Showing posts with label indigenous. Show all posts
Showing posts with label indigenous. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 1, 2023
The Health Benefits of Soursop
Looking for a delicious and nutritious way to boost your health? Look no further than soursop! Our new infographic is packed with information on the amazing health benefits of this tropical fruit, from its anti-cancer and anti-inflammatory properties to its immune system boosting and digestive health benefits. Check out our infographic to learn more about soursop and how you can incorporate it into your diet!
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Saturday, July 28, 2018
Heartbreak: Rasta Errol’s Tale
“Hearts can break. Yes, hearts can break. Sometimes I think it would be better if we died when they did, but we don't.”
~Stephen King, Hearts in Atlantis
“Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain and little, I am soulless and heartless? You think wrong! - I have as much soul as you, - and full as much heart!”
~Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre
My heart breaks often at least 3 times a year… that’s the way it is in Jamaica. Friends die. Yes they do, and die tragically too. Last year at this time I lost a sistren, Anieta Robinson. Her struggle was a short fight with cancer. By the time I heard and bought turmeric and noni to go look for her, she was gone. So she has been in my meditation as of late, especially since from time to time I review my role in my communities, be it the Rastafari community, my geographical space, my family or the artist community. So while these thoughts are floating about in my mind that at 4am while waiting for the Knutsford Express to go to a seminar on Monitoring and Evaluation, in Kingston on behalf of The Rastafari Coral Garden Benevolent Society, that a breddrin and member who is going to Kingston as well says, Yannick, yuh hear wah happen to Rasta Errol? Oh how I have grown to hate that question… the answer when I say no, is never him win Lotto! Nope; the answer 9 time out of ten is “him dead”. This occasion was scarcely different. When I said “no” the answer was, “Them stab him up a Arcade”. And as I feel the old familiar jolt of shock, all I can think is AGAIN!
So now as I am supposed to be having the time of my life watching Putin’s World Cup, my mind is a constant kaleidoscope of emotion, racing back and forth from planning the future, to grief to, happy as Ronaldo and Mbappi blazes the score sheets, celebrating Senegal, weeping for Germany, remembering Errol, Anieta, Likkle Dread, Chrissy, the army of fallen soldiers, writing proposals, chasing paper, being there for my daughter, considering the future of the nation, the future of the race, the future of my family, am I hovering close to St. James Infirmary, is there a pension for me, will I escape poverty, what is the future for me when I become an elder??? As all this is churning in my mind, my heartbreaks for myself, it breaks for Errol, it breaks when I consider the existential plight of Rastafari. Yet from this I reaffirm, why it is I am a community activist, why I am a member of the Rastafari Coral Gardens Benevolent Society!
The purpose of the organization is to alleviate the distress of the vulnerable Rastafari community. We provide relief and care to those who to varying degree have been excluded from society, disenfranchised or have been rendered voiceless – the elderly, neglected and victims of the 1963 atrocity. As a result of the actions of a few persons in Coral Gardens in 1963, the entire Rastafari community was officially targeted by the State of newly-independent Jamaica. This led to extreme brutality, imprisonment and death of many Rastafari sons and daughters across Jamaica by the police, army and other citizens of Jamaica. The Rastafari Coral Gardens Benevolent Society was registered under the Friendly Societies Act to keep alive the memory of the Coral Gardens atrocities and the denial of the fundamental human rights and freedoms of members of the Rastafari community.
Rasta Errol at 60 years old was a member of the RCGBS. At his age he was more than qualified to be a beneficiary. The last two times I saw Errol was at UWI out by the airport, we had been at a seminar for Capacity Building by Mona Social Services (MSS). The last time would be Sunday June 10, 2018 at The People’s Arcade at an RCGBS meeting. There he handed me some herb and a bottle of Spurlina. He showed me his MSS certificate which he had gotten framed. I was thankful as someone who ought to be getting was still giving… I didn't know it would be the last time I would see him.
As I perused the INTERNET to possibly understand what the media may know I found this meager report of a mighty man. “Reports from the Barrett Town Police are that, about 9am [on Tuesday, June 12], Cooke was walking in the People’s Arcade when he was pounced on by a group of men armed with knives, who attacked him and inflicted several wounds to his upper body.” The JCF stated that Cooke was taken to hospital where he died while undergoing treatment. Investigations are continuing. Sometimes people wonder within the Rastafari community and outside it… if our collective efforts are necessary or valid… it is lives like Errol’s, life lived exceptionally is why we must organize and central. It is to prevent the ending of lives in such tragedies and tragic manner is why we must organize to secure the future of Jamaica's pan African heart. SELAH.
Sunday, June 26, 2016
The Criminalization of African Spirituality: Part 1
"Democracy means that people can say what they want to. All the people. It means that they can vote as they wish. All the people. It means that they can worship God in any way they feel right, and that includes Christians and Jews and voodoo doctors as well."
~Dalton Trumbo
For most of my life Obeah in Jamaica has been a taboo. Scoffed at by academics and intellectuals rooted deep in empiricism and cynicism. The Church associates Obeah with spiritual wickedness and evil, skeptics tend to think it is used to defraud vulnerable people like the snake oil man to swindle and bamboozle. In my family it was the butt of jokes and was the stuff of old time superstition.For me the stuff Obeah was like the mythos of slavery... a literature populated with Rolling Calves, Black Heart men, Ananse, masks, Pocomania, Kumina, Revival, Jonkunnu, Bats(what Jamaican call moths), owls, D. Lawrence, Bible and Key and Maccabees Bibles.
