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Dr. Ronnie Yearwood: Points to Ponder on Going Republic

Let us consider that the Government will continue with its intended plan, it appears of swapping one ceremonial head for another, the Governor General for a President. Then I think that any new President of a Republic, ceremonial or executive should be directly elected and all Barbadians afforded the opportunity to run for and vote…

,

Let us consider that the Government will continue with its intended plan, it appears of swapping one ceremonial head for another, the Governor General for a President.

Then I think that any new President of a Republic, ceremonial or executive should be directly elected and all Barbadians afforded the opportunity to run for and vote for this office.

The Prime Minister likes to talk about every Barbadian boy or girl aspiring to the high office and knowing it is not representative of the Queen.

Let us make that aspiration real and not just talk.

Dr. Ronnie Yearwood: Lunch time Lecture at Barbados Yacht Club

Read Full Speech (PDF) – Dr. Ronnie Yearwood’s lunch time lecture at Barbados Yacht Club

137 responses to “Dr. Ronnie Yearwood: Points to Ponder on Going Republic”

  1. Pachamama Avatar
    Pachamama

    David
    We must admit, on the substantive issue, that Yearwood seemed to have confirmed that this goverment with this republicanism nonsense is merely engaged in a false nation building project to lionize Mugabe, like we have long suspected. That should have been the kernel.

  2. Pachamama Avatar
    Pachamama

    David
    Do you really think these pieties hold any purchase, anymore?

  3. David Avatar
    David

    @Pacha

    Important is that Mia has shown a willingness to pull back based on public opinion/feedback. It will be up to the people/NGOs to advocate concerns. Supported by the media of course.

    On Fri, Jul 16, 2021 at 1:07 PM Barbados Underground wrote:

    >

  4. David Avatar
    David

    There is a role for political parties if people of integrity support and participate, people include the general public. There is no man made system that will be relevant if people abdicate roles and responsibilities. It always comes back to integrity at the individual level.

  5. Pachamama Avatar
    Pachamama

    David
    Mugabe should not be able to make such a major political error and then assume that some sort of graceful retreat can be made without first paying a price.

    But this is what you get for allowing Mugabe every discretion known to man. Recall, the second throne speech. We are in unchartered political territory which you David were instrumental in enabling.

  6. David Avatar
    David

    @Pacha

    You have forgotten what a wedge issue can do to a democracy? If you need help to recall please reread the BREXIT Chronicle.

  7. Pachamama Avatar
    Pachamama

    David
    Please, don’t let us change the subject.
    For you are well worthy of being pinned to the cross on these issues.
    We are on record warning both you and Mugabe but vision cannot win against such widely held political ideologies, as unfounded as they are, buttressed by a fickle public.

  8. Pachamama Avatar
    Pachamama

    David

    Mugabe missed a signal political moment when, helped by you, she made a farce of what you call a democracy with the abergation of a social contract.

    She missed another by failing to foresee a radically changing economic environment.

    These failures are worthy of the highest penalty.

    Now all you can do is to continue feeding this monster of your own creation.

  9. WURA-War-on-U Avatar
    WURA-War-on-U

    “His voice reminds me of all the obstructionists of the late 60s and early eighties, who told those fighting for real change to go back to Africa.”

    that is the very best advice at this time…even if it’s virtually…get away frm the criminal Slave Society and dangerous government whose only intent is to put Africans at risk, feeing threatened AND FIGHTING TO SURVIVE….

    they are about to CRASH and BURN in the most spectacular fashion available….

    ” Yearwood seemed to have confirmed that this goverment with this republicanism nonsense is merely engaged in a false nation building project to lionize Mugabe, like we have long suspected.”

    it’s a distraction, pay no attention, watch the Fintech scam they are using to get a foothold on the continent and leave Black people on the slave society island scrambling for their next meal…

    ..but i don’t know how the hell the SELLOUTS thought they could get around me with that, when i was WAITING PATIENTLY….

  10. David Avatar
    David

    @Pacha

    What social contract?

