Developments today indicate that next week’s Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting may generate more sparks than usual on the issue of Reparations.
UK Prime Minister Burnham issued a “Statement” in the Guardian newspaper saying that the UK was open to discussions around an appropriate apology for its role in trans-Atlantic slavery, but was clear that reparations were not included.
Prime Minister Mia Mottley welcomed the UK statement and its openness to an apology, but noted that on reparations CARICOM had a different view.
The CARICOM Chair, Prime Minister Hon. Philip J. Pierre in a statement on behalf of all CARICOM states was even more clear. He said:
The Caribbean Community does not accept that reparations are “not the right answer”. Nor do we accept the argument that responsibility falls away because the people of Britain today played no personal part in these crimes. Reparatory justice has never been about individual guilt. It is about the responsibility of states and institutions — and that responsibility does not expire with the passing of generations. We do believe that the successive generations continue to be the beneficiaries, materially, socially and psychologically of that crime of racialised chattel enslavement.
The table has thus been set for a discussion on reparations that couild be quite difficult.
See also:
Burnham ‘open’ to calls for slavery apology but rules out reparations – BBC
Andy Burnham open to calls for formal apology for Britain’s role in slave trade | Commonwealth of Nations|- The Guardian