President Freundel Stuart? Not Likely

I know it has taken me a while to get to this issue, a week and 3 days to be precise but given the nature of a busy schedule such things are unavoidable. That being said it would be remiss of the Jamaican Tory not to make mention of events going on in our fellow CARICOM state of Barbados.On March 23, news broke to the world that the sitting Prime Minister of Barbados, The Right Honourable Freudel Stuart plans in short order to change Barbados’ constitution and turn Barbados from a monarchy into a republic.

As to why he would make this move? his simple reason was that Barbados would soon be celebrating the 50^th anniversary of its independence (next year to be precise) and so it was just the time to move on. If there was ever a lame excuse for anything Stuart laid it out right there. I mean seriously “it’s time?”, is that supposed to be an explanation or some stupid cliché, it’s one thing to openly announce treason like that but to lay is so bare with such a non-excuse is truly uncharacteristic of a Prime Minister. Time for what exactly? To break with over four centuries of Bajan history? To pretend of though the past did not happen? To throw out a perfectly functioning constitution for no good reason? He obviously did not outline his so called “logic” clearly enough, no wonder the people won’t support him. Trying to wash the last half a millennium of Bajan history will do no good whatsoever, unlike most other islands in the Caribbean that constantly changed hands between colonial powers, Barbados has always been an essentially English island, where British culture and traditional ideology is so strong that many even refer to it as Little England and as the most “British place on earth”, much to the envy of several other parts of the Commonwealth who see themselves in the same light.

    

What really irked me however is when he actually dared to invoke the name of Barbados’ first Prime Minister Errol Barrow as justification. As far as I’m concerned to try and identify oneself with the founding father of the Barbadian realm is only adding insult to injury. Like Stuart, Barrow also took an oath to the Crown, like Stuart, Errol also served on the Queen’s Privy Council. The difference between is that Errol Barrow never wavered in his loyalty to his sovereign, unfortunately the same cannot be said for Stuart who is a traitor, an oath breaker and an attempted usurper, Barrow would probably turn in his grave if he could only know what was happening to the stable constitution he and the other founding fathers had worked to hard to give to the people of Barbados. So deep was Barrow’s loyalty to Her Majesty that he even managed to influence other members of his family in like regard, as proven by the appointment of his sister as Dame Nita Barrow, Governor-General of Barbados, the first and only woman to ever be appointed to such an esteemed rank. For Stuart to compare now himself to Barrow is truly sacrilegious and that’s putting it mildly.

              

After years of following monarchist vs republican debates, I cannot help to make a comparison between the arguments made by anti-royals (especially in the Commonwealth) all of which are clichéd which only goes to show their lack of credibility since every argument put forward by these republicans have been discredited, time and again. One thing I can most certainly say is that Stuart’s pronouncement is far too reminiscent of his Jamaican counterpart Portia Simpson Miller who also announced similar plans in 2012 and for the exact reasons that he did, it has been three years and yet there has been no further word on moves to abolish Jamaica’s monarchy. I for one however am most certainly not complaining, as far as I’m concerned, keeping the constitution as it is, is a good thing for Jamaica as it is for Barbados. Becoming a republic simply for the sake of it, just so some politician can get the chance to call himself “Mr. President” will do no good whatsoever.  In fact histories on every single continent is filled with stories of countries than abandon their monarchies only to end up with something far worse, not that I’m predicting the same will certainly happen to Barbados but the chance is very much real thus upsetting the apple cart is ALWAYS an unwise move.

             

There is an old saying that a “drowning man will clutch at a straw”, this is precisely what is happening here. Politicians who pull this kind of stunt normally tends to pull this kind of stunt as part of their main profession, i.e. politics.  How ironic is it that Freundel Stuart made this announcement less than a week after the Island's leading newspaper The Barbados Nation showed that he was well behind in the polls as many persons would gladly vote his rival into office if given half a chance at this very moment. A PM in trouble would clearly need something to make himself more relevant, what better scapegoat to use than the Queen?  Nothing as clearly demonstrates the blatant politics behind it than the manner of the announcement, it must be noted that Stuart did not announce his latest scheme in an address to the people of Barbados but rather to a rally of his own supporters in an effort to drum up a sleazy campaign which was later leaked to the media,  to call it tacky would a gross understatement.

If The Prime Minister was under the impression that such a move would win him support he is dead wrong, in fact all the evidence points to contrary, all the polls indicate that people of Barbados most certainly do not want their beloved realm to be turned into a republic and I don’t blame them, in fact I feel exactly the same when it comes to Jamaica and have made no secret about my allegiance to the Queen who has the sole legitimate right to reign over both Jamaica and Barbados as well as the  rest of the Commonwealth. The people of Barbados are not interested in supporting a usurper which is exactly what Stuart will become if he tries to make himself President, the same also applies to whatever puppet president he will try to use a figurehead to promote is treasonous anti-royalist and most certainly anti-Bajan agenda.

         

Constitutional Monarchy is very much etched in the Barbados psyche, as demonstrated by the fact the Barbados probably has more knights and dames than the rest of the Caribbean put together, (it was also the first country to the Caribbean to establish its own unique order of Knighthood), I wonder how many of these nobles would be willing to give up their titles and status under a new republic, my guess is none. Just one trip to that island would be enough to tell immediately why is known as “Little England”, the idea of Barbados becoming a republic is as ludicrous as the idea of Britain becoming a republic, it simply will not happen (not after that nonsense that happened with Cromwell), nor is it eventually inevitable contrary to the propaganda spread by traitorous republicans, hence the Prime Minister should do himself a favour and actually find useful to talk about and leave well enough alone.