When saying sorry is too hard
The last week has seen the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (Chogm) held in Apia in Samoa. However, the meeting did not necessarily turn out in favour of the British state and its representatives, one Charles Philip Arthur George Mountbatten-Windsor, who some believe is its legitimate head of state, and ‘Sir’ Keir Rodney Starmer, head of government and leader of an allegedly Labour administration.
The main point of contention was one of the many crimes against humanity committed by the English/British during their centuries-long invasion, colonisation and exploitation of vast areas of the world’s land surface – chattel slavery.
The Caribbean members of the Commonwealth, under the umbrella of Caricom, have been demanding reparations for slavery for some time. Their reasoning is based on the fact that when slavery was abolished within the British Empire in 1833 (the slave trade as abolished in 1807. Ed.), the owners were compensated for their loss of ‘property‘ in the form of 700,000 enslaved persons This amounted to £20m and accounted for nearly one-quarter of the government’s budget in the year that it was paid. The emancipated slaves and their descendants were never compensated. Indeed to add further a insult to their suffering, the freed slaves were expected to work for free for the people who had already exploited them and were being handsomely rewarded for their inhumanity.
Mr Windsor, whose ancestor Charles Stuart II granted the Royal African Company (RAC) a monopoly on all English trade with Africa, had particular difficulty in apologising for the harm his family and his state have done to Africa and the Caribbean. The RAC’s initial purpose was to trade in gold, but quickly moved on to trading in captured human beings, which became its main activity. The so-called royal family also invested in the slave trade: William of Orange (the King Billy so beloved of certain people in Ireland’s occupied six counties) bought shares in the RAC off one Edward Colston, whose statue in Bristol was toppled a few years ago and taken for a bath in the city docks. Despite his own family having blood on its hands from the slave trade, the best Charlie boy could manage was to call slavery the “most painful aspects of our past continue to resonate. according to the BBC.
As for Starmer, he has ruled out any talk of reparation, but has indicated he is open to non-financial reparations, as The Guardian reports I don’t somehow think the Caribbean governments of Caricom will be persuaded by offers of mirrors, glass beads and other trinkets for supplying two centuries of free labour for Britain and its elite.
Beside slavery being discussed slavery, the transatlantic slave trade and reparatory justice have all made their way into the meeting’s final communiqué (PDF) in its paragraphs 21 and 22.
Finally, here’s a little song about saying sorry especially for Charles and Keir., which your ‘umble scribe hopes they will enjoy.