And while musicians are still struggling to get into that spotlight, one Belizean is shining across the region after she was elected onto the executive body of the Commonwealth Youth Council.
Student and youth advocate Dominique Noralez is now the representative for the Caribbean and the Americas and joins a host of other young people who also represent their respective region. Today, our colleagues at Krem spoke to her as she explained the challenges with having to campaign virtually and what this role now means.
Dominique Noralez - Rep, Caribbean & Americas, Commonwealth Youth Council "Campaigning was rather interesting, rather different that I imagine it to be, usually campaigning is on the ground in whatever place they host the commonwealth youth forum or the commonwealth heads of government meeting but this time we had to do it online so we had to use emails, we had to use WhatsApp, we had to use alliances to really win the race and garner support, you have to team up with people. One of the things I said to anybody who reached out because I think from the beginning I was recognized as the frontrunner for the Caribbean and Americas, there was one other person who ran in the race, in fact it started with 3 and one candidate pulled out because he decided that it made no sense to run against me. So, there was one other person in the race, she's from Trinidad and Tobago. So, the alliances that were made were really one that I said to myself, I want to see if I can win this on my own, without anybody pushing undercurrents for me. That eventually shifted a bit, because you recognize very quickly that you cannot win without some sort of alliances but I think I remain through to it for the most part. Essentially, I am the liaison between the commonwealth youth program, the commonwealth youth council, and this region, Caribbean and the Americas, which includes Canada. My job is to deliver on the mandates which I put forward, which were four points, three of them programmatic, one thematic, the thematic one was environmental protection one and coming from Belize and as an environmentalist myself that had to be a part of my manifesto. The other three has to do with incubating youth power which is focused on economic on economic empowerment of young people that comes straight from policy work from 2020 and the next one had to do with mental health and consciousness raising. You know me, and so it had to be a part of my work and I think in the pandemic we realize very quickly that a lot of labour rights violated so I really wanted young people to understand labour rights so that is why I put it in my manifesto. And then the last one had to do with national youth councils, a thing that has been very close to my heart given my own history and being a part of a national youth council that eventually dissolved and so I know it is a priority of the government now but I want to see it really institutionalized."
Elections for the Commonwealth Youth Council are held every two years.
