“America said it would stay away from a UN conference on racism, due to take place in April in Geneva, on the ground that it would be biased against Israel. Canada and Israel have already pulled out.”
– pg. 9, THE ECONOMIST, March 7, 2009
In an article published week before last in THE REPORTER, Alejandro Vernon was very critical of Amandala because we were negative towards the proposition of taking the Guatemalan claim to the Court of Justice. One of the adjectives he used to describe Amandala was “defeatist,” because we felt that only the Guatemalans could win at the court in The Hague. (Reference the ECONOMIST quote above, Hando, would you say the Americans are “defeatist”?)
We waited a while to make a response to Mr. Vernon’s opinions, because we wished to see how the Belizean people would respond to Mr. Vernon. It may be there is or will be a delayed reaction, but so far, nothing. There are likely a couple reasons for this non-reaction, one of them being that Alejandro is damaged goods from the 1970’s. Whatever.
In the four major Anglo-American initiatives (1968, 1981, 1991 and 2002) so far where the Guatemalan issue is concerned, only one of these has had a decidedly bi-partisan structure, and that was the Maritime Areas Bill in 1991. This is the initiative that went through: the Maritime Areas Bill was passed in the House. This is a sobering thought to Belizean nationalists. The suggestion is that if the British and the Americans can get the leaders of the UDP and the PUP on board with the ICJ, then it will be very, very difficult for the Belizean people at large to fight off the ICJ proposition.
It was the ruling and popular UDP which took the preliminary draft of the ICJ agreement, the so-called compromis, to the OAS in Washington for signing earlier this year, but it was the former Prime Minister/PUP Leader who first proposed the ICJ as the Guatemalan claim solution during his term of office.
A pattern has already emerged, since the Betheul Webster Proposals of 1968, insofar as the solution which the British, the Americans, and the other “Friends of Belize” desire. The people of Belize went into the streets to fight off Webster’s Seventeen Proposals in 1968 and the Heads of Agreement in 1981. (The Ramphal/Reichler Proposals of 2002 got washed away in Guatemalan election politics.) But, because the PUP and the UDP came out with a public show of unity on the MAA in 1991, we can see, in retrospect, that that package was guaranteed.
Over the years, the fallout from the Maritime Areas Act has blown away “like wahn lee breeze.” In fact, the veteran statesman, Hon. Philip Goldson, broke away from the UDP because of the Esquivel–Barrow support for the Maritime Areas Act. Goldson formed the National Association for Belizean Rights (NABR). At the time, Mr. Philip was the Albert constituency area representative. He was joined by Hon. Derek Aikman, the Freetown area representative; Sam Rhaburn, the Belize Rural North area representative; and Hubert Elrington, the UDP Lake Independence standard bearer.
(It is interesting to note how the political fortunes of Aikman, Rhaburn and H. Elrington have since fallen.)
For his part, faced with the prospect of another PUP general election victory and promised that a UDP/NABR government would repeal the Maritime Areas Act, Mr. Goldson decided in April of 1993 to take NABR into a coalition with the UDP for the June 30, 1993, general elections. UDP/NABR won. The Maritime Areas Act is still in place, 16 years later.
The MAA precedent suggests to us that opponents of the ICJ as final court and supreme arbiter for the Guatemala issue, should begin their fight within the structures of the two major parties. If the UDP and the PUP come together at the highest levels to support the ICJ proposition, then it will be very, very difficult to reject The Hague. On this matter, where the power of the two major parties is concerned, here we may be derided as “defeatist.”
In order to win elections in Belize, political parties must submit to the major Christian churches. That is a given. But over the years since our electoral democracy first emerged with adult suffrage in 1954, we have seen an even more dangerous compromising of our democracy. This has to do with campaign financing. With no rules in place to govern who gives money and how much to our political leaders, Belizeans have gotten the impression that money is overpowering people here.
Now the issue with the referendum to decide whether we go to the ICJ or not, is an issue in which the relevant oil companies have a serious interest. These oil companies are some of the wealthiest organizations in the world. In the Belize matter, moreover, British, America and Taiwanese oil companies will be working closely with their governments, because oil is still a national security priority all over planet earth.
Big oil. Big money. Big politics. Small Belizean people. The ingredients are disturbing to us Belizean nationalists. All one can do is to believe in the people. They are the ultimate source of our resistance. Power to the people.