anything tranquil about our country right now. That we are so murderous is compounded by these extremely difficult times in which we live, with cases of Covid-19 infections still flaring up across the globe, numerous “rumors” of other dangerous diseases looking to pounce and harm lives/further disrupt our livelihoods, and a frightening war in Europe that is presently destabilizing economies around the world and threatening to explode into a devastating nuclear war.

We know what’s at the root of our problem. The United States declared a war on drugs in the 1970s, and they have fought their battle south of the Rio Grande. The demand for drugs in the US is huge. They are the hardest working people on the planet, driven in their pursuit of material goods, driven to improve their already high standard of living. In the high-paced world, bodies and minds break down. Americans are, or are among, the highest users of drugs, pain killers and mind benders, not all of them legal.

Their war has helped make our region one of the most violent on the planet. The UK’s Office of National Statistics, in the article “Homicide in England and Wales: year ending March 2021”, which can be found at the website www.ons.gov.uk, says data from Eurostat shows that in 19 of the 27 EU member states the homicide rate in 2019 was below 10 per million persons. The paper says the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), in a global study on homicide, said “that the global average homicide rate was 61 per million population in 2017”, and that same year, in Central America, it was 259 per million, and in South America it was 242 per million—both more than 20 times that of countries in the EU.

We know what’s at the root of our problem. Dr. Herbert Gayle, Dr. Virginia Hampton, and Ms. Nelma Mortis (MSc), in the book, Like Bush Fire: A Study on Male Participation and Violence in Urban Belize, highlighted in their discussion the effects of our numerous fractured families, how that has led to aggression in boys; the “problems in the socialization and nurture of boys” in the inner city; what’s behind all the feuds among urban male youth; the traumatic experiences of our young adolescents; the deficiencies in our education system, and the scarcity of job opportunities.

We know what’s at the root of our problem. We have encouraged a culture that is disrespectful, notorious for violent, careless words. When we are consuming alcohol we are poor at containing our jealousies or our anger if we feel disrespected. We know what’s at the root of the problem. There is too much corruption in high places, which we don’t move to stomp out; instead, we focus on the speck in the eyes of destitute Belizeans, a woman or man stealing a loaf of bread or a tin of sausage. We know what’s at the root of our problem. In the midst of excruciating poverty there is obscene wealth.

We know what’s at the root of our problem. Our justice system has a fairly good record in dealing with violent crimes—but when it comes to murderers, they are free to roam. The UK’s Office of National Statistics says, about the justice system in England and Wales, that “in the three years from the year ending March 2019 to the year ending March 2021, 81% of suspects indicted for homicide, where we have information on a court outcome, were found guilty of homicide, 13% were acquitted, and 4% were convicted of a lesser offence.”

Meet Belize, where the last reported conviction rate for the world’s worst crime hovered around 5%. In times past, when we were a tranquil haven, that wasn’t so. In times past, jurors believed in the integrity of police officers and the prosecution branch; witnesses weren’t afraid to tell their truth to the court; punishment was swift; and we weren’t paralyzed by fear of “miscarriage of justice,” because it was for the benefit of the whole.

We can’t accuse our leaders of doing nothing. They have introduced numerous social interventions, tried to create jobs, and the present government is making high school education free on the south side of the Haulover Creek in Belize City, all good initiatives that will pay off down the road. They have also used the “big stick”—introduced numerous SOEs; passed draconian gun, drugs, and association laws; attempted to pass a Preventative Detention law; held murder trials without juries—measures that have produced questionable results.

We can accuse our leaders of not being successful in containing our murderous rage, but maybe the failure is as much ours as theirs. Blame aside, the truth is that the conditions in our country are ripe for chaos. We are living in a country that is no longer deserving of our anthem, and if we want to right our ship we’ll all have to pitch in, we’ll all have to do our part to keep the peace.

Leaders at every level will have to get directly involved in violence prevention. Our nation must go beyond prayer vigils when there’s an especially horrific murder; we need to constantly be in prayer.

We need to ease our nation’s pain. All our efforts must be directed toward the survival of our country, to pulling together, for life, the great gift of the Almighty. Our ancestors, returning soldiers from WWI, from the Caste War, from war-torn or unjust areas across the globe, made Belize the tranquil haven Samuel Haynes wrote about. We owe it to the past, the present, and the future, to put down the gun, all weapons.