    Our system is one where a politician has to promise A (masses) to be elected but is financed by B who the politician is liable once elected. Bear in mind a political party’s job is to be popular.

  11. Pachamama Avatar
    Pachamama

    David
    The notion of a social contract or compact is well establised within the political science literature, legal traditions and history.

    Ask the former NDP people if this principle was not the basis of their formation. Do we have no historical memory? Or are we only now for now people?

    How could you David continue to make these tired pleadings about “democracy” and yet when a party comes to the public and makes manifesto promises, as basis for democracy. And when they afterwards determine that those promises were ill-founded, instead of reverting to the people for divine correction, as consistent with your Westminster tradition, erects the fantasy of a second throne speech, as it abrogates the original political crime by commuting another to cover up.

    Yours is the last word.

  12. Pachamama Avatar
    Pachamama

    Original promises

  13. Pachamama Avatar
    Pachamama

    social contract
    [ˈsōSHəl kənˈtrakt, ˈkäntrakt]
    NOUN
    an implicit agreement among the members of a society to cooperate for social benefits, for example by sacrificing some individual freedom for state protection. Theories of a social contract became popular in the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries among theorists such as Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, as a means of explaining the origin of government and the obligations of subjects.

    https://www.bing.com/search?q=social+contract+definition&form=ANNTH1&refig=e93c25ae12734abb8cac113a03eb5db3&sp=2&qs=LS&pq=social+contract&sk=LS1&sc=8-15&cvid=e93c25ae12734abb8cac113a03eb5db3

  14. David Avatar
    David

    @Pacha

    Is a social contract legal?

    What is the Latin derivative for politician?

  15. WURA-War-on-U Avatar
    WURA-War-on-U

    “for example by sacrificing some individual freedom for state protection. ”

    the Afican population have never had freedom OR state protection from Barbados’ colonial agents….who see them as meal tickets for bribe collection to be robbed generationally….

    the first thing these DEMONS did was put racist thieving minorities first in everything and neglect the people…not even the African birthright do these evil, low class criminals want their people to have first option…

    no other group would dare do that to their own, the same half-asssed indians and other minorities now salivating and the negros told they could rob our continent… WOULD NEVER EVER DO THAT to india or anywhere else, how many Black people do they invite to india…and were they the inheritors of the African continent they would drop you dead for having the audacity to think ya can encroach on their ancestral rights…,

    but the niga has no respect for ancestors or their people and is deserving of a spiritual backlash…

  16. WURA-War-on-U Avatar
    WURA-War-on-U

    how many Black people do they invite to india…TO INVEST..

    i will wait for the Slaves to answer that…yall should be swinging at the end of a rope..

  17. TLSN Avatar
    TLSN

    @Waru,
    Here is an interesting take on reparations:

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/07/12/jamaica-seeking-billions-pounds-reparations-britain-historical/

  18. WURA-War-on-U Avatar
    WURA-War-on-U

    yeah TLSN…they got their work cut out for them……they are looking at it from the wrong angle…

    while the Barbados government is inviting criminal minorities who would set up political assassinations and commited endless crimes against Africans for the last 6 decades…to the continent like if the bitches own it…..well forget that shit, the government DO NOT OWN A CONTINENT or anything else other than the billions they TIEF from African people, them and the dangerous minorities and now own that debt..

    the gall on these evil demons…acting like we don’t exist and have no say…

    WE, THE BLACK PEOPLE IN THE DIASPORA OWN THE CONTINENT….and i dare these demonic fcukers and their little parliamentary nigas to continue believing they can invade our inheritance.

    i notice the Slaves still can’t answer me..

  19. WURA-War-on-U Avatar
    WURA-War-on-U

    Pacha…the problem is, no one on BU would call out these BLP criminals for that despicable sellout move, but they always got mouth for me…..when it’s THEIR FUTURE GENERATIONS will be robbed by the minority criminals in the region and who knows what level of evil they will try to get away with IF THE CONTINENT WAS NOT WARNED and know they WILL HAVE TO WATCH THEM ALL VERY CLOSELY……….AND …also the extremely wicked negros in Barbados’ parliament….who WOULD BE MORE THAN WILLING TO HELP THEM…carry out crimes against Africans and ROB THEM….as they have done for DECADES to the helpless people on the island..

