7 News Belize

Gender Politics Invades Youth Advocacy Movement
posted (June 23, 2016)
In a press release issued this morning, the Youth Advocacy Movement, which is the youth arm of the BFLA, came out strong against one of the District presidents of the National Youth Council of Belize. The issue was a homophobic facebook post made earlier in week.

Now before we get into the details of that post, the real issue that the Youth Advocacy Movement (YAM) addressed in their press release has to do with a decision made by the National Youth Council to have the word "gender" redacted from a clause in their constitution. This decision was made at their AGM last week. The release said that YAM is, "disappointed in the actions of elected members of the council." The omission of the word gender, according to YAM opens the doors for discrimination. We spoke to the President of YAM Belize who told us more about their stance.

Emanuel Pech
"What are some of those real concerns that you guys have with the word gender now being extracted from their constitution?"

Leandra Betson - Pres. YAM Belize City
"Our concerns are that when it comes to the discrimination process maybe a young person in the future wants to be a part of the district, anyone of the district youth council of the country and then because they are of certain gender class they are discriminated against simply because the constitution did not say anything against not discriminating against the gender part of your make up."

Emanuel Pech
"So, you can see how someone might feel discriminated by their constitution."

Leandra Betson - Pres. YAM Belize City
"Yes, we want to avoid that. We want for everybody equally."

Emanuel Pech
"Have you gotten any complaints that people feel discriminated because of this?"

Leandra Betson - Pres. YAM Belize City
"No, no, no it's just something - prevention is better than cure. So, we are just trying to prevent it should in case it happens."

Emanuel Pech
"Will you guys be compelling or advocating for them to do a re-voting?"

Leandra Betson - Pres. YAM Belize City
"That is something that we are considering, because we understand the severity at which not including the word gender in this constitution how it can affect the District Youth Council, all of them. So, we understand, I as a young person don't want to see them go through that. Maybe, a young person can come up and because they have a different gender orientation they feel like well, they are being discriminated against and then they go to court. We try avoid those things. So, that's why."

We spoke to the president of the Belize District Youth President, Stafin Duncan via phone today and he told us that he was disappointed that the Youth Advocacy Movement went on a media rampage before speaking to them privately on the matter. According to Duncan, at their AGM last week they were discussing the criteria for youth groups who should be considered as full members of the council. A clause under that heading spoke of discrimination against race, religion, sex, sexual orientation and others. Now when it came to including the word "gender" under that clause, one of the members argued that the term was too open to interpretation. It went to a vote, and the majority voted to have it removed. However according to Duncan they maintain that this is in no way a license for any form of gender based discrimination. Further, Duncan affirms that as the official youth arm of the government they remain opened and committed to dialogue.

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