Sept 10th: from National Day to St. George’s Caye Day

Last week cabinet approved changes to the traditional formatting of the September celebrations, which is, that official ceremonies for Independence Day on September twenty-first would now be held in Belmopan and not in Belize City. Well, at its regular session today Cabinet approved another change. September tenth celebrations, previously known as National Day, will revert to St George’s Caye Day. This has been a grey area between the two political parties in Belize. The P.U.P., in the pre-independence period, renamed what was known as St George’s Caye Day to National Day. At the time the reason given was that it was to foster nationalism but the followers of the then loyal opposition considered it to be a dilution of the significance of the battle of St George’s Caye. Many, however, have continued to refer to the day as September tenth. And to drive home its point, this year, the government is also taking the opening of the celebrations to Saint Georges Caye.