    .people are shocked that they would even think of such a treacherous act against the Black population who HAVE LIMITED TO NO OPPORTUNITIES in Barbados.., let alone carry it out..they could not hide it, because too many of us are directly connected in Africa…..and they knew the fools in Barbados will meekly and docilely say nothing if they get the crumbs of what is stolen from their inheritance…

    ..but the political rats will come face to face WITH KARMA….for their Judas personas.

  20. WURA-War-on-U Avatar
    WURA-War-on-U

    https://www.nationnews.com/2021/07/16/report-of-robbery/

    people are hungry and now reduced to robbing supermarkets and scavenging how they could to survive…while the vicious government is busy betraying them..

  21. WURA-War-on-U Avatar
    WURA-War-on-U

    Pacha…it may be a waste of effort, but we keep trying.

    ““The oppressed and the exploited of the earth maintain their defiance: liberty from theft. But the biggest weapon wielded and actually daily unleashed by imperialism against that collective defiance is the cultural bomb. The effect of a cultural bomb is to annihilate a people’s belief in their names, in their languages, in their environment, in their heritage of struggle, in their unity, in their capacities and ultimately in themselves. It makes them see their past as one wasteland of non-achievement and it makes them want to distance themselves from that wasteland. It makes them want to identify with that which is furthest removed from themselves; for instance, with other peoples’ languages rather than their own. It makes them identify with that which is decadent and reactionary, all those forces which would stop their own springs of life. It even plant serious doubts about the moral rightness of struggle. Possibilities of triumph or victory are seen as remote, ridiculous dreams. The intended results are despair, despondency and a collective death-wish. Amidst this wasteland which it has crated, imperialism presents itself as the cure and demands that the dependent sing hymns of praise with the constant refrain: ‘Theft is holy’. Indeed, this refrain sums up the new creed of the neo-colonial bourgeoise in many ‘independent’ African states.â€
    -Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Decolonising the Mind”

  22. WURA-War-on-U Avatar
    WURA-War-on-U

    Every crime this traitor government commit against the Black population going forward will be REPORTED ON THE CONTINENT…ya want to use Africa to enrich ya corrupt, criminal friends and yaselves while your people SUFFER AND HAVE NO FUTURE……..ya want fame…..that ya will get..

  23. Vincent Codrington Avatar
    Vincent Codrington

    @ David Bu at 12 :18 Pm of July 16th.

    The word politician is a Greek derivative from “Politai” ( I do not know how to access the Greek alphabet).
    The latter, literally translated, means citizens. Those who live in the city. The politician usually is a citizen,elected by fellow citizens to administer their public affairs.
    I hope the above answers your question.

  24. Pachamama Avatar
    Pachamama

    The Greeks never developed an alphabet. Not dissimilar to the English , the Romans and all of your hollowed Europeans.

    The Greeks copied it from the people who actually developed it. And circuitously through the Phoenicians and others the alphabet was gifted to all of mankind.

    The alphabet is maybe the most culturally transformative inventions of all times. And it was the Ancient people of Kemet we must thank for this.

    This was well known by both the Greeks and the Romans who would brag about their Kemetic education, forty years it took to be a scholar, multi-genius. Brag in the same way Vincent Codrington brags about his eurocentric affiliated miseducation today.

    And Kemet is Black Afrika. For we can follow the techno-complexes from South to North informing such genius.

