Shyne has lost his bid for re-election in Belize. The former Bad Boy rapper conceded defeat during a press conference on Wednesday night (March 12).
According to Channel 5 Belize, Shyne (born Moses Barrow) was unseated by fellow United Democratic Party (UDP) member and businessman Lee Mark Chang in the general election.
Shyne, who was elected to the Mesopotamia seat in Belize City for the House of Representatives in 2020, had been serving as the Leader of the Opposition and the leader of the Belize United Democratic Party.
In the election, Shyne secured only 318 votes in the constituency of Mesopotamia, while Chang earned 601.
“The people have spoken. Congratulations to Lee Mark Chang — he’s now the new area representative of Mesopotamia, and I wish him well,” Shyne said, according to Channel 5 Belize. “I was confident; that was the interaction I was having with the people, but they made a decision to go in another direction, and I respect that.”
With Shyne losing his House of Representatives seat, he plans to resign as leader of the Belize UDP once a new official is elected.
“I certainly will resign effective once we have a national convention to elect a new leader,” he added. “Obviously, you can’t be a leader of the United Democratic Party once you’re not a member of the House, and I would not want to be appointed as a senator or anything to hold on to the leadership.”
Leading up to the election, Chang had been highly critical of Shyne, reportedly referring to him as a “cancer” in the government, adding that “the people are realizing they have been bamboozled.”
It’s unclear if this loss marks the end of Shyne’s political career in Belize.
Shyne first rose to fame in the late ‘90s as a rapper under Diddy’s Bad Boy Records label. In 2001, he was sentenced to 10 years in prison on assault, gun possession, and reckless endangerment charges for his role in a 1999 NYC nightclub shooting that left two people wounded. He was released in 2009 after serving eight years behind bars and was deported to Belize.