In a more academic light... Obeah is a term used in the West Indies to refer to folk magic, sorcery,
and religious practices developed among West African slaves,
specifically of Igbo origin. Obeah's history is similar to that of other Afro-American religions including Palo, Vodou, SanterÃa, and
Hoodoo. Obeah is practiced in Suriname, Cuba, Jamaica, Trinidad and
Tobago, Dominica, Guyana, Grenada, Belize, The Bahamas, and other
Caribbean nations. Enslaved Africans brought spiritual practices to the
Caribbean that included folk healing and a belief in magic for good and
for evil to opposition.
Vodun means spirit in the Fon and Ewe languages, pronounced [vodá¹¹] with a nasal high-tone u; also spelled Vodon, Vodoun, Vodou, Voudou, Voodoo, etc. is practiced by the Ewe people of eastern and southern Ghana, and southern and central Togo; and the Kabye people, Mina people, and Fon people of southern and central Togo, southern and central Benin. It is also practiced by some Gun (Gbe) people of Lagos and Ogun in southwest Nigeria.
It is distinct from the various African traditional religions in the interiors of these countries and is the main source of religions with similar names found among the African Diaspora in the western hemisphere such as Haitian Vodou; Puerto Rican Vodú; Cuban Vodú; Dominican Vudú; Brazilian Vodum; and Louisiana Voodoo. All of these closely related faiths are syncretized with Christianity to various degrees and with the traditional beliefs of the Kongo people and Indigenous American traditions.
Now the term 'Obeah' is first found in documents from the early 18th century, as in its connection to Nanny of the Maroons, but discussion of it becomes more frequent when it was made illegal in Jamaica after Tacky's War, in which an Obeah-man provided advice to the rebels.
In 1787 a letter to an English newspaper referred to "Obiu-women" interpreting the wishes of the dead at the funeral of a murdered slave in Jamaica: a footnote explained the term as meaning "Wise-women".
A continuing source of white anxiety related to Obeah was the belief that practitioners were skilled in using poisons, as mentioned in Matthew Lewis's Journal of a West India Proprietor. The European world had equated Black and African Spirituality with their own history of wizards and witchcraft and necromancy. Thousands of people in the Caribbean have been subject to prosecution
for their religious and spiritual healing practice, since the first law
against Obeah was passed in Jamaica in 1760 then in the anti-Obeah law passed in Barbados in 1818 there was the specific forbidding of the
possession of "any poison, or any noxious or destructive substance"during slavery, until the recent
past.
A doctor who examined the medicine chest of an Obeah man arrested in Jamaica in 1866 identified white arsenic as one of the powders in it, but could not identify the others. The unnamed correspondent reporting this affirmed "The Jamaica herbal is an extensive one, and comprises some highly poisonous juices, of which the Obeah men have a perfect knowledge."
During the mid 19th century the appearance of a comet in the sky became the focal point of an outbreak of religious fanatical millennialism among the Myal men of Jamaica. Spiritualism was at that time sweeping the English-speaking nations as well, and it readily appealed to those in the Afro-Caribbean diaspora, as spirit contact, especially with the dead, is an essential part of many African religions.
During the conflict between Myal and Obeah, the Myal men positioned themselves as the "good" opponents to "evil" Obeah. They claimed that Obeah men stole people's shadows, and they set themselves up as the helpers of those who wished to have their shadows restored.
Myal men contacted spirits in order to expose the evil works they ascribed to the Obeah men, and led public parades which resulted in crowd-hysteria that engendered violent antagonism against Obeah men. The public "discovery" of buried Obeah charms, presumed to be of evil intent, led on more than one occasion to violence against the rival Obeah men.
Laws were passed that limited both Obeah and Myal traditions but due to the outrages perpetrated by the mobs of Myalists, the British government of Jamaica sent many Myal men to prison, and this, along with the failure of their millennialist prophecies.
Obeah laws, which still exist in many Caribbean
countries, there have also been laws against specific religious groups,
including the Spiritual Baptist faith, which was outlawed for a
substantial part of the twentieth century in Trinidad and Tobago, St.
Vincent, and Grenada. Other people faced prosecution for independent
religious and healing work under laws against practicing medicine
without a license, vagrancy, and ‘night noises’, among others.
- 1760: In response to a major slave rebellion, the colonial government outlaws Obeah for the first time in the Caribbean, with the Act to Remedy the Evils arising from Irregular Assemblies of Slaves, defining Obeah as: "The wicked Art of Negroes... pretending to have Communication with the Devil and other evil spirits"
-
1898: Under the Obeah Law
practitioners face 12 months in jail and flogging. An Obeah practitioner
is defined as: "Any person who, to effect any fraudulent or unlawful
purpose, or for gain, or for the purpose of frightening any person,
uses, or pretends to use any occult means, or pretends to possess any
supernatural power or knowledge"
- 1908: Parliament passes the Medical Law, which was intended to regulate medical practice, but was also used frequently in cases to define difference between medicine and Obeah
Sunday, March 27, 2016
Wednesday, March 9, 2016
53rd Commemoration of "Bad Friday": The Coral Gardens Atrocity of 1963
The Rastafari Coral Gardens Benevolent Society
Hosts
Our 53rd Commemoration of "Bad Friday"
The Coral Gardens Atrocity of 1963
25th of March 2016
Jarrett Park, Montego Bay, St. James.
Jarrett Park, Montego Bay, St. James.
GATES OPEN 10:00 am
~Health Fair
~Children's Funday
~Banquet for the Elders
~Testimonies of the Victims and Witnesses
~Certificate of Recognition to Matriarchs and Patriarchs
~Observation of the 50th Anniversary Visit of H.I.M. to Jamaica
~SYMPOSIUM ON PUBLIC DEFENDER'S REPORT
~Cultural Presetations
ADMISSION: $700
Food, Refreshment and Craft On Sale!
#badfriday #rastafari #coralgardens #mobay #montegobay #humanrights #1963 #jarrettpark
Food, Refreshment and Craft On Sale!
