By Dylan Vernon, Time Come #5, 8 February 2024.
During the usual ham and turkey handouts by politicians in December 2023, a different kind of X-mas gift made the news. Five days before X-mas, the Government of Belize and a grouping called the ‘Church Communities’ signed a 10-point Statement of Agreement that affirmed the preambular commitment to the ‘supremacy of God’ as a fundamental constitutional principle. The two parties also re-affirmed some of the religious freedoms stated in Part II of the Constitution of Belize. But the Agreement also went further. Apart from an insightful critique made by the always fearless Caleb Orozco, there was negligible public discussion about this development and its timing. What do we make of it? How does this relate to the current constitutional review process?
The Origins of the God Clause
Before addressing the Agreement, it’s useful to recall the constitutional history of the ‘supremacy of God’ clause and that of religious freedoms in the Constitution. As I noted in a previous Time Come post, the 1963 Self-Government Constitution did not have a substantive Preamble nor a section on human rights. The ‘supremacy of God’ phrase first appeared in clause (a) of the proposed Preamble in the White Paper on the Proposed Terms for the Independence Constitution of Belize, released in February 1981.… Read the rest...
Few things rile Belize’s two main political parties more than being labeled PUDP – Belize’s version of Tweedledum and Tweedledee. It grates red and blue nerves raw not only because being perceived as different is the backbone of the partisan game, but also because the truth stings. The petty, personal and often vicious ways the People’s United Party (PUP) and the United Democratic Party (UDP) attack each other are mostly tactics to mask the truth that not much really separates them in ideology, policies and electoral practices in post-independence Belize. Both compete largely as center-right ‘handout’ machines. Both have encouraged voters to ‘tek di money but vote dem out’. Both get voted out when the rot of corrupt ‘feeding’ swings the pendulum to the other side. The list of commonalities is long. But is the issue of constitutional reform on it?
“Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never has and never will.” This timeless piece of political wisdom from Frederick Douglas has been critical to determining the degree of success or failure of constitutional reform processes around the globe. So will it be for the current People’s Constitution Commission in Belize. Without informed and sustained advocacy from a critical mass of Belizeans, the odds are slim for a new or reformed constitution that meaningfully returns more power to the people and improves the quality of Belize’s democracy. In this regard, it is imperative to explore the lessons and impact of Belize’s first post-independence constitutional reform exercise – the Political Reform Commission of 1999-2000. (Image shows ten of the fourteen PRC Commissioners in 1999, names given below).
Although there is near universal agreement that the Preamble is the cornerstone of the Constitution of Belize, some are sceptical on its practical utility. Is it purely a set of aspirational declarations? Is it obligatory and legally-binding on its own merit? Can it only be used by courts to help interpret the rest of the Constitution? Should it be left as is or should it be amended? These are some of the questions that the