“You Touch One, You Touch All”: Why Belize’s Garinagu Took to the Streets 

Garifuna people backed by the National Garifuna Council marched this morning in a peaceful protest from Marion Jones Stadium to the Honduran Embassy in Belize City. The march moved to the beat of drums, singing and placards showing solidarity with Garifuna communities in San Juan, Honduras.

Signs read “Justice for San Juan,” “Garifuna Rights Are Human Rights,” “Our Land is Not For Sale” and “We Remember the 1937 Massacre in San Juan, Honduras.”

The protest responds to reports of armed security forces entering San Juan de Lempira and removing Garifuna people from their land.

“We see people in their uniforms, military, police, and fully armed against our people to remove us yet again from our lands. This we cannot allow to happen,” said Ifasina Efunyemi during the protest, an executive of the National Garifuna Council.

“We are one people. So you touch one, you touch all,” Efunyemi added as Honduran officials came out of the embassy to see what was unfolding at their doorstep. “We are a peaceful people. But if you stir us up, we are a warrior people.”

Efunyemi said the protest carries a message for the governments of the countries Garifuna people have helped build.

Belizean Garinagu trace direct ancestry to San Juan. In 1937, Garinagu in San Juan were massacred and violently repressed. Survivors fled to Belize, and many families in Dangriga, Hopkins, Seine Bight, Punta Gorda, Georgetown and Barranco trace their ancestry to those who escaped.

The Inter-American Court of Human Rights ruled in favour of Garifuna communities in Honduras in 2015. The council says the 2026 military presence in San Juan represents a renewed threat to land its people have already fought to keep.

“So know that even though the numbers that you see here may seem small to you, you are not seeing the millions that stand with us right at this moment,” Efunyemi said.