#badfriday #rastafari #coralgardens #mobay #montegobay #humanrights #1963 #jarrettpark
Friday, April 17, 2015
PRESS RELEASE: Thank You from The Rastafari Coral Gardens Committee
The Rastafari Coral Gardens Committee thanks Speakers, Sponsors, Artistes, Well-wishers and the Rastafari Community for participation in the 52nd Commemoration of the atrocity against Rastafari 1963 “Bad Friday” and the recognition of Empress Menen Earthstrong Success.
 |
| Empresses receiving the Menen Award |
The event then turned its attention towards the recognition of Empress Mennen 125th Birthday and awarded certificates of recognition to nine Rastafari Matriarchs for their continued struggle in the development of the Rastafari Community. Special attention given to posthumous awarded Ivorine Walsh (Mama Ita) a great warrior for the upliftment of women and mother of popular reggae Artiste Queen Ifrica.
Patrons were moved by the messages from out of the Speakers Corner of the event. Maureen Minto, Clinton Hutton, Bunny Wailer, Ras Iya-V, Michael Barnett, Maxine Stowe, inspired the audience with messages about our struggle as Rastafari and pan-Africanist in the 21st century, reaffirming that the struggle continue even as it is passed from generation to generation.
The cultural presentations were filled with energetic performances from poets, singers, drummers and the empresses Sis Isis , Sis Isha and Sis Jackie Roots marshalled the proceedings with Jah Mike Sound System to a prompt after 2:00am closure making way for the spiritual Nyahbhing Chanting till around 8:00am in the Saturday morning.
Information about the Committee’s full range of programs and services will soon be available on-line as we seek to broaden our outreach and education of the public of our missions, aims and progress in the struggle.
The Rastafari Coral Gardens Committee is a Rastafari / Pan African non-aligned organization centred around the Coral Gardens Incident, attending to the Rastafari Community, elders and survivors of the atrocity also the youths.
Thursday, October 16, 2014
Beckles Address on Reparations
Beckles Address on Reparations (SOUNDCLOUD AUDIO)
ADDRESS DELIVERED BY PROFESSOR SIR HILARY BECKLES, CHAIRMAN OF THE CARICOM REPARATIONS COMMISSION, HOUSE OF COMMONS, PARLIAMENT OF GREAT BRITAIN, COMMITTEE ROOM 14, THURSDAY, JULY 16, 2014, 9:00 P.M.
Madam Chair, the distinguished member of Parliament for Hackney North and Stoke Newington, Diane Abbott, other distinguished members of the House of Lords, and House of Commons, Excellencies of the Diplomatic Corp, colleagues at the head table, Ladies and Gentlemen.
I speak this evening, in this honourable chamber of the House of Commons, as Chairman of the Caricom Commission on Reparations. My colleagues of the Commission are tasked with the preparation and presentation of the evidentiary basis for a contemporary truth: that the Government of Great Britain, and other European states that were the beneficiaries of enrichment from the enslavement of African peoples, the genocide of indigenous communities, and the deceptive breach of contract and trust in respect of Indians and other Asians brought to the plantations under indenture, have a case to answer in respect of reparatory justice.
The case of genocide is not only in respect of our decimated native community. It is also important to recognise the genocidal aspect of chattel slavery in the Caribbean.
British slave ships brought 5.5 million enslaved Africans into their Caribbean colonies over 180 years.
When slavery was abolished in 1838 they were just 800,000 persons remaining. That is, a retention/survival rate of 15%.
The regime of enslavement was crafted by policies and attitudes that were clearly genocidal.
Jamaica received 1.5 million Africans. Only 300,000 remained at Emancipation (20%).
Barbados received 600,000 Africans. Only 83,000 remained at Emancipation (14%).
This case is for the Caricom governments to present on behalf of its citizens. I am sure that in its presentation there will be due regard for the principles of diplomacy and development cooperation - for which they have long distinguished themselves. This process will bring honour and dignity to the people of the Caribbean as well as to the people of Great Britain and Europe.
Caricom governments, like the government of Great Britain, represent nations that are independent and equal. As such, they should proceed on the basis of their legitimate equality, without fear of retribution, in the best interest of humanity, and for a better future for us all.
I am honoured to be asked to speak in this historic parliament of the people of Great Britain. Like you I am aware that this Parliament prepared the official political basis of the crimes that defined the colonial past. It is here, in this House, that the evil system of slavery, and genocide, were established. This House passed laws, framed fiscal policies, and enforced the crimes that have produced harmful legacies and persistent suffering now in need of repair.
This House also made emancipation from slavery and independence from colonialism an empowering reality. It is in here, we now imagine, that laws for reparatory justice can be conceptualized and implemented. It is in here, we believe, that the terrible wrongs of the past can be corrected, and humanity finally and truthfully liberated from the shame and guilt that have followed these historical crimes.
We must believe in the corrective power of this Parliament to respond positively to this present challenge, and in the process free itself from the bondage of its own sins and crimes. Without this belief our journey here this evening would be lacking integrity, and without a doubt, would be a useless exercise.
But I speak in this honourable House this evening, not only as chairman of a rightfully constituted commission that is peopled by some of our finest Caribbean citizens, and who have been selected by our distinguished Presidents and Prime Ministers, but as a Caribbean person with an affinity for this country. I was raised and educated here. I came from the Caribbean to this country as a child; I grew to maturity here; and was educated here in a fine university that has distinguished itself in the Liberal-Progressive pedagogy of the nation.
Great Britain, therefore, is my second home and I care for it as I care for my first home, the Great Caribbean. I wish for Great Britain, as I do for the Great Caribbean, peace and prosperity. I wish that their shared past, painful though it has been, will be transformed into a moral force of mutual respect and development cooperation.
It is for these reasons that I have joined the Caribbean and global movement for reparatory justice. I believe we can settle this case within the context of diplomatic initiatives that are consistent with our status as equal nations.
