When asked what political party one belongs to, a few years ago most people said PUP or UDP; some even said “Blue till a dead” or “red till a dead”

Today However, a growing group of voters (both young and old) are now answering that question with the response, “none of the above.” Or “I don’t believe in Party Politics”

Belize’s independent voters are a group of mostly young voters from diverse backgrounds, who do not want to affiliate with any of the two major political parties.

These voters state that they seek to break out of the stranglehold of partisan politics, and now vote for candidates based on merit, patriotism and national plan.

“Independent voters believe that these two parties are more interested in self-enrichment than in the betterment of ordinary grassroots people.

 

Belize’s entire Political and Electoral processes have been hijacked

There is nothing in our constitution that governs the process or registration of political parties, yet, when elected these parties form our government and take the reins of our Country so much so that they are responsible for the Laws, policies and decisions that affect our livelihood.

Not only have these parties failed to enact laws to govern their political entities, but they have attacked the very democratic process that elect them by paying for votes.

The way I see it they are actually private business houses. And what’s alarming is that they are so very corrupt in all their actions, that they are using and misusing our tax dollars to serve their own interests and maintain power, by keeping our laws weak and our people struggling.

Another reason why young voter are identifying as independents is that they have become disenfranchised, disappointed and have lost trust in both major political parties—they have much more access to information technologies and are seeing political parties for what they really are.

These voters no longer believe that the two dominant parties are interested or able to solve problems such as education improvements, violence, the job crisis and foreign policy. The public, particularly the disenfranchised youth, is fed up with the reluctance to improvement of our quality of life and the failures in diplomatic negotiations of the Guatemala dispute.

 

Our People are very unhappy with the dirty, corrupt partisan politics and are expressing their feelings all over social Media, in our music, university essays, and on talk shows… these dissatisfactions and concerns fall on deafened ears.

The deadlock on corruption and dysfunction in every single Government department is alarming and what is worst is that solutions to the soaring crime rate, solutions to a corrupt governance and solutions to people’s critical issues are no where to be found in the proposals and rhetoric of the PUDP.

The diehard partisan reapers are quick to form opinions and cause aspersion on those who identify themselves as independent or those swing voters who vote with open minds.

They want to make others believe that they are not stable and not loyal to anything … This is a mere political tactic of the PUDP and one that has no real validity with Today’s voters, infact it has become very distasteful and insulting to a population of new, intelligent, openminded, non-partisan independent voters.

There are those partisan followers who believe independent voting is a fad, it is not! The numbers are growing and  have already made lots of changes in most of Latin America,  it is that wave of Independent, populist thinking that has finally reached Belize.

As Belizeans get ready to cast their votes, in the upcoming elections, (sometime in 2020 it seems) many observers and investors express concern about the outcome of this election. The uptick in cases of corruption and other forms of political dishonesty have caused widespread disenchantment with the idea of blatant attacks on democratic and fair elections in Belize. Numbers indicates that Belize is one of the most corrupt governments in Latin America, our crime rates have soared, and there is an uncomfortably high level of support in favour of military investment. The increased anti-establishment sentiment plus the magnitude of votes that will soon be cast are a legitimate cause for concern that Belize is or will be seduced by populism, following the trend of Latin America.

It would certainly be in our best interest to make the effort to learn more about the populist movement.  These reforms would mean a strong and stable Belize; providing a vast assortment of opportunities in just about every industry possible for our region.

So, if this is so good why hasn’t this happened already?

a very likely explanation is that the forces that allow populist leaders electoral success are the same obstacles that stood in the way of their progress: Mainstream Media, like attorneys are mostly compromised. In the past, as in the present they have purposely ignored the alternatives and populists’ leaders.  It’s not unique to Belize, Latin America did the same; what has changed is that the majority of the population has stop depending on mainstream media and have flocked to online sources and social media as their main source of information. In Reality, mainstream media have been harming these movements through the years, but the shift is so much so that they have made themselves almost irrelevant to the young voters as it relates to their political information and decisions.

This is how the sweeping success of populism has shocked the world, we did not hear much of them on the Grand national Televisions, Radios and newspapers…but the word got out on social Media and it was ingeniously played …much the same is happening in Belize. Fasted your seat Belts Belize the ride will get rough.