Smith: I Understand Island Woman Label
Junior Minister Lorna Smith says she now understands why some long-called her an "island woman" after reading the Constitutional Review Commission’s report. Speaking in the House of Assembly, Smith urged the Constitution be updated so citizenship and contribution — not ancestry alone — determine eligibility for elected office.
Junior Minister for Financial Services Lorna Smith told the House of Assembly she finally understands why she and others have long been labelled an "island woman" — a phrase she once regarded as an insult. Smith said reading the Constitutional Review Commission's report gave her context for the sentiment, tracing it to the civic pride Virgin Islanders developed after leaving the Leeward Islands Federation in 1956. "It was only after reading this report that I fully understood why I grew up most of my life being referred to as an island woman or a garret," she told legislators during the ongoing constitutional review debate.
Smith, who is a belonger but not of Virgin Islands ancestry, said she has avoided the topic previously out of sensitivity. She said it is time to speak openly about inclusion, particularly in relation to section 65 of the Constitution, which currently restricts eligibility for elected office to those with Virgin Islands lineage. "I am able to sit in this House because I was grandfathered under the 1976 Constitution," Smith said. "But what of my other brothers and sisters who, like me, know no other home?
What of their children who may want to contest an election?" She said the restriction excludes many people born, raised and deeply rooted in the Territory. Smith argued that belonging and contribution to the BVI should count as much as bloodline, noting that most countries base political eligibility on citizenship rather than ancestry.
She warned that narrow definitions of identity risk dividing a small community that cannot afford internal fractures: "There are persons among us who are using this definition of ancestral Virgin Islanders for divisive reasons. Something that this community can ill afford. So where is this divisiveness taking us if not down a path of self-destruction?" Her call for a more inclusive approach echoes comments by Opposition Leader Myron Walwyn and has become one of the central, and most contentious, threads in the constitutional review.
For residents, the debate touches everyday questions of who can represent their interests and how the Territory recognises long-term ties that are not determined solely by ancestry. The constitutional review process remains under way. Any changes to eligibility rules would require the agreed legal steps to amend the Constitution, but Smith’s remarks have sharpened attention on whether the Territory will move toward a citizenship-based standard for public office or maintain the current ancestral requirements.
Primary source: BVI News