The original Said
Posted: 10/05/2007 - 08:11 PM
Author:
In early 1969, after publicly demonstrating against the pro-Vietnam War film, THE GREEN BERETS, Said Musa, a young lawyer who was employed by the Government of Belize, first as a magistrate and then as a Crown Counsel, briefly joined the United Black Association for Development (UBAD), and then left with Assad Shoman to form the People’s Action Committee (PAC). In October of 1969, UBAD and PAC merged to form the Revolitical Action Movement (RAM).
RAM broke up in January of 1970, and UBAD resumed its separate existence. Assad Shoman and Said Musa went into private law practice, and their first big case came just weeks after RAM broke up. The PUP government which had been massively re-elected, 17-1 over the coalition NIPDM in December of 1969, in February of 1970 decided to arrest UBAD leaders Evan X Hyde and Ismail Shabazz and charge them with seditious conspiracy. Shoman and Musa immediately offered to defend the UBAD leaders on a voluntary basis, and then, in dramatic fashion, won the case July of 1970 in the Belize Supreme Court.
At some point after that, both Assad and Said entered the ruling People’s United Party, and they both became PUP candidates in the October 1974 general elections. Assad contested Cayo North, and Said ran in the Fort George constituency. Assad lost to the late Joe Andrews, and Said lost to Dean Lindo.
In 1977, Said Musa became the business partner of Evan X Hyde in a company named Cream, Ltd. The company, capitalized at $50,000, purchased offset camera and printing equipment to take Amandala from the obsolete letter press technology into the modern offset process. Mr. Musa owned 40 percent of Cream, Ltd.
The company collapsed between late 1980, when the upcoming independence of Belize was announced by the United States State Department, and March of 1981, when the Heads of Agreement were made public.
Mr. Musa had won the Fort George seat in the December 1979 general elections, and he became Minister of Education in the new PUP government. In a PUP national convention held in 1983, Said Musa challenged the incumbent Louis Sylvestre for the important chairmanship of the ruling PUP. At the time, Sylvestre was considered a leading PUP supporter of big money capitalism, while Musa, supported by Assad Shoman, was still considered a people-oriented socialist. Sylvestre defeated Musa.
The following year, in December 1984, the PUP lost a general election for the very first time. They were beaten badly by the United Democratic Party. Shoman and Musa both lost their seats, in Cayo North and Fort George, respectively.
Shoman retired from electoral politics. It now appears that sometime between 1984 and 1989, Mr. Musa changed his political beliefs. As Prime Minister since 1998, Mr. Musa has been a leader whose first priority is to support big business. It is incredible how much he has appeared to change since Belizeans first saw the original Said Musa in public life in 1969.
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