Barbados ready to break free of British rule by seeking total independence
Barbados is set to sever the imperial ties that bind.
The ex-British island colony, once referred to as “Little England,” plans to dump Queen Elizabeth as its head of state and replace her with its own leader by late 2021, reported The Associated Press on Wednesday.
“Our country can be in no doubt about its capacity for self-governance,” Sandra Mason, the nation’s governor general, said on Tuesday. “The time has come to fully leave our colonial past behind.”
The 167-square-mile island, which is located approximately 580 miles south of Puerto Rico, has a population of nearly 300,000 inhabitants.
Barbados to relieve the UK Queen of her duties by 2021.
“Barbados will take the next logical step toward full sovereignty and become a republic by the time we celebrate our 55th anniversary of independence.”
This is the globalization of #BLM. pic.twitter.com/gk7p5qn6mL— Kristen Clarke (@KristenClarkeJD) September 16, 2020
Although Barbadian businessman Chester Sue says he supports the push toward complete autonomy, he doesn’t believe significant change will occur.
“It is long overdue,” Sue told The AP. “I don’t subscribe to the present system. . . . We still have to pay homage to the queen of England. I find it to be a whole lot of nonsense.”
The British prime minister’s office claims it is OK with the potential move but that the decision is in the hands of Barbadian officials.
“We obviously have a shared history and remain united with Barbados in terms of history, culture and language,” said one representative of Boris Johnson’s office.
Within the current Black Lives Matter upsurge, Sue wants to witness the dismantling of a statue of British Vice-Admiral Horatio Nelson in the capital of Bridgetown, a symbolic emblem of bygone British domination. But he also worries that many of his fellow citizens are content with the status quo.
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“I feel a lot of Barbadians are happy under the colonial trappings,” explained Sue. “They have been in that mode for so long.”
English settlers first arrived in the 1620s to Barbados, where it prospered into a sugar colony dependent on thousands of African slaves.
The island gained its independence in 1966 but employed the United Kingdom’s court system through 2005, according to The AP.
