Campaign for Black Men Achievement in the U.S. Comes to Belize

Mayor Bernard Wagner and the City Council hosted some twenty-one young African American men from the United States, who are part of the Campaign for Black Men Achievement in the U.S.—an organization that focuses on improving lives of young men of color. The visiting group comprises of at-risk youths who have been traumatized by gun violence, gangs as well as racial crimes. The brainchild of Malcolm X’s daughter, Ambassador Attallah Shabazz, the group will be interacting with inner city kids from Saint John’s College, the detention center as well as will make visits to Hopkins and Caye Caulker. The trip to Belize is fully funded by global partners and it is expected that the young boys will gain insightful experiences.

Attallah Shabazz

Ambassador Attallah Shabazz

“As a Caribbean child and as an international citizen in the United States and having been blessed with parents who were teachers and inspirers, I don’t know any different than to be a part of that which enables people to find their best self and connect those dots. And I know there are red tapes and distractions, but those distractions take your off course. So while they exist, had we find our best self, and the collaborators and the family members and the partners to do this kind of great work; Campaign for Black Male Achievement was born of the fact that all of those young men of color in the United States were being gunned down the last five or six years. And so out of all of the tragedy was born this endeavor. So that’s a good thing and then the university and colleges and hard works, I couldn’t wait to introduce them to Belize. I was putting Belize in their ear for a long time. Imagine, not one of those young men had a passport four months ago; not one. And parents were apprehensive of letting their children go beyond the zip code. Many of them have had to bury brothers and uncles and fathers so there is a lot of trauma and self perception. I know the same thing happens in Belize and it happens everywhere. So if we don’t enable young people specifically to know their wingspan and their place in the world despite zip code, despite village or district, then you are restricting them of anything they aspire to do.”

Steve Vassor

Steve Vassor, Vice President, Campaign for Black Men Achievement in the U.S.

“When we mean black, we talk about African America, but we also talk about Africans in the disapora. Our young men are disconnected in a number of ways from what their roots and their culture is. So they don’t realize that they have the Latino and the Mestizo. They don’t realize the tribes; that these are interwoven in the way that children in the Americas realize—that there is more than just skin tones; that there is also culture. And so what this is doing for these young men is exposing them to their wider selves. And when you as a person know who you are from a wider perspective, the world becomes a better place.”