The crimes committed against the indigenous, African, and Asian peoples of the Caribbean are well documented. We know of the 250 years of slave trading, chattel slavery, and the following 100 years of colonial oppression.
Slavery was ended in 1838, only to be replaced by a century of racial apartheid, including the denigration of Asian people. Indigenous genocide, African chattel slavery and genocide, and Asian contract slavery, were three acts of a single play – a single process by which the British state forcefully extracted wealth from the Caribbean resulting in its persistent, endemic poverty.
I wish to comment, as a result, on the 1833 Act of Emancipation, and how this august Parliament betrayed the enslaved people of the Caribbean by forcing them to pay more than 50% of the cost of their own emancipation. This is an aspect of the history long hidden from public view.
We know, for example, that this Parliament in 1833 determined that the 800,000 enslaved people in the Caribbean were worth, as chattel property, £47 million. This was their assessed market value.
We know that this Parliament determined that all slave owners should receive just and fair compensation for the official taking away of their property.
We know that this Parliament provided the sum of £20 million in grants to the slave owners as fair compensation for the loss of their human chattel.
And we know that this Parliament determined that the enslaved people would receive none of this compensation. The argument made in this House was that ‘property’ cannot receive property compensation. This Parliament, in its Emancipation Act, upheld the law that black people were not human, but property.
What this Parliament has hid from the world is that it also determined that the remaining £27 million would be paid by the enslaved people to their enslavers, by means of a 4 year period of free labour called the Apprenticeship.
This period of additional free labour by the emancipated represented the enforced extraction of £27 million by the state. It was a cruel and shameful method of legislating Emancipation by forcing the enslaved to pay more than 50% of the financial cost of their own freedom. The £20 million paid the enslavers by this Parliament was less than the £27 million paid by the enslaved to the enslavers as dictated by this House.
I wish now to engage the argument of the British Government that the slavery and other colonial crimes were ‘legal’, and that they took place ‘a long time ago’, and are beyond the border of adjudication.
Allow me, madam Chair, to breach protocol and to interject myself into the discourse, in order to demonstrate how very contemporary and current this exploitation of the Caribbean people is and has been.
Upstairs this chamber sits the Earl of Harewood. He is an honourable member of the House of Lords. But does Lord Harewood know that my grandfather after Independence in Barbados in 1966 laboured on his sugar plantation, as did his father and forefathers, going back to the days of slavery? Does the goodly Lord know that as a child I took lunch for my grandfather into the canefields of his sugar plantation? Lord Harewood, and my family, go back a long way, from slavery right into the present.
Take also the very aristocratic and very distinguished Cumberbatch family. It has now produced the brilliant young actor, Benedict Cumberbatch [who I would love to meet one day]. Benedict’s grandfather owned the estate on which my beloved great grandmother worked all her adult life. They enslaved my family on their Cleland plantation in the parish of St. Andrew. My great grandmother, who helped to raise me, and who we all called ‘mammy’, carried the name Adriana Cumberbatch. The actor and academic are joined therefore by a common past and present, and maybe, common blood!
My case is but one of ten thousand such cases. Everywhere across the Caribbean the presence of our enslavers can be identified in our daily domestic lives. This history is not remote. It is alive and pressing upon our daily affairs.
And what have our people and governments been doing with respect to this legacy since we have gained national independence? The truth is, the people of the Caribbean have been very courageous in their effort at self-development and self-help in respect of this terrible history and enduring legacy.
Our citizens have faced this past head on, and have established a vibrant culture of community self-help and sustainable regional development mobilization. We are not beggars! We are not subservient! We do not want charity and handouts! We want justice! Reparatory justice!
When all is said and done, our governments these past 50 years have been cleaning up the mess left behind by Britain’s colonial legacy. Our finest Presidents and Prime Ministers have been devising projects to clean up the awful mess inherited from slavery and colonisation. They must be commended for this effort, but the fact is, this legacy of rubble and ruin, persistent poverty, and racialised relations and reasoning, that continues to cripple our best efforts, has been daunting.
Britain, and its Parliament, cannot morally and legally turn their back upon this past, and walk away from the mess they have left behind. This Parliament has to return to the scene of its crimes, and participate as a legitimate parliament, as a legal parliament, in the healing and rehabilitation of the Caribbean.
We cannot, and should not, be asked to do this by ourselves. We have done our part. This Parliament must now return, and do its part, within the context of reparatory justice, and within the framework of development cooperation.
I wish to give two examples of how this reparatory justice can work:
(1) Jamaica, Britain’s largest slave colony, was left with 80% black functional illiteracy at Independence in 1962. From this circumstance the great and courageous Jamaican nation has struggled with development and poverty alleviation. The deep crisis remains. This Parliament owes the people of Jamaica an educational and human resource investment initiative.
(2) Barbados, Britain’s first slave society, is now called the amputation capital of the world. It is here that the stress profile of slavery and racial apartheid; dietary disaster and psychological trauma; and the addiction to the consumption of sugar and salt, have reached the highest peak. The country is now host to the world’s most virulent diabetes and hypertension epidemic. This Parliament owes the people of Barbados an education and health initiative.
It is the same for all our countries; the Bahamas, the Leewards, the Windwards, Guyana, Trinidad and Tobago, Belize, and beyond.
The Caricom Ten Point Plan for Reparatory Justice addresses these development issues that are central to the case Britain has to answer.
It is an invitation to Great Britain to demonstrate leadership within the legal, moral, and diplomatic culture of the world, within the Commonwealth, and within its relations the Caribbean.
There can be no escaping the importance of this exchange of views about the matter before this honourable chamber tonight.
It took all of the 19th century to uproot slavery from the Caribbean; from Haiti in 1804 to the Spanish sub-region in the 1880s. It took another 100 years to create citizenship, nationhood, and democracy across the Caribbean as a development framework. We have helped ourselves.
