It’s hard to believe that with so many billboards everywhere, everywhere, that there are still a few vacant 8 x 16 spaces along the George Price Highway. Even the Referendum Committee must be bored with all the re-runs, and are looking for a few new faces to plaster. But there are not that many courageous live ones about.

The faces of Sedi and his colleague, Assad, will create a backlash, so they are not for consideration. Ambassadors are way above that kind of thing, wouldn’t dream of allowing their faces to be so exposed, even though they are all supportive of Sedi’s Special Agreement. Putting up some scantily clad young ladies will provoke a firestorm from the women’s groups, and those buff boys who wear even less dress, wouldn’t dare pose on a billboard.

We’ve got three Prime Ministers up, but it is not likely that Dr. Esquivel wants his countenance used that way, even though he is one hundred percent supportive. Brother Harry Lawrence of The Reporter might consider it, but he could lose his friendship with Brother Paul Rodriguez if he did that. Hector Silva and Fred Hunter are 100% against the ICJ. Hmm, and they’ve got all these vacant spaces to fill.

I say, why not continue playing the posthumous card? It’s a desperate hour, desperation time, and the Referendum Unit doesn’t have any honor to protect because they already blew that when they went to Lord Ridge and exhumed the two heroes.

I am not sorry for George Price. I just knew he would pay, if not when he was here, when he was gone, for stealing “Land of the Gods” and compounding the dastardly felony by changing the words. The thing is, George Price was an accomplished poet/songster, and he could read/compose/ and play music. Why the heck did he have to steal? He’s not here to answer, so I’ll just guess. He read it, he sang it, he liked it, and he was First Minister so he stole it. Well, he’s paying for that now! Every word you say they can take and, context hell, use it to satisfy their narrow ends.

We’ve got lots of bygone heroes to trot out, and like I said, there are spaces to burn. I think we should go for the firebrands, the men who used to raise “Cain” at the Battlefield Park. We could use some Governors too. And we’ll need some women. It is just impossible that there are no women of political worth (haven’t seen any) on these billboards. Everyone knows that if it wasn’t for them, Belize would have been the 23rd Department.

If they want my advice (that’s not impossible), I’d tell them to go for Madam Liz and Cleopatra White, two great women who are no longer here. If they’re not here they can make whatever words come out of their mouths that they want. About the posthumous thing, I’m not telling them anything new. They obviously have no respect for the dead.

Please choose Japan, Naomi

Naomi Osaka, the top-ranked tennis player in the world, who is a lovely young lady, yes, will be forced to choose between the USA and Japan very soon. A Japanese law bans dual citizenship after a person turns 22, and the Japanese/American will have to make up her mind. Those Japanese kill whales, and I believe they eat dogs, but I’m riding with them. Those Japanese were part of the deadly Axis in WWII, and I’m not sure how much they like black people, but I’m riding with them.

Haiti, the land where Naomi’s dad was born and grew up, has been under the hammer of racist-type whites ever since they overthrew slavery/white supremacy around 1804. We see the amount of punishment the white power in the region has piled on Cuba, and their leaders don’t have much melanin. The punishment on Haiti is magnified a number of times.

I see in Brother Clinton Canul Luna’s last column that he has this article, from El Caminente, which says, of the situation in Haiti, that it “is so serious that international NGOs working in the field have no way of effectively helping the population, especially the children who are the most vulnerable. So much so that more than 50 thousand Haitian children between 2 and 12 years old, many of them orphans, will leave the country in the next few hours and will be welcomed in the neighboring country, Dominican Republic.”

Would that it was really so that the children will be “welcomed”. I’ve read a lot about the Dominican Republic and their racism. But maybe I shouldn’t be so harsh on the DR. It is global, this pressure on people with a lot of melanin, ever since 1492 when European domination of the world began.

This assault on the melanin has been relentless. The Wikipedia says Leonardo da Vinci painted The Last Supper between 1495 and 1498. I bet those bohgaz commissioned the painting so they could take it around the world and show black and brown people what “God” looked like. It is the greatest lie the white people ever told, and their most productive. Black people, the ones furthest away from the white Jesus, have taken the brunt of the pain.

No, we couldn’t ask Naomi to choose Haiti if she didn’t choose Japan. Haiti doesn’t have any kind of support set up for lawn tennis.

Me, I don’t hate the USA…I love baseball, don’t care so much for hot dogs and apple pie, and I think that Chevy S-10 is some wonderful vehicle. But those bohgaz have everything. And they can really be obnoxious. I heard one of their newscasters say that Lebron James would have been the best football (soccer) player in the world if he had chosen that as his number one sport. That’s the kind of obnoxious these Americans are. They feel like they are the best at everything.

Naomi was born in Japan and she has lived in the US since she was three. I read this story by Isabella Steger, on (Reuters), in which she says “that when Naomi was young her parents chose Japan over the US” because they have “always felt Japanese.” Steger says that from a young age Japan’s tennis association supported Naomi, and the US “did not vigorously try to poach her until 2016 when she played in the Australian Open.” She said Naomi’s dad “decided that his daughter would continue to represent Japan because of Japan’s long-standing support…”

Steger wrote that a Japanese journalist said that he believes that Naomi will “choose to give up her Japanese citizenship for her American one”, and that “the disappointment in Japan will be so great…that it could even lead to the downfall of the Japanese government.” Steger says that may be an exaggeration, but it illustrates “the added urgency of the discussion over Japan’s citizenship laws as the country prepares to host the Olympics next year. The country will no doubt want Osaka to choose her Japanese passport over American.”

Steger pointed out that Naomi’s success story has “advanced the discussion in Japan over what being Japanese means…in a society where many mixed-race Japanese still face discrimination.” She said that allowing dual citizenship would be a step forward for the Japanese, “toward acknowledging a more diverse and inclusive Japan.”

I won’t be blown away disappointed if she chooses the US. I know for one that it will help her check book. Japan isn’t poor, and they’re the manufacturers of the great Toyota and Honda, but those Americans are what most everyone wants to be. I think they have most everything already, and it will be just so bad that as Serena fades away, they will get a Naomi to fill her shoes. Bah, some guys got all the luck.

Hmm, I have a story with a heroine named Naomi that’s been languishing, unpublished for a long time. Some years back I told Ms. Adele Ramos about it in a little interview she did with me in the Amandala. If I’d had the money I’d have published it a long time ago. My story is very, very not proper. But I like my story and that is enough for me. Yap, if I put effort into it I want it published, even if it’s under a pen name.

Oh, this Naomi could have been my heroine, if she was around from then. But if she was the heroine of my book, and she chose America, I’d find another girlšgirl’s name.