A new thrust in the tricontinental quest for reparations and repair for slavery and native genocide

IT was simply advertised as a “Reparations Forum’, but the February 27 launch of the Trevelyan Family Reparations Fund in, and for, Grenada also turned out to be much more: a new thrust in the tricontinental quest for reparations for slavery and native genocide in Africa, Europe and the Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) region.

The proposal drew more criticism than support before the launch, with claims that the US $100,000 was “too little”, compared to today’s equivalent of three million British Pounds the family was paid in compensation after Abolition (1834) for their five estates and hundreds of enslaved Africans in Grenada.

But after the launch, the story changed to one of better understanding, more appreciation and support for the unique private initiative by a US-based and globally-recognised TV news presenter and members of her family.

The event at the Grenada Trade Center Annex was a full-house affair with a headtable featuring Prime Minister Dickon Mitchell, Vice Chancellor of the University of the West Indies (UWI) and Chair of the CARICOM Reparations Commission (CRC), Sir Hilary Beckles, Chair of the Grenada National Reparations Committee (GNRC), Arley Gill and Laura Trevelyan (representing her family).

The majority of the island’s Cabinet Ministers were also present, as well as teachers and secondary school students, Rastafarians and supporters of CARICOM’s Reparations quest – and a small group of individual placard-bearing ‘protesters’ who eventually joined and participated.

The ceremony, chaired by GNRC Deputy Chair, Nicole Phillip Dowe, was well-prepared and executed, starting with drumming by the Tumda Drummers and prayers by a representative of the local branch of the Twelve Tribes of Israel Rastafari Order.

A journalist and news correspondent for over three decades and based in New York as a veteran BBC World News presenter, Laura Trevelyan told the fund’s full story – and with six other family members, read and signed a formal apology earlier signed by 104 family members.

She confirmed that the initial contribution was entirely from her retirement pension – and not an overall or final family contribution; and she plans to make five annual personal contributions, while other family members will also make deposits from the UK.

The family had now been contacted by several Jamaica-based families that also prospered from slavery, who were attracted by her formula.

Sir Hilary, a renowned Caribbean scholar, historian and an authority on the CARICOM’s quest for reparations, put the event in proper historical context, spelling-out, with facts and figures, the deadly effects of Chattel Slavery, which the United Nations (UN) has designated ‘The Worst Crime Against Humanity’ in humankind’s history.

The author of ‘Britain’s Black Debt’ and ‘How Europe Underdeveloped the Caribbean’ noted that while three million enslaved Africans were shipped to the Caribbean as cargo and insured property through the so-called Middle Passage (from Africa to the Caribbean and The Americas), at Emancipation in 1834 there were only 600,000 left.

Similarly, after Columbus opened the way for European conquest, the genocidal pursuit of the region’s First People also saw their numbers decline from millions to just a couple thousand, in very few years.

Chairman Gill called on other British and European families that benefitted from slavery to follow the Trevelyan example; and on CARICOM governments (including Grenada) to do more to support the National Reparations Committees, most of which have been operating (from birth in 2013) without government funding support.

The GNRC chair also called for more teaching of true Caribbean history at the region’s schools, where it’s increasingly becoming an endangered subject.

Prime Minister Mitchell delivered a quiet but clear indication of his government’s support for the CARICOM reparations quest.

The speakers appealed for the region’s First People and past and present leaders of Caribbean People of African descent to be recognised for their historical roles as early freedom fighters and champions for Abolition and Emancipation; and for Reparations not to be treated as a “side show”, but one that has full support from every CARICOM government.

An appeal was also made to rename Grenada’s streets, schools and other public places after local and regional heroes.

There was a call for a ‘national consultation on Republicanism’, to which the Prime Minister (during the later Q&A period) responded that his government would be willing to take that road, but only when the majority of islanders were ready to support such an initiative through a referendum vote, as required by the constitution.

The Prime Minister assured, however, that “We shall move forward on our feet and not on our hands.”

The event’s cultural input featured an interesting and serious drum-and-poetry rendition by Nigel De Gale, a school principal, offering an uncomfortable but realistic poetic version of his vision of what life would have been like for Europeans under Slavery in the Caribbean, with Africans as the enslavers.

Also on display was an exhibition entitled ‘Say My Name’, prepared and presented by the Grenada National Museum and explained by curator Angus Martin (also a member of the GNRC), featuring cards (distributed to the audience) with the names of all the enslaved Africans on the Trevelyan plantations, where in Africa each was born — and how they got their ‘slave names’.
Meanwhile, the Trevelyan initiative and the also-private ‘Repair’ initiative by Digicel Chair, Denis O’Brian, have brought new perspectives to the tricontinental movement for reparations through repentance and repair, apology and atonement, that can also be easily adopted and adapted in Africa, the Americas, the Caribbean and Europe.

CARICOM’s 2013 initiative has had strong and visible ripple effects worldwide.

It can therefore be logically expected that the CRC, alongside other reparations entities across the three continents will examine the prospects of encouraging establishment of private and coordinated reparations funds, after prior consultation with intended beneficiaries, by British and American families, churches, universities, businesses and other entities in the same boat, on both sides of the Atlantic.