This 21st century will be the century of global reparatory justice. Citizens are now, for the first time since they were driven into retreat by colonialism, able to stand up for reparatory justice without fear. Their claim, their just claim for reparations, will not go away. Rather, like the waves upon our beautiful shores, they will keep coming until reparatory justice is attained.
Madam Chair, we call upon you, and all members of this House, to rise to this challenge and to assist Great Britain to be truly worthy of the title “Great”. I urge you to do the right thing, in the right way. There is no other right time, other than right now, in our time. There is so much to gain from your leadership. The Caribbean is counting on you.
In 1823, the honourable Thomas Buxton, M.P. for Weymouth and Melcombe Regis, presented a bill to this House calling for an Emancipation Act with compensation for the enslaved people. His bill and vision were defeated. Instead, ten years later, an emancipation bill was passed, not with compensation for the enslaved, but with handsome and generous compensation for enslavers. Some 40% of the national expenditure of the country was handed over to slave-owners as reparations.
The enslaved people of the Caribbean got nothing. Indeed, they were then called upon by the said Emancipation Act to give £27 million in free labour to their enslavers. The injustice and the cruelty of that Emancipation Act, remain today like a fish bone stuck in our throats.
We urge you, madam Chair, and other members of this Parliament, to rise up and bring the Buxton vision to life. He was a noble warrior for reparatory justice; his spirit can return to this House, in both places, and the 21st Century will be ours to forge a new moral order for our collective wellbeing.
On behalf of the Caricom Reparations Commission, all my colleagues across the Caribbean who have worked with our governments in order to bring this case before you, I ask that you respond with humility and openness when your government receives an invitation to meet with our governments in summit in order to discuss this matter.
May the values and the spirit of development cooperation and mutual respect guide us all.
Thank you madam Chair.
ADDRESS DELIVERED BY PROFESSOR SIR HILARY BECKLES, CHAIRMAN OF THE CARICOM REPARATIONS COMMISSION, HOUSE OF COMMONS, PARLIAMENT OF GREAT BRITAIN, COMMITTEE ROOM 14, THURSDAY, JULY 16, 2014, 9:00 P.M.
Madam Chair, the distinguished member of Parliament for Hackney North and Stoke Newington, Diane Abbott, other distinguished members of the House of Lords, and House of Commons, Excellencies of the Diplomatic Corp, colleagues at the head table, Ladies and Gentlemen.
I speak this evening, in this honourable chamber of the House of Commons, as Chairman of the Caricom Commission on Reparations. My colleagues of the Commission are tasked with the preparation and presentation of the evidentiary basis for a contemporary truth: that the Government of Great Britain, and other European states that were the beneficiaries of enrichment from the enslavement of African peoples, the genocide of indigenous communities, and the deceptive breach of contract and trust in respect of Indians and other Asians brought to the plantations under indenture, have a case to answer in respect of reparatory justice.
The case of genocide is not only in respect of our decimated native community. It is also important to recognise the genocidal aspect of chattel slavery in the Caribbean.
British slave ships brought 5.5 million enslaved Africans into their Caribbean colonies over 180 years.
When slavery was abolished in 1838 they were just 800,000 persons remaining. That is, a retention/survival rate of 15%.
The regime of enslavement was crafted by policies and attitudes that were clearly genocidal.
Jamaica received 1.5 million Africans. Only 300,000 remained at Emancipation (20%).
Barbados received 600,000 Africans. Only 83,000 remained at Emancipation (14%).
This case is for the Caricom governments to present on behalf of its citizens. I am sure that in its presentation there will be due regard for the principles of diplomacy and development cooperation - for which they have long distinguished themselves. This process will bring honour and dignity to the people of the Caribbean as well as to the people of Great Britain and Europe.
Caricom governments, like the government of Great Britain, represent nations that are independent and equal. As such, they should proceed on the basis of their legitimate equality, without fear of retribution, in the best interest of humanity, and for a better future for us all.
I am honoured to be asked to speak in this historic parliament of the people of Great Britain. Like you I am aware that this Parliament prepared the official political basis of the crimes that defined the colonial past. It is here, in this House, that the evil system of slavery, and genocide, were established. This House passed laws, framed fiscal policies, and enforced the crimes that have produced harmful legacies and persistent suffering now in need of repair.
This House also made emancipation from slavery and independence from colonialism an empowering reality. It is in here, we now imagine, that laws for reparatory justice can be conceptualized and implemented. It is in here, we believe, that the terrible wrongs of the past can be corrected, and humanity finally and truthfully liberated from the shame and guilt that have followed these historical crimes.
We must believe in the corrective power of this Parliament to respond positively to this present challenge, and in the process free itself from the bondage of its own sins and crimes. Without this belief our journey here this evening would be lacking integrity, and without a doubt, would be a useless exercise.
But I speak in this honourable House this evening, not only as chairman of a rightfully constituted commission that is peopled by some of our finest Caribbean citizens, and who have been selected by our distinguished Presidents and Prime Ministers, but as a Caribbean person with an affinity for this country. I was raised and educated here. I came from the Caribbean to this country as a child; I grew to maturity here; and was educated here in a fine university that has distinguished itself in the Liberal-Progressive pedagogy of the nation.
Great Britain, therefore, is my second home and I care for it as I care for my first home, the Great Caribbean. I wish for Great Britain, as I do for the Great Caribbean, peace and prosperity. I wish that their shared past, painful though it has been, will be transformed into a moral force of mutual respect and development cooperation.
It is for these reasons that I have joined the Caribbean and global movement for reparatory justice. I believe we can settle this case within the context of diplomatic initiatives that are consistent with our status as equal nations.
The crimes committed against the indigenous, African, and Asian peoples of the Caribbean are well documented. We know of the 250 years of slave trading, chattel slavery, and the following 100 years of colonial oppression.
