Peace Begins With Me, Declares City Residents

The unending spate of crime and violence which continues to grip the streets of the Old Capital has given rise to a social movement where friends and families of countless victims are demanding a ceasefire.  They are doing so by taking to those very streets en masse.  We’ve seen a galvanization of Belizeans in the wake of Tyler Savery’s murder and we are also witnessing the coming together of various organizations in support of that cause.  Peace Begins with Me is one such initiative that sees the Belize City Council taking the lead.

Darrell Bradley

Darrell Bradley, Belize City Mayor

“Well it was an initiative of the Belize City Council to say what can we do symbolically to really raise awareness and show unity in relation to wanting to combat crime.  I think that people may ask the question, well lots of people do rallies so why is this different?  And my response is that it’s not different but I think that at certain points the community needs to come together with various stakeholders to, even if it is only for an afternoon and to do a symbolic gesture to say that we stand together with our police, we are in support of the efforts that our police face daily in terms of their challenges and their efforts to combat crime.  We are in solidarity with the victims of crime and we are aware of some of the issues that cause people to resort crime and violence and we want to come against them as a city and so I think it’s important for me as the leader of the city, together with our councilors, our staff, members of our community, people that we work with very closely to come together on occasions like this to say that the only way that we can solve this crime situation is if we recognize some of the deep and abiding challenges that we face as a community and if we come together with our police and others to have a unified front to fight crime.  I think a lot of burden is placed on police but we need a community response in relation to combating crime and this is part of that initiative.”

The rally on Wednesday saw the participation of dozens of Belize City residents who marched through the principal streets and made their way to B.T.L. Park.