Ramos took the same sort of stand that the late Dr. Rosa Parks took, when she decided that enough was enough! She would not be pushed around any more and relegated to an inferior place, because of her race!
Ramos’s message was the same as Dr. Parks’s: He recognized the Garifuna people as a downtrodden people; we are Blacks in the African Diaspora, though some of us are too afraid to admit this essential fact. He recognized the discrimination that faced us; he recognized the hypocrisy of the system that perpetuates the falsehood that the Creoles and the Garinagu are separate people.
What all Blacks in Belize should know is that when T. V. Ramos fought for Garifuna Settlement Day, he was also fighting for the recognition of all Blacks.
T. V. Ramos’s involvement in the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) was by no coincidence. My father, Abraham Ramos, who authored his biography below, wrote in another biographical sketch (that of the late Roderick Augustus Pitts), that Ramos used to chair UNIA meetings in Stann Creek.
His involvement in the larger Black Power movement is testimony that T.V. Ramos was not merely seeking the interest of the Garinagu when he founded Carib Disembarkation Day, now known as Garifuna Settlement Day. What Ramos was, in fact, doing was paving the way for the wider recognition of Afro-Belizeans by starting in his own backyard, those Africans who were painted, like those from the motherland, as backward cannibals, not worthy of respect, love and adoration.
At the same time, he was working at the international level as a Garveyite — a soldier for the UNIA. This is an aspect of Ramos’s work that has been severely downplayed; it is an aspect of him that we must understand.
Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to send a message to a bus driver that she deserved to be treated like a human being, that her rights must be respected. It was a stand that has won her great acclaim.
T. V. Ramos took a stand for the Garinagu, for all Afro-Belizeans, and for all in the African Diaspora. He took a logical approach by beginning in his home, where he was a model father; then stretching out his efforts to reach his community, where he was an activist for social change; in the country of Belize, where he contributed to the advancement in education, sports, religion, information and other areas; and on the wider front, championing the cause against the oppression of the Black race.
Like Rosa Parks, Ramos is an icon to be reckoned with. This is why each year since he died in 1955, Garinagu pay homage to this great activist. What all Belizeans, and particularly Afro-Belizeans, should recognize are the far-reaching effects of Ramos?s work on all fronts.
His biography, reproduced below, will help all of us to gain a greater appreciation of him. (ENDS)