  25. WURA-War-on-U Avatar
    WURA-War-on-U

    “The alphabet is maybe the most culturally transformative inventions of all times. And it was the Ancient people of Kemet we must thank for this.”

    tell them again, i see the fools love to pump up their hollow chests and quote the Greeks said this and the Greeks said that, but who tief the shit from our revered Kemetic ancient ancestors….but fools won’t know that, ya have to keep repeating it because ten minutes later, the information leaves their empty heads…

  26. David Avatar
    David

    Republic issue too major for bungling Govt
    How a Government that cannot even get simple things like the issuing of new driver’s licence cards and number plate stickers, to name a few, along with the increasing debt, which is one the highest in the world, can really plan a change to a republic at this time is mind-boggling, especially in the midst of a pandemic.
    The many other issues like the type of republic along with its legal and institutional framework have to be addressed in order that a proper proposal can be placed before the citizens of Barbados in the form of a referendum.

    – Hugh Armstrong

    Source: Nation

  27. Vincent Codrington Avatar
    Vincent Codrington

    Where ignorance is bliss ,it is folly to be wise. I will leave the two of you to wallow in wunnuh ignoranciness.

  28. Tron Avatar
    Tron

    The commentators obviously do not live in Barbados. I know many black millionaires and very successful black businessmen. Or the commentators don’t live where I reside. LOL.

    We need the transformation from kingdom to republic more urgently than ever before! Only republican status permanently secures the power of our supreme leader, namely as president for life following the Chinese or Russian democracies.

  29. angela cox Avatar
    angela cox

    Question
    Can Barbados holds its own as a republic
    Presently Barbados struggles to hold its own as an Independent country
    England owe these small countries plenty in financial resources
    Why not like Jamaica fight to obtain what is rightfully ours
    The time for a republic must be giving serious thought
    Why walk away empty handed with the queen having a part of the last laugh

  30. angela cox Avatar
    angela cox

    NEWS
    Jamaica to ask UK for billions in ‘well overdue’ reparations over slave trade
    By Lee Brown

    July 13, 2021 | 3:08pm

    Sculpture monument of Jamaican National Hero Samuel Sharpe in Sam Sharpe Square, downtown Montego Bay, Jamaica.
    An estimated 600,000 Africans were shipped to toil in Jamaica.
    Shutterstock / Debbie Ann Powell
    Jamaica plans to ask the UK to pay billions in compensation for the centuries-old slave trade in the former British colony, a senior government official has announced.

    “Our African ancestors were forcibly removed from their home and suffered unparalleled atrocities in Africa to carry out forced labor to the benefit of the British Empire,” Minister of Sports, Youth and Culture Olivia Grange told Reuters.

    “Redress is well overdue,” she insisted.

    Grange refused to say exactly how much the Caribbean nation is seeking, but the reparations petition is based on a motion by Jamaican lawmaker Mike Henry, who has put it as worth more than $10.5 billion, roughly equivalent to what Britain paid the slaveholders.

    “I am asking for the same amount of money to be paid to the slaves that was paid to the slave owners,” said Henry, a member of the ruling Jamaica Labour Party.

    A group of liberated slaves on the parade at Fort Augusta, Jamaica
    “Our African ancestors were forcibly removed from their home and suffered unparalleled atrocities in Africa to carry out forced labor to the benefit of the British Empire,” Olivia Grange said.
    Getty Images
    “I am doing this because I have fought against this all my life, against chattel slavery which has dehumanized human life.”

    The petition, with approval from Jamaica’s National Council on Reparations, will be filed pending advice from the attorney general and three legal teams, Grange said.

    The attorney general will then send it to Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II, who remains head of state of the Commonwealth country.

    An estimated 600,000 Africans were shipped to toil in Jamaica, according to the National Library of Jamaica.

    Olivia Grange
    Jamaica plans to ask the UK to pay billions in compensation for the slave trade. Government minister Olivia Grange refused to say exactly how much the nation is seeking.
    FIFA via Getty Images

    Britain prohibited trade of slaves in its empire in 1807 but did not formally abolish the practice of slavery until 1834.

    Seized from Spain by the English in 1655, Jamaica was a British colony until it became independent in 1962.