Slavery was ended in 1838, only to be replaced by a century of racial apartheid, including the denigration of Asian people. Indigenous genocide, African chattel slavery and genocide, and Asian contract slavery, were three acts of a single play – a single process by which the British state forcefully extracted wealth from the Caribbean resulting in its persistent, endemic poverty.
I wish to comment, as a result, on the 1833 Act of Emancipation, and how this august Parliament betrayed the enslaved people of the Caribbean by forcing them to pay more than 50% of the cost of their own emancipation. This is an aspect of the history long hidden from public view.
We know, for example, that this Parliament in 1833 determined that the 800,000 enslaved people in the Caribbean were worth, as chattel property, £47 million. This was their assessed market value.
We know that this Parliament determined that all slave owners should receive just and fair compensation for the official taking away of their property.
We know that this Parliament provided the sum of £20 million in grants to the slave owners as fair compensation for the loss of their human chattel.
And we know that this Parliament determined that the enslaved people would receive none of this compensation. The argument made in this House was that ‘property’ cannot receive property compensation. This Parliament, in its Emancipation Act, upheld the law that black people were not human, but property.
What this Parliament has hid from the world is that it also determined that the remaining £27 million would be paid by the enslaved people to their enslavers, by means of a 4 year period of free labour called the Apprenticeship.
This period of additional free labour by the emancipated represented the enforced extraction of £27 million by the state. It was a cruel and shameful method of legislating Emancipation by forcing the enslaved to pay more than 50% of the financial cost of their own freedom. The £20 million paid the enslavers by this Parliament was less than the £27 million paid by the enslaved to the enslavers as dictated by this House.
I wish now to engage the argument of the British Government that the slavery and other colonial crimes were ‘legal’, and that they took place ‘a long time ago’, and are beyond the border of adjudication.
Allow me, madam Chair, to breach protocol and to interject myself into the discourse, in order to demonstrate how very contemporary and current this exploitation of the Caribbean people is and has been.
Upstairs this chamber sits the Earl of Harewood. He is an honourable member of the House of Lords. But does Lord Harewood know that my grandfather after Independence in Barbados in 1966 laboured on his sugar plantation, as did his father and forefathers, going back to the days of slavery? Does the goodly Lord know that as a child I took lunch for my grandfather into the canefields of his sugar plantation? Lord Harewood, and my family, go back a long way, from slavery right into the present.
Take also the very aristocratic and very distinguished Cumberbatch family. It has now produced the brilliant young actor, Benedict Cumberbatch [who I would love to meet one day]. Benedict’s grandfather owned the estate on which my beloved great grandmother worked all her adult life. They enslaved my family on their Cleland plantation in the parish of St. Andrew. My great grandmother, who helped to raise me, and who we all called ‘mammy’, carried the name Adriana Cumberbatch. The actor and academic are joined therefore by a common past and present, and maybe, common blood!
My case is but one of ten thousand such cases. Everywhere across the Caribbean the presence of our enslavers can be identified in our daily domestic lives. This history is not remote. It is alive and pressing upon our daily affairs.
And what have our people and governments been doing with respect to this legacy since we have gained national independence? The truth is, the people of the Caribbean have been very courageous in their effort at self-development and self-help in respect of this terrible history and enduring legacy.
Our citizens have faced this past head on, and have established a vibrant culture of community self-help and sustainable regional development mobilization. We are not beggars! We are not subservient! We do not want charity and handouts! We want justice! Reparatory justice!
When all is said and done, our governments these past 50 years have been cleaning up the mess left behind by Britain’s colonial legacy. Our finest Presidents and Prime Ministers have been devising projects to clean up the awful mess inherited from slavery and colonisation. They must be commended for this effort, but the fact is, this legacy of rubble and ruin, persistent poverty, and racialised relations and reasoning, that continues to cripple our best efforts, has been daunting.
Britain, and its Parliament, cannot morally and legally turn their back upon this past, and walk away from the mess they have left behind. This Parliament has to return to the scene of its crimes, and participate as a legitimate parliament, as a legal parliament, in the healing and rehabilitation of the Caribbean.
We cannot, and should not, be asked to do this by ourselves. We have done our part. This Parliament must now return, and do its part, within the context of reparatory justice, and within the framework of development cooperation.
I wish to give two examples of how this reparatory justice can work:
(1) Jamaica, Britain’s largest slave colony, was left with 80% black functional illiteracy at Independence in 1962. From this circumstance the great and courageous Jamaican nation has struggled with development and poverty alleviation. The deep crisis remains. This Parliament owes the people of Jamaica an educational and human resource investment initiative.
(2) Barbados, Britain’s first slave society, is now called the amputation capital of the world. It is here that the stress profile of slavery and racial apartheid; dietary disaster and psychological trauma; and the addiction to the consumption of sugar and salt, have reached the highest peak. The country is now host to the world’s most virulent diabetes and hypertension epidemic. This Parliament owes the people of Barbados an education and health initiative.
It is the same for all our countries; the Bahamas, the Leewards, the Windwards, Guyana, Trinidad and Tobago, Belize, and beyond.
The Caricom Ten Point Plan for Reparatory Justice addresses these development issues that are central to the case Britain has to answer.
It is an invitation to Great Britain to demonstrate leadership within the legal, moral, and diplomatic culture of the world, within the Commonwealth, and within its relations the Caribbean.
There can be no escaping the importance of this exchange of views about the matter before this honourable chamber tonight.
It took all of the 19th century to uproot slavery from the Caribbean; from Haiti in 1804 to the Spanish sub-region in the 1880s. It took another 100 years to create citizenship, nationhood, and democracy across the Caribbean as a development framework. We have helped ourselves.
