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Barbados has announced its intention to remove the Queen as head of state and become a republic next year.
The Caribbean island said it wants “full sovereignty” by the time it celebrates its 55th anniversary of independence from the United Kingdom in November 2021.
A speech written by Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley quoted her first Prime Minister Errol Barrow, who warned against “loitering in colonial facilities.”
The Queen met with the Governor General of Barbados, Dame Sandra Mason, at Buckingham Palace in 2018
Reading the speech, Barbados Governor General Dame Sandra Mason said: “The time has come to completely leave our colonial past behind.
“Barbadians want a Barbadian head of state.
“This is the ultimate statement of confidence in who we are and what we are capable of achieving.
“Therefore, Barbados will take the next logical step towards full sovereignty and will become a republic when we celebrate our 55th anniversary of independence.”
The queen photographed during a tour of Barbados in 1977
The country gained its independence from Great Britain in 1966, although the Queen remains its constitutional monarch.
In 1998, a Barbados constitutional review commission recommended republican status, and in 2015 Prime Minister Freundel Stuart said that “we have to move from a monarchical system to a republican form of government in the very near future.”
The Queen and Prince Philip greet the crowd in Barbados in 1966
Most Caribbean countries have maintained formal ties to the monarchy after achieving independence.
Barbados would join Trinidad and Tobago, Dominica and Guyana if it continues with its plan to become a republic.
Jamaica’s Prime Minister Andrew Holness has also said it is a priority for his government, but has yet to do so.
Barbados took another step towards independence from the United Kingdom in 2003 when it replaced the Judicial Committee of the London-based Privy Council with the Caribbean Court of Justice, located in Trinidad and Tobago’s Port of Spain, as its final court of appeal.
