VIOLENCE IN URBAN BELIZE

Belize is the third most violent nation in the Caribbean behind Jamaica and Trinidad, according to Dr. Herbert Gayle, Caribbean Anthropologist of Social Violence. In the summary report of the Male Social Participation and Violence in Urban Belize study published by Gayle and a local team of researchers, led by Local Manager Nelma Mortis, he noted that, “Belize, which though politically Caribbean, is located on the Central American corridor adjacent to Mexico, joined the top ten most violent countries during the shift of the drug trans-shipment route from the Caribbean to the Central American corridor.”
 
The report points out that whereas Belize had 16 murders per 100,000 in 2000, by 2002 it had experienced its first major spike in murders to 29 per 100,000. The country went into what he describes as “social shock.”

The youth of Belize have been traumatized by the climb in the homicide rate. The study was very revealing in detailing to what extent this is affecting Belize’s youth. For instance, it revealed that 91% of boys surveyed had had exposure to gun violence, 85% of adolescents had seen the dead body of a murder victim, % of them had seen at least one person being shot; 11% had themselves been stabbed at least once.
 
A major problem facing youth is the fact that over 30,000 of primary and secondary school age are not getting an education.

Six in ten of those who return to prison have the following profile: Afro-Belizeans, not educated above Standard IV, unmarried, below the age of 36 and of the Belize District, most of them hailing from the Southside of Belize City. Belize’s prison population of 1,400 is made up of almost 98% males, with over 300 on remand (awaiting trial) for as long as five years. Over 500 have been imprisoned more than once and the most prevalent charges are drug-related.
 
Public frustration over the crime situation is worsened by the fact that murder conviction rates are dismal. In 2007, for example, there were 95 murders reported, but only 10 convictions were landed.
 
In an article of April 26, 2010 titled, “Violence and the Health of a Nation”, Dr.Bernard E. Bulwer, MD, Director of Medical Services at the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital, said that, “Belize had 95 murders in 2009; the KHMH recorded 91 other gunshot victims who showed up alive at the emergency department…. We have to find a way to ‘outlaw’ idleness. All able-bodied young men and women should be in school or at work. There is no shortage of work to be done in Belize…. We need to halt the spread of Belize City slums—where an entrenched sub-culture of violence and the stuff that feeds it, have taken root….

“Worse still, too many of our children are being born, but not ‘raised’.” This ties right in with another finding in the Gayle et al study: “The data show that parents’ neglect is a critical issue affecting our youth. Over half (59%) of the youth said they have seen neglected children in their community.”

The team hopes that the research will help Belize chart a new course in smoothening out the pot-holed journey the majority of our youth—and especially those on the Southside—are now travelling to adulthood, as their future so much depends on it. “Governance needs to have arm and teeth,” said Gayle, urging the Central Political Authority to stop the spread of slums—where people grab crates to build makeshift homes over morass (swamp), right within the City—and to move ahead with decisive action.