This 21st century will be the century of global reparatory justice. Citizens are now, for the first time since they were driven into retreat by colonialism, able to stand up for reparatory justice without fear. Their claim, their just claim for reparations, will not go away. Rather, like the waves upon our beautiful shores, they will keep coming until reparatory justice is attained.
Madam Chair, we call upon you, and all members of this House, to rise to this challenge and to assist Great Britain to be truly worthy of the title “Great”. I urge you to do the right thing, in the right way. There is no other right time, other than right now, in our time. There is so much to gain from your leadership. The Caribbean is counting on you.
In 1823, the honourable Thomas Buxton, M.P. for Weymouth and Melcombe Regis, presented a bill to this House calling for an Emancipation Act with compensation for the enslaved people. His bill and vision were defeated. Instead, ten years later, an emancipation bill was passed, not with compensation for the enslaved, but with handsome and generous compensation for enslavers. Some 40% of the national expenditure of the country was handed over to slave-owners as reparations.
The enslaved people of the Caribbean got nothing. Indeed, they were then called upon by the said Emancipation Act to give £27 million in free labour to their enslavers. The injustice and the cruelty of that Emancipation Act, remain today like a fish bone stuck in our throats.
We urge you, madam Chair, and other members of this Parliament, to rise up and bring the Buxton vision to life. He was a noble warrior for reparatory justice; his spirit can return to this House, in both places, and the 21st Century will be ours to forge a new moral order for our collective wellbeing.
On behalf of the Caricom Reparations Commission, all my colleagues across the Caribbean who have worked with our governments in order to bring this case before you, I ask that you respond with humility and openness when your government receives an invitation to meet with our governments in summit in order to discuss this matter.
May the values and the spirit of development cooperation and mutual respect guide us all.
Thank you madam Chair.
Tuesday, October 7, 2014
Wednesday, April 23, 2014
Saturday, April 19, 2014
Sunday, February 23, 2014
OCCUPY PINNACLE
As you may be aware there is movement afoot to get the issue that surround Pinnacle addressed... contribute and play apart...
If you are in Jamaica donate at any National Commercial Bank (NCB)... Leonard P Howell Foundation Act # 1000003 Originally opened at Manor Parkway branch ( if they need to know) Also you may send your US$20 contribution to http://lphfoundation.org/donate/
If you are in Jamaica donate at any National Commercial Bank (NCB)... Leonard P Howell Foundation Act # 1000003 Originally opened at Manor Parkway branch ( if they need to know) Also you may send your US$20 contribution to http://lphfoundation.org/donate/
Saturday, December 7, 2013
Save Pinnacle for RasTafari
The planned eviction of I and I Rastafari family from Pinnacle -- the first self-sufficient Rastafari community on the island, located on lands purchased by Leonard P Howell -- seems to be manifesting as Babylon would will it. Already set to give away Goat Islands the Government now intends to take Rastafari lands.
So I and I would like to know, while Jamaica works out with its neighbours sanctions against the Dominican Republic for disinheriting Haitians in that country, our own courts do the same to Rastas?
Read more: http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/letters/Save-Pinnacle-for-RasTafari_15580078#ixzz2moS7571i
p.s. Thanks to Nadia Bernaz of RightsAsUsual for her expertise on the matters of rights and point of law!
As far as I and I comprehend, the Jamaican State has made the site a national heritage site, and wishes to evict whoever lives on it. Hence this is firstly a case about land title -- who "owns" the land?
Many of the revolutions of history were fought on grounds of land and property, the Coral Gardens incident of 1963 had similar issues of land ownership to the dispute and ensuing tragedy. So, for public clarity I and I would like to know whose land is it?
If the Rastafarianism is a recognised religious group in Jamaica, and by this I mean in law -- which I believe they are -- and seeing that Jamaica has recently adopted its own Bill of Rights, then there is no denying that Rastafari is a legitimate with regard to religious freedom as recognised in Jamaica, Great Britain, the United States, and other countries. I and I believe one of the arguments against this heinous act of the state, is based on freedom of religion.(ie by evicting off the land and interfering with Rastafari's freedom of religion). Thus this makes the case a constitutional one as well. Does the public defender have anything to say?
I and I cannot be sure what the State intends to do with the site. If the idea is to keep it as State property, as an important part of Jamaican history, it may seem hard to argue against that. After all, the State may argue that they are taking care of the place by doing this, and making sure its historical significance is well known by everyone. This is a controversial notion and forces the question, who have the stakeholders consulted? Could not an initiative that engenders a community and communal heritage trust be set up to navigate the dual existence of a heritage site and the Rastafarian community?
Bearing this in mind, I ask, is it time for some Rastafari agencies and groups, artistes, and lawyers to find a way to take this case to the Privy Council or the Caribbean Court of Justice? There needs to be good advocacy and help in raising international awareness for this undoubted human rights travesty.
I encourage both the Rastafari community, as well as the State, to examine the Saramaka People v Suriname case before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. In this case, descendants of self-liberated African slaves were held to be "indigenous peoples" and to enjoy the rights recognised to these categories of people under international law. A similar case can be made for the communities at Pinnacle as well. Using that line of argument, if the land if sold no project will be able to start unless the consent of the local communities has been secured by the company. (See the International Finance Corporation Performance Standard number 5 and 7). This is a powerful tool. I hope you understand, this does not change anything with regards to the title to the land, but at least it could prevent the land from being destroyed by logging, mining, tourist resorts, or whatever their plans are.
Ultimately, whilst seeing that Jamaica has not joined the appellate jurisdiction of the Caribbean Court of Justice, it would appear that no case can be brought there. The final Court of Appeal of Jamaica is still the London-based Privy Council. They apply the same law so it ought not to matter much for your case. These are issues representatives of the RasTafari community and its lawyers if there are any must be aware of.
This injustice cannot be allowed!
