Barbados is ready to ditch Britain’s Queen. For many in the country, the move has been a long time coming

The former British colony — which gained independence in 1966 — “It was the first laboratory for English colonialism in the tropics,” added Drayton, who grew up in the country. “It is in Barbados that the English first pass laws, which distinguish the rights of people who they call ‘Negroes,’ from those who are not, and it is the precedence set in Barbados in terms of economy and law, which then come to be transferred to Jamaica, and the Carolinas and the rest of the Caribbean, along with institutions of that colony.” A decades-old debateThe writing has long been on the wall for a break-up between Barbados and Britain, with many calling for the removal of the Queen’s status over the years, according to Cynthia Barrow-Giles, a professor of constitutional governance and politics at The University of the West Indies (UWI) at Cave Hill, Barbados. She told CNN the desire to become a republic is more than 20 years old and “reflected the input in the governance consultations across the island and its diaspora.””The conclusion then was very simple,” Barrow-Giles said. “Barbados had reached the stage of maturity in its political evolution where what ought to have been part and parcel of the movement to independence was not for pragmatic reasons. 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Others have questioned the timeframe of just over a year that the government gave itself to make the transition, aligning the birth of the republic with the country’s 55th anniversary of independence on Tuesday. Hewitt believes Mottley’s government wanted to act quickly to “try to take attention off of what is a very difficult time in Barbados.””The world suffers and struggles against the Covid-19 pandemic, but for Barbados, as a tourist-based economy, it has been particularly difficult,” he said. “If you accept the notion of a republic being a system being given to the people, the challenge we face is there’s not been a lot of consultation on becoming a republic. Yes, it was included in the throne speech. But the people of Barbados have not been part of this journey.” He added: “What we are dealing with now is just the ceremonial, cosmetic changes and I feel that if we were really going to republic, it should have been a meaningful journey, where the people of Barbados were engaged in the entire process of conceptualization to actually bringing it to fruition,” he added.It’s a sentiment shared by Ronnie Yearwood, an activist and lecturer of law at the UWI Cave Hill campus in Barbados. While he too supports the declaration of a republic, he also feels “robbed of an opportunity to have my beautiful moment.” “The process was so badly managed, the government made a decision on the type of republic that we were going to become, without asking me the voter, me the citizen, what form of republic do you want?”The Barbadian government “focused on the endgame” rather than the process of transition, a move Yearwood described as “backward.” Yearwood said he and many others felt that the government should have held a public referendum and engaged in a longer period of public consultation before making the switch. “If you’re going to do this, you do it in a holistic way, remove everything. You don’t piecemeal the Constitution,” he added. Will other countries follow?Prime Minister Mottley, who recently charmed world leaders at the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland, did not need to hold a public referendum on the subject to push forward. In May, her government created a Republican Status Transition Advisory Committee, a 10-member group tasked with helping manage the transition from a monarchical system to a republic. The only hurdle was securing a two-thirds majority in parliament, which was a relatively straight-forward process given her party has held a majority since her “The decision in some ways doesn’t reflect any evaluation of the House of Windsor. I do think it reflects more of a sense of people within Barbados now think it’s a little bit absurd to have your head of state determined by the circumstances of birth in a family which resides 4,000 miles away.”Hewitt, too, anticipates more countries may opt to break with the British monarchy but suggests that will happen after the reign of Elizabeth II comes to an end “simply because the Queen is held in such high regard.” “People would see it as almost a personal slight against her to do it now. But I feel that once the Crown passes, people will feel that it is time.”CNN has launched Royal News, a new weekly dispatch bringing you the inside track on the royal family, what they are up to in public and what’s happening behind palace walls. Sign up here.