Dr. Douglas Slater

MESSAGE DELIVERED BY

DR. DOUGLAS SLATER

ASSISTANT SECRETARY GENERAL

HUMAN AND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT

CARIBBEAN COMMUNITY SECRETARIAT

ON THE OCCASION OF

THE SECOND REGIONAL CONFERENCE ON REPARATIONS

ANTIGUA AND BARBUDA

12 OCTOBER 2014

It is a distinct pleasure and honour to address the opening ceremony of the Second Regional Conference on Reparations and to bring warm greetings on behalf of the Secretary General of the Caribbean Community, His Excellency Mr. Irwin LaRocque.

This is an important historic moment in the development of our region and the regional integration movement as the governments and people of the region have embarked on an important effort to revisit and right the history of wrongs that are an intrinsic part of the evolution of the Caribbean. It is a journey that we must take to bring the people of African descent healing, redress, truth and reconciliation from a painful past of over 400 years of the trans-Atlantic Slave Trade, Slavery and Colonialism.

Our Heads of Government took the historic and unanimous decision at their Thirty-Fourth Regular Meeting of the Conference of Heads of Government, held in July 2013 in Trinidad and Tobago, to endorse a proposal from the Prime Minister of St. Vincent and The Grenadines, Dr. the Hon. Ralph Gonsalves, to pursue Reparations for the crimes against humanity of Native Genocide, the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade and Chattel Slavery from the United Kingdom and other former colonial European nations. It was agreed that all Member States would establish national reparations committees that would report to a regional commission, constituted by Chairpersons of the national committees. We currently have 12 Member States that have established national committees, those being Antigua and Barbuda, The Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Dominica, Guyana, Jamaica, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname and Trinidad and Tobago.

We owe a debt of gratitude to Dr. the Hon. Ralph Gonsalves and the Honourable Freundel Stuart, Prime Minister of Barbados for their political leadership in this movement and we are also indebted to Professor Sir Hilary Beckles, Chairman of the CARICOM Reparations Commission - for his intellectual leadership, seminal research and passion that has inspired so many in our region to action.

Words can never adequately describe human slavery as a concept, or the slave trade as a practice. The Trans-Atlantic slave trade in Africans – let us call it what it was - with its repulsive and inhumane character, was a human atrocity of global proportion organised to satisfy an economic need (mainly of European Society). In that process, it relegated human beings to property – chattel. It justified widespread, systemic and prolonged African enslavement, for profit, through an ideology of racism, resulting in virtual genocide.

As a united CARICOM, we intend to establish the moral, ethical and legal case for Reparations, including the special case for reparative justice for Haiti. As we seek redress for the blatant wrongs that have never been adequately addressed, we are on the threshold of a massive regional awakening and renewal that in no small way may re-ignite and rally the region to new levels of consciousness and cooperation.

The fact that CARICOM’s action has resonated with so many countries, communities and people across the world is testimony to the reparatory healing that is so greatly needed at this peculiar moment in human history.

However, we know that we have no easy task before us. To be successful in our bid for reparatory justice there are a few things we need to do. First we need to educate ourselves and each other on the facts. We must be our own best advocates. We must use this opportunity to recall the facts of this protracted period of oppression for the benefit of especially the younger generation; for those who may have forgotten; and for those from whom the truth was perhaps hidden. This is an important opportunity for teaching and we must teach each other and the younger generation.

If we are going to be successful in our bid for Reparations we also have to refute those who oppose us. We must refute arguments like:

The descendants of the enslavers today cannot be held responsible for what their forefathers did;
CARICOM nations need to stop playing victim and take responsibility for their own condition and development;
Slavery was a legal institution at the time and therefore not subject to legal restitution in the present day.

These are arguments that we must discredit and counter with the facts; arguments by those who do not want to take responsibility for the crime against humanity that was committed against our forebears.

In 2007 when the United Nations observed the 200th Anniversary of the Abolition of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade – the observance of which I should point out was as a result of a Resolution that was co-sponsored by CARICOM States – the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams, delivered a historic address at Westminster Abbey on 27 March 2007 at a special service to mark the Bicentennial. He stated then, and I quote, that “ We who are the heirs of the slave owing and slave-trading nations of the past have to face the fact that our historic prosperity was built in large part on this atrocity; those who are the heirs of the communities ravaged by the slave trade know very well that much of their present suffering and struggling is the result of centuries of abuse.” End quote. We could not have said it better ourselves.

To be successful in winning our cause, I urge all of us to remain strong and resolute; ensure that we are well organized and we do the necessary research at the national and regional levels to present the scientific and historical evidence. This Second Regional Conference on Reparations will help to advance this action. We have an august body of intellectuals, activists and Pan-Africanists with us to interrogate and to present the evidence we need to advance our cause. We have a challenging but not insurmountable task because we have all the expertise and support we need to succeed.

I wish to take this opportunity to thank the Government and people of Antigua and Barbuda most sincerely; thank-you Honourable Prime Minister Gaston Browne for so graciously offering to host this Second Regional Conference on Reparations to ensure that we keep the momentum going. A heartfelt thank you to the Antigua and Barbuda Reparations Support Commission for all the hard logistical work that we know goes into planning and executing such an event. Thank-you to all the delegations from Member States for your presence here which signals your commitment and support.

We stand on the shoulders of many iconic giants who have called for Reparations, called for African liberation and for racial pride. Iconic Pan Africanists like the Rt. Hon. Marcus Mosiah Garvey; like the late Ambassador Dudley Thompson; great artists and proponents of Rastafari like the Hon Robert Nesta (Bob) Marley and Honourable Neville “Bunny Wailer” Livingston and the entire Rastafari movement that has been the conscience and the vanguard of the Reparations and back to Africa Movement.

I leave you with the words of that great Pan-Africanist, Marcus Mosiah Garvey, founder of the Universal Negro Improvement Association in 1914, National Hero of Jamaica, and ardent advocate of black racial pride, who said:

“God and Nature first made us what we are, and then, out of our own created genius, we make ourselves what we want to be. Follow always that great law. Let the sky and God be our limit and Eternity our measurement.

“Up, up, you Mighty Race! You can accomplish what you will.”

Thank you and good evening.