Opposition Leader Shyne Barrow Promotes Bio-Documentary with Major U.S. Media Tour

Belize’s Leader of the Opposition, Moses “Shyne” Barrow, has embarked on a high-profile media tour, with recent appearances across major U.S. platforms. The tour promotes Barrow’s upcoming bio-documentary, The Honorable Shyne, which dives into his transformation from a chart-topping musician to a Belizean political figure. In a special screening held last night in New York, Belizean artist Daryn Casanova attended and later praised the film, calling it an “Amazing Documentary, 10/10” via Instagram. Today, Barrow made guest appearances on The Daily Show and The Stephen A. Smith Show, where he continued to share insights on his life and the documentary’s themes of resilience, ambition, and change.

Moses “Shyne” Barrow, Leader of the Opposition: “Fast forward to 46 year old Shyne, who I’ve been politically active for the last 10 years. I have an opportunity to be the system and that doesn’t always happen. You know, Jay Z helped Obama become president. You know, Beyonce tried to help the Vice President, you know but it doesn’t always work out. You don’t always have someone who can go from the spectrum of entertainment to actually the Oval Office or the Prime Minister’s Office in my case. And so in my work in the last 10 years it was a smooth transition from singing about all that was wrong with the society I was living in to being the person that can provide solutions for all that is wrong. And I don’t think it’s a stretch . Financial commitment it was a story that we were going to tell. I didn’t want to tell the Diddy story. I did not want to tell…”

Stephen Smith, Host: Why not?

Moses “Shyne” Barrow, Leader of the Opposition: “Because that’s not my story. My story is next prime minister Belize. My story is power. My story is victor. My story is trying over tragedy. That’s my story.”

On the Daily Show in particular, he emphasized how he has been able to transmit the same energy he put into music, into his political career in Belize. He also discussed his friendship with Sean “P Diddy” Combs and how that changed the trajectory of this life. 

Moses “Shyne” Barrow, Leader of the Opposition: “Music, I was making music to be the voice of the voiceless. My art represented so much more than just a beat and being famous and being an entertainer. It was really poetry, it was really dissertations that were life or death. And being in the House of Representatives is the same thing. The people that are dealing with high crime rates, high poverty rates, people dealing with inflation, people dealing with poverty and when I go into the House of Representatives I’m speaking on behalf of those people. So I don’t care what my political critics have to say. I don’t care what the paid media or any of my detractors have to say because I’m fighting for people. Nothing in life is given. So whatever policies you believe in, you have to fight for it. And sometimes you might have a temporary loss. I had a loss of 10 years, incarceration, for something that I didn’t do. I was defending a friend and a friend turned around and said, hey, it was him. And it wasn’t me. It was, according to the witnesses, one of the witnesses said, Diddy shot him. I never said it, because I was busy defending myself and defending him. But the point I’m trying to make is I could have felt sorry for myself for ten years, but I didn’t. I was present every day of those ten years. Then I got deported and I was present every day for the thirteen years of deportation before I was allowed to come back here as the future Prime Minister of Belize. So I kept fighting for twenty-three years.”

The documentary is set to premiere on Hulu and Disney Plus on November 18.