Sunday, August 11, 2024

A lot of grant money has been coming into Belize lately, for various causes—the environment, refugees, farmers, women, which is fine; but the demographic group perhaps in need of the most urgent attention is often being bypassed.

Belize is described as The Jewel, and it is for very good reasons. While there are regions of the world in turmoil—so-called advanced and developed countries, where riots are raging among the population because of certain differences among and discrimination against particular demographics, especially recent immigrants—in Belize, despite demographic changes on a scale unprecedented in any other nation in the world, still the people are living in social peace and relative harmony. Unbelievable, but true. But it has not been all wine and roses. In fact, with more development on the horizon, and funding coming from a number of sources to help women, and farmers, and tourism, the authorities need to pay some attention to sections of the population who are perhaps the most negatively impacted by the huge population shifts that have taken place. We recently celebrated, or commemorated, Emancipation Day, but is there any move or effort to help repair the psychological and economic damage still being suffered due to the generational effects of slavery?

Throughout the post-slavery generations of Afrikan descendants in Belize, land was made very difficult to access, to maintain a cheap labor pool for the contractors in timber and chicle in the colony. The result is that subsequent generations of city-confined Kriol laborers became estranged from the land, and unaware of its potential in agriculture.

The influx of immigrants from Central America in the 1970s onwards saw land being made available to these people with an already strong background in, and affinity to, agriculture; and they have done well, while most Kriol youths, even many in the villages, are drawn to the city life, and have a negative outlook on the tilling of the soil as not the way to the good life. Everybody wants an office job or something that pays big quickly; and thus the lure of the gang life with fast, easy money, but at a price of high risk for life and limb.

What had helped the situation of Black youth in Belize City for decades, had been the safety valve provided by access to the U.S., beginning with open doors following Hurricane Hattie in 1961. The ability to speak English was a big advantage for Belize Kriols “going through the back”, and there are stories of young boys, only 16 years old, going alone and “making it” to the “promised land” of America by hitchhiking and busing their way to the border crossing, and pretending to be Black Americans when questioned by officials.

While the ranks of the Belize City unemployed was kept at manageable levels by the continuing exodus to the U.S., thousands of Central American immigrants were taking up residence in the Jewel under the United Nations program, and finding their own version of “paradise” in the rich lands made available in their new villages like Armenia and Valley of Peace, and in established ones such as Cotton Tree and St. Margaret. Just like every growing settlement of citizens soon saw a Chinese grocery shop set up in their midst, so every traditional Belizean village, already with the amenities of electricity and water, soon saw an appendage they referred to as “Spanish Town”, consisting of new Belizean immigrants.

But the tide was turning against the Kriols in Belize City, for Uncle Sam had tightened up their border, thus closing off that safety valve for many to go to the U.S. Homes were crumbling with unsupervised children left behind by those who had long joined the exodus, and the resulting large groups of school dropouts were not able to meet the requirements for a U.S. visa or the stringent border crossing conditions.

Now the safety valve is almost closed, but more than that, the U.S. has been deporting Belizeans who ran afoul of their laws or are found to lack proper immigration status, so the old capital is faced with increasing difficulties for the Kriol demographic. It must be a concern for those in authority that the Kriol males in Belize City, mainly the generation born from the 1980s onward, when crack cocaine arrived in Belize and gangs were subsequently formed, and who grew up with parental shortcomings, are killing each other at an alarming rate, and falling into the trap of a life of crime.

Meanwhile, international agencies keep the goodwill focus on financing programs to help women in business and entrepreneurship, and to escape the violence of their partners; and to train the industrious farming villagers in modern techniques and new ventures like raising sheep and using greenhouses.

The troubling picture is that one group is making progress, while another seems to be going backward into oblivion. Inescapably, the group that seems doomed to self-destruction is the group chiefly responsible, through their ancestors’ years of blood, sweat and tears in slavery to make the original settlement viable, and whose vibrant agitation and proactive pressure on the colonial system were instrumental in forging this new nation called Belize.

Belize is a melting pot, still a Jewel, with a lot of love, and no inclination to squabble due to ethnic or racial differences. We’re getting along together, born Belizeans, new Belizeans, of all tribes and races, one people. Our government just needs to look at all our people, especially those with unique difficulties, and lend a helping hand where they are being disenfranchised by the system. Without the safety valve, the pressure is high for survival in the Kriol community in Belize City, and it is not eased any bit by the addition of brothers who are sent home with special “skills” from the streets of L.A. and New York. Training for gainful employment at livable wages must be given high priority.

The bottom line is that only the Black Belizeans inherited the psychological scars of slavery in Belize, and the journey of emancipation will need a little support from the educational system as well as every program designed to enhance entrepreneurship and appreciation and knowledge of the productivity of land in Belize. Whatever program is funded by the U.N., the USA, the Republic of China Taiwan, or other foreign donor, make sure that descendants of Emancipation are part of the action.