    It remains part of the Commonwealth, although the petition coincides with increasing efforts by some Jamaican leaders to sever formal ties with the UK. Opposition lawmaker Mikael Phillips in December presented a motion to remove the British monarch as head of

  31. TheOGazerts Avatar
    TheOGazerts

    “The many other issues like the type of republic along with its legal and institutional framework have to be addressed in order that a proper proposal can be placed before the citizens of Barbados in the form of a referendum.”

    It does not matter which side of the political spectrum the author is on. This is one of the steady stream of bloggers who want to see more of the engine.

    Some demand more than switching Duracell with Eveready and saying “God damn the queen”.

  32. angela cox Avatar
    angela cox

    I am with Jamaica plan
    Let’s get what is rightfully ours
    Then kick the old Queen to the curve
    If Jamaica persist it will make a dent in the royal Throne
    Persistence is a well planned mechanism in moving the needle forward
    Barbadians long talk as usual adds up to nothing
    The queen goes and along takes anything of worth with her
    Anything that could help Barbados in times of upheaval
    Which brings to mind the problems which Haiti is undergoing and having to beg USA for a helping hand
    Meanwhile the current administration answers in a,posturing stance

  33. Pachamama Avatar
    Pachamama

    You are representative of chronic ignorance of the slave typology.

    All you can rejoin with is the difference between an a and an o. Nothing substantive?

    One of the many errors made here everyday by this writer refusing to re-read every contribution like you an eleven plus boy of nearly 70 years old. In other words, a boy who believes in the rightness of Whiteness.

    Hoping the thumbs haven’t deceived us.

  34. David Avatar
    David

    Secrets of rebel slaves in Barbados will finally be revealed | Slavery | The Guardian

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jul/18/secrets-of-rebel-slaves-in-barbados-will-finally-be-revealed

  35. Donna Avatar
    Donna

    Look how David gone and upset my day!

    I fear I don’t have the stomach to read the naked truth so early this morning, no matter how I really want to do so.

    Seeing the actual documents is too painful.

    As for that Drax monster, somebody ought to track down some descendents of slaves who were on the plantation and fly them to England to do the demanding for that plantation to which he still clings while sittting as a British MP. We should make him the poster child for “How Britain Got Rich”.

  36. Donna Avatar
    Donna

    On the bright side, John Knox’s version of Ebony and Ivory will be obliterated by a read of these documents.

    If anybody was stupid enough to listen to it in the first place, that is.

  37. TLSN Avatar
    TLSN

    The pressure is piling on to Mia.
    BT have published an article from Guy Hewitt, the defender of the UK Windrush generation..

    https://barbadostoday.bb/2021/07/18/btcolumn-its-how-you-do-it/

  38. WURA-War-on-U Avatar
    WURA-War-on-U

    https://www.nationnews.com/2021/07/21/moore-improve-police-pay/

    look at that fraud already pimping for votes, so all this time as head of a union ENABLING low salaries, enabling the sandy lane racists and other…. and the disenfranchisment of nurses and police, she only now found out that police are not properly paid..

  39. WURA-War-on-U Avatar
    WURA-War-on-U

    “They also advised that “Mottley’s office did not follow up on multiple requests for an interview.”

    The increasing lack of transparency in the affairs of the government should be of concern to the people of Barbados. Given what Guyana experienced in and out of its journey to republicanism, we need to protect ourselves against any possible threat of despotism.”

    The SPIRITUAL BACKLASH will be her legacy and the stuff of legends….let her continue believing that she “got this”

    our disrespected ANCESTORS and their VERY SPIRITUALLY POWERFUL descendants are WATCHING

    time to pay the piper…time to pay for selling your soul…..

  40. Miller Avatar
    Miller

    There you have it!

    Just an ordinary swap of an irrelevant queen for a crippled but costly king.

    The big question to the Electoral College of is who would be ‘elected’ to be the first President of the Republic of the New Barbadoes?

    How many figureheads would be up for election to be ‘singularly’ selected by the parliamentary queen and courtiers (and not the common people)?

