Participants at a reparations summit in Ghana agreed to establish a global reparations fund to seek overdue compensation for the millions of Africans enslaved centuries ago as part of the transatlantic slave trade.
The Accra Reparations Conference calls for reparations in response to the fact that approximately 20 million people were forcibly taken from Africa by European countries from the 16th to the 19th century and enslaved on plantations where vast fortunes were made from the misery of workers. This is further increasing the rise in the number of people.
Centuries after the end of the slave trade, people of African descent around the world remain “victims of systemic racism and racialized attacks,” according to a recent report from the United Nations Special Forum. This report supports the idea of “reparations as follows.” It is the cornerstone of justice in the 21st century. ”
On Thursday, Ghanaian President Nana Addo Akufo-Addo said at the conference, attended by government officials from all over Africa and the diaspora, that “Africa, with its sons and daughters who have been ruled free and sold into slavery, must also be free. It’s time to get it.” Compensation. ”
Reparations for the enslavement of Africans is an issue that the world “must face and can no longer ignore”, he argued.
Mr Akufo-Addo accused Britain and other European countries of enriching themselves through the slave trade, while “the enslaved Africans themselves have not received a penny”.
Participants at the conference in Ghana’s capital, Accra, did not say how such a reparations fund would be administered. But Gunaka Lagoke, assistant professor of history and Pan-African studies, said the system should be used to “fix the problems” the continent faces in all sectors of the economy.
Ambassador Amr Aljowaily, Strategic Adviser to the Vice-President of the African Union Commission, who read out the draft resolution entitled Accra Declaration, said reparations are based on “the moral and legal rights and dignity of peoples”. .
In addition to the Global Reparations Fund, which is supported by a committee of experts set up by the commission in collaboration with African countries, “the special envoy will engage in campaigns as well as litigation and judicial work,” Aljowaily said. .
Activists argue that reparations should go beyond direct financial payments and include development assistance to countries, the return of colonized resources, and systemic redress of oppressive policies and laws. There is.
Nkechi Taifa, director of the US-based Reparations Education Project, said the amount of compensation required would be determined through a “negotiated settlement”. [that will] benefit the public. ”