Belizeans question the role of the British monarchy ahead of coronation
Americas Belizeans question the role of the British monarchy ahead of coronation Two men walk along a dirt road in Punta Gorda, Belize. (Joshua Lott/The Washington Post)
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PUNTA GORDA, Belize — As King Charles III gears up for his coronation Saturday, some in this Central American nation are reassessing his role as their head of state. Belize, which borders Guatemala, Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, became a British colony in 1862 and achieved independence in 1981. It continued, however, as one of the remaining Commonwealth realms — former British territories, including Australia, the Bahamas and Jamaica, for which the British monarch is still the ceremonial head of state.
The death of Queen Elizabeth II resurfaced debates here and across the Caribbean over whether to split from the monarchy, as Barbados did in 2021. Especially in this region, the monarchy is a reminder to many of colonial occupation, slavery and exploitation.
As the Belizean government assesses whether to hold a referendum on parting with the crown, people are reexamining their relationship with its legacy and their new king.
Ludwig Palacio
Ludwig Palacio, 59, wants an apology from King Charles. He believes the British crown is living off the wealth accumulated through slavery.
The enslaved population of Belize reached some 2,300 in the 18th century, when the area was a British settlement. They lugged heavy timber for the colony’s major exports, mahogany and lumber. Calls for reparations and a formal apology from the monarchy have grown in Belize and its neighbors.
In the coastal fishing town of Punta Gorda, Palacio works as a veterinarian, artist and writer. Museums all over Europe, he says, are littered with stolen treasures from former colonies.
“If you steal something, the least you can do is give it back,” he said.
Cynthia Pitts
Cynthia Pitts, 73, remembers being a young girl when Princess Margaret, Elizabeth’s sister, visited Belize. Pitts and her classmates had to gather in a field to form the word “welcome” for the princess to see as her plane flew over.
When Pitts the lawyer visited the British Parliament in 1989 on a fellowship, she saw all the mahogany in the building. It made her emotional to think of the enslaved people of Belize who may have carried it.
Pitts has no strong feelings about Charles as head of the Commonwealth. She knows he has no power over her country. “Whatever we are experiencing now, it is in the hands of our own people,” she said.
Donisio Shol
Donisio Shol, a mapping coordinator, is Q’eqchi’, a Maya people of Belize and Guatemala. The 32-year-old lives in the small town of Indian Creek with his wife and daughter. Last year, Prince William and Catherine, Princess of Wales, canceled a trip to the village after Shol and others organized a protest against the royals, whom he refers to as “colonial masters.”
As if addressing Charles, Shol said: “If you’re serious about an apology, come and do it. And make sure you look the people in the eye that have been hurt.”
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Roque Marin
Roque Marin, 82, is a land surveyor who lives in Belize City. He was 12 when King George VI died and Elizabeth took his place. He has a soft spot for the queen.
“I don’t like when people degrade her,” he said, “even though she may deserve the degrading.”
Marin also likes Elizabeth’s grandson William, who made headlines dancing with a local community in Hopkins, a town on the eastern coast, during his trip to Belize last year.
“That brotha can wind,” Marin said.
Abbie Godoy
Abbie Godoy, 24, was a 2020 Commonwealth Caribbean Rhodes Scholar; she studied social anthropology at the University of Oxford, where she came to realize few Britons are even aware of Belize or its connection to the crown.
“It was just the realization that I really am an outsider,” she said. She came home “way more Caribbean” and committed to advocating for a departure from the monarchy. “To free yourself from that last tie, to me, is super important for future generations,” Godoy said.
Source: The Washington Post