    Would it be a new brand ‘Sir’ or would conservative Bajans continue with the ‘Dame,’ KCMG et al?

    Does the Constitution, as it stands, have the power to invest such power in an ‘organ’ of Parliament which has not yet been created or would it have to be amended before such a process of electing a President can take place?

    Blogmaster, which ‘black’ horse of the Hobson’s variety are you putting your money on to win the Presidential stakes in the Independence Day race to be called the RED Cup for His or Her Excellency of the New Republic?

  41. David Avatar
    David

    @Miller

    We get it, the symbolism of not reporting to a former colonial master is lost to you? The blogmaster agrees with the decision, however, the devil is always in the detail. We will have to fight whatever challenges present if we want to achieve. The prize:

  42. Miller Avatar
    Miller

    @ David July 27, 2021 9:48 AM

    There is NO prize David!

    The prize of Prime ministerial dictatorship has already been won in the republic of Barbados.

    The ceremonial figure head of State of Barbados has always been selected by the real (de facto) Head of political power in Barbados.

    An that political reality goes back to the de facto ‘election’ of the first native GG.

    The real electoral question to you is if you would support the continuation of the present holder of the ceremonial post in the proposed rubbing-stamping job like what took place with the transition from Stowe to Scott?

    Or would you go for a new face (even if old ‘red’ blood) for the new de jure republic?

    Now that is where the real politics ‘lies’!

  43. David Avatar
    David

    @Miller

    How will this electoral college work?

  44. TLSN Avatar
    TLSN

    Thank God our country has moved away from this dark period in our history. How life is sweet in today’s Barbados for the common black man and woman. For this we must thank our great leaders since independence.

    https://barbadostoday.bb/2021/07/27/pan-africanist-repeats-call-for-israel-lovell-and-nanny-grigg-to-be-honoured/

  45. Miller Avatar
    Miller

    @ David July 27, 2021 10:41 AM

    Now that is carrying the debate to a desirably higher level other than the notion of a prize to show off to the masses.

    The Constitution ought to be amended, tout suite, to accommodate this ‘foreign’ notion of an electoral college in Parliament ‘tasked with’ the responsibility of acting on behalf of the majority of the people (the electorate) in the selection of the country’s head of State.

    We know the role of the Constitutional standing of the Electoral and Boundaries Commission or even that empowered’ to recommend the elections of judges including the DPP.

    Are there current provisions in the Bajan Constitution for such an ‘electoral’ organ of State?

    BTW, who can be opposed to any plan to turn Barbados governance model into a republic, political adult the qualities of which are already manifesting?

    Why not go about it in the light where transparency and integrity are the rules of the game?

  46. David Avatar
    David

    @Miller

    Hopefully the recommendations supporting the transition to republican status will be shared .

  47. angela cox Avatar
    angela cox

    On the ground barbadians are totally confused about the change to Republic
    Most applaud the queen Head removed
    However the word electoral College takes on different meaning for some
    Some even asking if this electoral college would be made up of friends associates and family
    Others asking if Barbados Constitution would be revised
    Others asking about the need for transparency on this important issue

  48. David Avatar
    David

    Electoral College is members of the House of Assembly.

  49. angela cox Avatar
    angela cox

    DavidJuly 27, 2021 1:27 PM

    Electoral College is members of the House of Assembly.

    Xxxxx
    hmmm

  50. NorthernObserver Avatar
    NorthernObserver

    Lol…apart from getting @ac goat, that hummmm as she thinks of 29-1-0, how can an electoral college be anybody ‘elected’. It is ‘generally’ a predetermined formula applied to all votes (aka popular vote) from a region. It can be absolute so a single vote margin secures ALL electoral college votes, or apportioned based on several predetermined factors. In many cases it’s “peculiarities” are found within the Constitution.
    One example is that semi-useless body called the Senate. If Senate appointments were for longer than the parliamentary election cycle, and forced to draw from all geographic regions in an apportioned way, the current government couldn’t automatically stack the Senate.

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