Gwendolyn Lizarraga
| Gwendolyn Lizarraga | |
|---|---|
 |
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| Member of the Belize House of Representatives for | |
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In office 26 March 1961 – 30 October 1974 |
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| Preceded by | (constituency created) |
| Succeeded by | Adolfo Lizarraga |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
Gwendolyn Margaret Smith 11 July 1901 Maskall, Belize District, British Honduras |
| Died | 9 June 1975 (aged 73) Belize City, Belize |
| Nationality | Belizean |
| Political party | People's United Party |
Gwendolyn Margaret Lizarraga, MBE (11 July 1901 – 9 June 1975) commonly known as Madam Liz, was a Belizean businesswoman, women's rights activist and politician. She was the first woman elected to the British Honduras Legislative Assembly (now the Belize House of Representatives) and the first woman to serve as a government minister in British Honduras, now Belize.
Gwendolyn Margaret Smith was born on 11 July 1901 to Sidney Smith and Guadalupe Baeza in Maskall Village, British Honduras. She attended Mr. Datsun Primary School, St. Mary's Primary School and St. Catherine's Academy. In 1926, she married the photographer Victor Manuel Lizarraga and they subsequently had five children.
Lizarraga was a businesswoman, who operated a successful chicle and mahogany farm. As she conducted her business inspecting the chicle and mahogany camps, Lizarraga ignored convention, driving a land rover, wearing pants, carrying a gun, and smoking cigarettes. She was very outspoken and authoritative, and not intimidated in her dealings with big companies such as Wrigley’s, Castillo and Thurton. She was also known as a compassionate employer and one who supported equal pay for equal work. In 1943, when the British Honduran Trade Union (BHTU) was forming, Lizarraga was an invited speaker to an April meeting. She urged inclusion of protections for women laborers and equal wages and while the male participants agreed with her at her speech, when they voted on their minimum wage standards in June of that year, women were excluded.
Beginning in the 1950s, Lizarraga worked in several areas to promote women's rights. In 1953, she was hired as a female parole officer for the Social Development Department. In 1954, she began organizing women politically throughout the country beginning in her home area of Maskall Village. From there she traveled north to Orange Walk Town, and then to Sand Hill, Benque Viejo and finally to the far southern, Punta Gorda. In 1959, she formed the United Women’s Group (UWG) with 900 women from throughout the country, with the goals of empowering women culturally, economically, and politically. To that end, she co-founded the United Women’s Credit Union, encouraging women save, "even if they could only afford $0.25 per week". Recognizing that only landowners were eligible voters in British Honduras at that time, Madam Liz made special efforts to help women acquire property. She took women from the UWG to the Lands Department to obtain land grants, but they were was told there was no land available. Marching into the swamps, Lizarraga surveyed and created a map of parcels for the women. She then took it back to the Lands Department for recording. These women's parcels are located in what is today the Collet Constituency between Curassow, Elston Kerr and Gibnut Streets, bounded by North Creek. Similarly when children were denied access to education because there was no money to prepare the site and construct a school in their poor and working-class neighborhood, Madam Liz and the UWG women began clearing the mangroves from the swamps with two-man handsaws. Workers from the Publics Works Department later joined the women and the result was two new schools—Belize Junior Secondary Schools N° 1 and N° 2—were completed, which were later renamed Edward P. Yorke School and Gwen Lizarraga High School.
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