Ultimately, whilst seeing that Jamaica has not joined the appellate jurisdiction of the Caribbean Court of Justice, it would appear that no case can be brought there. The final Court of Appeal of Jamaica is still the London-based Privy Council. They apply the same law so it ought not to matter much for your case. These are issues representatives of the RasTafari community and its lawyers if there are any must be aware of.
This injustice cannot be allowed!
p.s. Thanks to Nadia Bernaz of RightsAsUsual for her expertise on the matters of rights and point of law!
Saturday, November 30, 2013
The Debacle at Pinnacle: RasTafari Robbed of The Promised Key - Babylon's New Assault!
#Rastafari robbed!!!
So what of OUR PROMISED KEY?
The planned eviction of InI RasTafari Family from Pinnacle: the first self-sufficient RasTafari Community on the island located on lands purchased by Hon. Leonard P Howell, seem to be manifesting as Babylon would will it!
IS THIS A CASE FOR THE #CCJ???
The Caribbean Court of Justice is a shared final court of appeal for currently three Commonwealth Caribbean countries: Barbados, Guyana and Belize. Jamaica is probably the next country of the region that will stop sending their appeals to the London-based Privy Council and switch to the CCJ as well. A human rights assessment of the Court and concluded that its very creation constitutes a positive step towards better access to justice in the region and shows once again the key role superior courts can play in protecting the rights of vulnerable groups.
Bearing this in mind again I ask is it time for some RasTafari agencies and groups artistes and lawyers, to find a way to take this case to the CCJ???
Time for #Rasta to find the #CaribbeanCourtofJustice!
Land reform and revolution reaching to ahead... THIS CAN'T WORK!
Whapp'm to "adverse possession"???
Gi weh GOAT ISLAND and tief RASTA LAND! (Having given away the Goat Islands the Government now intends to steal RasTafari lands!)
So InI would like to know, while #Jamaica works out with its neighbours sanctions against the Dominican Republic for disinheriting #Haitians in that country our own courts do the same to Rastas????
Why this situation wasn't blasted over the #media ages and ages ago? This case has been in court for a while now! Where are the artistes to chant on this issue???
Leonard Howell, his seed and scions, the early Howellites all suffered for this. InI cannot leave History to repeat itself. InI will not allow Mr. Lake and his friends at the National Heritage Trust to deceive us into believing they care to preserve RasTafari legacy.
Never forget the atrocities of CORAL GARDENS, when many RasTafari bredda and sista were abused and massacred.
As a member of the Rastafari community in Montego Bay and growing up in the aftermath of the Coral Garden atrocity and having gleaned 2nd hand knowledge of it, heard first person accounts, InI cannot sit by whilst InI bredda and sista are being dealt another modern day injustice and atrocity, no matter the civility of the apparent legal process, this is a violation of a vulnerable sector of society by the state, guised as civil law and legal prociess, it is vile and unethical, a violation of culture!
#ancestoral land theft, Rasta #oppressed in the 21st century, SUBDIVISION... robbery...
http://lphfoundation.org/rastafari-ordered-to-vacate-pinnacle-by-january-31-2014-resident-magistrate-vashti-chatoor-131113/
#Rastafarian #digitalactivism #socialactivism #IandI #Selassie#Haile #EqualRights #Justice
So what of OUR PROMISED KEY?
The planned eviction of InI RasTafari Family from Pinnacle: the first self-sufficient RasTafari Community on the island located on lands purchased by Hon. Leonard P Howell, seem to be manifesting as Babylon would will it!
IS THIS A CASE FOR THE #CCJ???
The Caribbean Court of Justice is a shared final court of appeal for currently three Commonwealth Caribbean countries: Barbados, Guyana and Belize. Jamaica is probably the next country of the region that will stop sending their appeals to the London-based Privy Council and switch to the CCJ as well. A human rights assessment of the Court and concluded that its very creation constitutes a positive step towards better access to justice in the region and shows once again the key role superior courts can play in protecting the rights of vulnerable groups.
Bearing this in mind again I ask is it time for some RasTafari agencies and groups artistes and lawyers, to find a way to take this case to the CCJ???
Time for #Rasta to find the #CaribbeanCourtofJustice!
Land reform and revolution reaching to ahead... THIS CAN'T WORK!
Whapp'm to "adverse possession"???
Gi weh GOAT ISLAND and tief RASTA LAND! (Having given away the Goat Islands the Government now intends to steal RasTafari lands!)
So InI would like to know, while #Jamaica works out with its neighbours sanctions against the Dominican Republic for disinheriting #Haitians in that country our own courts do the same to Rastas????
Why this situation wasn't blasted over the #media ages and ages ago? This case has been in court for a while now! Where are the artistes to chant on this issue???
Leonard Howell, his seed and scions, the early Howellites all suffered for this. InI cannot leave History to repeat itself. InI will not allow Mr. Lake and his friends at the National Heritage Trust to deceive us into believing they care to preserve RasTafari legacy.
Never forget the atrocities of CORAL GARDENS, when many RasTafari bredda and sista were abused and massacred.
As a member of the Rastafari community in Montego Bay and growing up in the aftermath of the Coral Garden atrocity and having gleaned 2nd hand knowledge of it, heard first person accounts, InI cannot sit by whilst InI bredda and sista are being dealt another modern day injustice and atrocity, no matter the civility of the apparent legal process, this is a violation of a vulnerable sector of society by the state, guised as civil law and legal prociess, it is vile and unethical, a violation of culture!
#ancestoral land theft, Rasta #oppressed in the 21st century, SUBDIVISION... robbery...
http://lphfoundation.org/rastafari-ordered-to-vacate-pinnacle-by-january-31-2014-resident-magistrate-vashti-chatoor-131113/
#Rastafarian #digitalactivism #socialactivism #IandI #Selassie#Haile #EqualRights #Justice
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