From midnight this Tuesday (30), the British monarchy will decline. The Caribbean island of Barbados will remove Queen Elizabeth II as head of state and become a republic, with another woman, former judge Sandra Mason, 72, as the country’s president.
The transition is the result of the demonstrations after the death of African-American George Floyd by a white police officer in Minneapolis, in May 2020. The big acts in several US cities sparked discussions on the island, raising historical contexts of slavery in the region.
About 400 years ago, English ships anchored in Barbados. With colonization came a slave system that lasted until 1834. The British sent African slaves to work in the sugarcane fields, and Barbados eventually became the focus of the transatlantic slave trade.
Today, of the nearly 300,000 inhabitants of the island, most are of African descent.
For young activists like Firhaana Bulbulia, 26, founder of the Muslim Association of Barbados, British colonialism and slavery are responsible for the island’s economic imbalance.
“Economic inequality, the ability to own land and even access to bank loans have a lot to do with the structures built after British rule,” she says.
The date chosen to be the country’s first day as a republic is symbolic: on the same day, in 1966, the island became an independent country, detaching itself from its role as a colony of the United Kingdom.
The transition was announced in September 2020, and the following month, Parliament elected Mason as the island’s first president. “The time has come for us to claim our complete destiny,” Prime Minister Mia Mottley, leader of the country’s Republican movement, said in a speech after the vote.
At the time, Buckingham Palace said the decision was an internal Barbados affair, a position echoed by the British Foreign Ministry. “Barbados and the United Kingdom are united by our history, culture, language and much more. We have a lasting partnership and we will continue to work with Barbadians,” said a spokeswoman for the ministry.
Mottley, the prime minister, will be present at the ceremony held this Monday night (29), which will feature military parades and the presence of Prince Charles, son of Elizabeth II. At the celebration, he will receive the Order of Liberty of Barbados, the highest national honor. In his speech at the transition event, Charles will highlight the permanent ties between the two countries.
“As constitutional status changes, it was important for me to reaffirm the things that do not change. For example, the close and reliable partnership between Barbados and the UK as vital members of the Commonwealth,” the prince said in a statement, first in line to the throne.
The Commonwealth is a group of 54 countries — mostly former British colonies — that share ideals of democracy, society and government and are led by British royalty. Despite the transition, Barbados will remain a member of the organization, as will Trinidad and Tobago, Dominica and Guyana.
The last time the Queen was removed from her post as head of state was in 1992, when Mauritius, an island in the Indian Ocean near Madagascar, proclaimed itself a republic.
The challenge for the new government is to put Barbados’ economy on track after the Covid-19 pandemic, which minimized its main source of resources, tourism, which mainly comes from the United Kingdom.
In addition, unemployment is nearly 16%, down from 9% in recent years, despite the increase in loans to finance public sector projects and create jobs. High inflation – a movement that is repeated around the world – is also a problem for the island, which is dealing with disruptions in the supply chain.
These challenges were present in the main arguments of the opposition, which claimed that the time was not ripe for a change in the country’s political system. “An increasing number of obscene cases, a growing sense of stress and fear. I just don’t think the time is right,” said opposition leader Bishop Joseph Atherley.
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