I think we have reached a stage after 45 years when we should give serious consideration to becoming a republic. – Retired jurist and Barbados’ first post-Independence Attorney General Sir Frederick “Sleepy” Smith, SUNDAY SUN, May 1.
One of the more important side issues out of the spectacle of Britain’s recent royal wedding has been an attempt to revive the near dead national discourse on Barbados becoming a republic.
That the primary source of the seemingly half-hearted attempt to fan pro-republican embers was the octogenarian retired jurist Sir Frederick “Sleepy” Smith, a respected if not exactly revered senior member of the hierarchy within the ruling Democratic Labour Party (DLP), left some people both bemused and amused.
Sir Frederick told the interviewer he didn’t have a problem with Queen Elizabeth II, but with her potential successor Prince Charles, an adulterer, who would be the next king of Barbados.
“I have no problem with William [Charles’ son and the newly married and minted Duke of Cambridge],” he added, “except that I want a republican Government.
“My view is that as long as Her Majesty is alive I don’t mind the monarchy, but we should be in a position to become a republic the moment she abdicates.”
The republican view is one that Sir Frederick has long held, even though he has also long sought the coveted post of Governor General of Barbados, who under the Constitution is the Queen’s representative, and he obviously sees no contradiction.
“I had ambitions [for the post],” he acknowledged, “but I am too old for that now. I wanted to make Government House relevant to the people of Barbados. Not like Buckingham Palace. People are dying day in and day out and never seeing where their Governor General lives from colonial days. So I would open it up.
“Naturally, a lot of English-background people want to have the Queen, but when you look at Independence and what it means to you, you want to be an independent country, not with the Privy Council as your final court of appeal or the Queen as your head of state.”
In a 1997 article, Sir Frederick observed: “I would go so far as to say that if Her Majesty is told of our decision to become a republic, then I have no doubt that she would give us her blessing, and her interest in Barbados would not lessen.”
After reading last week’s SUNDAY SUN’S The Big Interview, one man called to enquire whether I felt that the new Stuart administration might have been using this well known and hugely popular DLP “elder” to fly a political kite.
My response was to ask why would Prime Minister Freundel Stuart seek or accept such a nudge or reminder from Sir Frederick?
Surely, he could not be speaking for Stuart who, as we all know, has his own timetable.
Couldn’t it merely be that the exuberant Sir Frederick was just being Sir Frederick, and in his own inimitable idiosyncratic way, making a last-gasp effort with one eye on the clock?
At the DLP’s weekly lunchtime lecture recently, Sir Frederick made a plaintive plea – one hopes only to the unconverted sharing with the faithful – for the DLP to be granted at least a second term in office based on its track record which he felt had stood the test of time.
One could almost feel the anguish in his voice: “We have a rich heritage. Errol Barrow set the tone. The people gave the Barbados Labour Party 13 years, why can’t they give us at least ten? This Government hasn’t done anything wrong.
“Barbadians should not get sidetracked by propaganda, and Dems supporters need to stick together.
“The forces are against us!” Sir Frederick declared.
Whatever the motivation, Sir Frederick’s comments have certainly served as a well timed distraction – possibly unintended – from the very real and serious social and economic problems besetting Barbados, and with which the Stuart administration is trying to grapple.
I am not aware of this new administration’s position on the issue of republican status, which appeared to have been settled in favour of republicanism by the DLP at an annual conference in 1997, but I am aware of the new Prime Minister Freundel Stuart’s views on “democracy”.
He does not believe in the empty and meaningless definition of “government of the people, by the people, for the people”, a definition that “targets nobody and that defines nothing”.
“I reject that definition of democracy,” he told the House of Assembly shortly after taking his seat for the first time in 1994, “and I prefer a definition that targets those elements in this society that cry out for participation and for the right to influence the decision-making processes here.
“A definition, therefore, that says that democracy is an agreed method by which those who are deemed to be politically relevant are allowed to influence the decision-making process meets more with my approval because it forces us to confront the issue: who do we consider to be politically relevant?”
One wonders whether in Stuart’s “democracy”, people like Sir Frederick can still be considered “politically relevant” enough to demand an influence in the decision-making processes.
As the issue stands now, the nation would only want to know whether Stuart will maintain the DLP’s position on republicanism subject only to a determination of the kind of powers to be granted to the individual replacing the Queen.
“I think it is vital for some kind of referendum to be held to determine what powers and role should be given to the head of state,” said late Prime Minister David Thompson.
Next door in the Opposition Barbados Labour Party (BLP), the issue is less clear, given the flip-flopping by former Prime Minister Owen Arthur on whether there would be a referendum.
But Arthur still seems committed to the country becoming a republic, which he felt was necessary if Barbados were to truly come of age after Independence.
“We can’t build a great society until we have symbols of our identity,” he said,
“ . . . [and] recognize the work of those who struggled in 1937, and we must complete that process by allowing a Barbadian to be able to aspire to be our head of state.”
