And, while that pillar of democracy was defaced and tainted by thuggery - could that ever happen in Belize? Well, in a sense, it almost did. Back in 2005, there was an angry mob outside the National Assembly Building in Belmopan. But, unlike the Trump supporters, they weren't there to prop up a desperate leader trying to hold on; they were there to force the Musa Administration to pull back a new budget with some painful tax measures.
The Unions and the then UDP opposition joined common cause as they assembled outside the Assembly building. But it was the UDP's Southside soldiers who did the heavy lifting in shaking up the House Chamber.
It was January of 2005. Jules Vasquez was there and looks back at the day Belmopan almost fell to a mob:
I was there with a camera in the crush of the crowd, the bared teeth of an angry mob, as they tried to pull down the police barrier, on the stairs of the National Assembly.
Stairs which soon became projectiles, slabs of concrete turned into mobile battering rams
Jules Vasquez "So now the stairs are broken, and they are using the stairs of the national assembly to mercilessly pelt the police and the police are holding their ground remaining in formation. Now this would provoke Mr. Jeffries to run into the crowd, there he is, he fell to the ground and somebody kicked him when he fell on the ground."
Jeffries may have fallen, but the police held their ground and held the line.
This is one man who tried to get across to the National Assembly building and police stopped him in his tracks.
The young attorney Mike Peyrefitte also made it to the top of the hill - and was taken away.
But none was a match for Yellowman who cut right through the middle of their defence - like a forward on a football field who can't believe how open he is.
Jules Vasquez "And here we see yellow man right through the middle, yellow man comes up the stairs and the police catch him and they try to take him back over to their side. Now they're holding him on the ground, beating him in the foot, he's accused of biting one of them and he runs back, escapes and run backs into the crowd, so he is back in the UDP crowd, one of the most daring escapes."
Indeed, Yellow ran back like Bolt, But with all that, the house never fell. Yes, the meeting had to be suspended after a tear gas canister was picked up and thrown at police and the fumes wafted into the house
But the House stood, even as the stairs were reduced to rubble and trash - that's as far as the rioters got.
And while order was preserved on that day, the House did descend into anarchy 11 years later in August of 2016 - and it wasn't the rioters who caused it - but the members themselves, when defiant member Julius Espat refused to yield to the speaker - and refused to leave the Chamber when named. The police had to be called into to forcibly eject him - literally kicking and screaming - an ignoble exit - and he wasn't the only one.
Of course, three years and two months later Yellowman did make it into the house chamber, where he became mace-bearer for 12 years, the longest term of anyone to hold that important symbolic post in post independent Belize.
