(CARICOM Secretariat, Turkeyen, Greater Georgetown, Guyana) Chairman of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) and Prime Minister of St Vincent and the Grenadines, Dr the Hon Ralph Gonsalves has called upon the Community to use the occasion of the Bicentenary of the Abolition of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade as an opportunity to teach the younger generation of the region, the history, the lessons and the effects of slavery and to ensure that this tragedy “is never again experienced in old or new forms.”
Dr Gonsalves’ statement was read by CARICOM Secretariat’s Assistant Secretary General, Human and Social Development, Dr Edward Greene at a brief yet solemn ceremony in Guyana, on Sunday, March 25, 2007 to mark the beginning of the 200th Anniversary year of the Abolition of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade.
The CARICOM Chairman stated that while the observance should be used as an opportunity for healing, it should be noted that healing could only come if all the parties involved were willing to remember and acknowledge their respective roles and collective responsibility “for the betrayal, for the atrocities and for the suffering that resulted from African genocide and enslavement.”
He noted that by far, the most crippling effect of slavery and the slave trade has been the ideology and the legacy of racism, legitimized then by the Code Noir in the French colonies; and which he stated, is still perpetuated in new and insidious forms in our contemporary world, and charged the Community to “never forget.”
However the Chairman pointed to the fact that despite the atrocities, the Caribbean Community also had much to celebrate as a great Caribbean Civilisation that has triumphed over great adversity.
“We celebrate our cultural diversity and the melting pot of races, cultures and peoples who have demonstrated to a divided, globalised world that we can live in peace and harmony. Out of the crucible of our painful past, we have created a neo-people, a model community, and a spiritual and cultural renaissance,” the Chairman concluded.
Chaired by President of the National Emancipation Trust, Lorri Alexander, the Ceremony which was held in the forecourt of the historic Parliament Buildings also saw several officials including the Deputy Secretary General of the CARICOM Secretariat, Ambassador Lolita Applewhaite, the Prime Minister of Guyana, the Hon Samuel Hinds and the Mayor of Georgetown, the Honourable Hamilton Green in attendance.
In her remarks on behalf of the Secretariat, Ambassador Applewhaite pointed to the historic significance of the Parliament Buildings, alluding to it being the site of many slave hangings.
“This place bears the burden of the history of pain and suffering of many Africans, who met an untimely and brutal death in this very place, for their refusal to accept the dehumanising status of “chattel” that could be bought and sold; and for refusing to accept the denial of their freedom and the life-long exploitation of their labour,” the Deputy Secretary General emphasised.
Built by the former slaves of Guyana, the Parliament Buildings were commissioned in1832, two years before the Proclamation of the Emancipation Act that ended slavery in 1834. The Guyana Parliament Buildings is also the site where the Emancipation Proclamation was read on August 1, 1834.
Pointing to the theme CARICOM Reflects…Never Forget, Ambassador Applewhaite, further stated that reflecting on the past and on “the colonial policy of divide and rule, that pitted races against each other and isolated countries in the region, should strengthen our resolve to rise above racial and ethnic division in our countries, and deepen our Caribbean integration within CARICOM and across language groups in the Region.”
In his remarks, Prime Minister of Guyana the Honourable, Samuel Hinds noted the progress that the Caribbean Community had made since the abolition of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade and challenged the peoples of the Community to see themselves “as members of one human race shouldering equitably all the responsibilities of our race, contributing and sharing equitably in our common produce.”
Mayor of Georgetown the Honourable Hamilton Green in an impassioned speech recalled the story of Guyana’s National Hero, Damon and pointed to the significant contributions made to the development of Guyana by the enslaved.
“Today we need to invoke the spirit of the thousands of slaves who died… let us do so in order to give ourselves strength,” the Mayor urged.
At noon, the Town’s clock gave the signal and one minute of silence was observed in honour of those who died in the Middle Passage and in resistance to slavery. The silence then transmuted into the wail of the congo drums and the lament of the steel pans as the audience joined in the singing of freedom songs, including Bob Marley’s ‘One Love,’ and ‘Redemption Song,’ led by Guyana’s songbird Delma Lynch, thus bringing to a rousing finish, the voices of history makers in marking yet another historic event.
