First of all, the Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations Rebellion Groundings were not organised by Black Lives Matter. They were organised by the Stop the Maangamizi: We Charge Genocide/Ecocide Campaign in partnership with the Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March Committee who from 2015 have been co-organising the Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March on the 1st August.
This year however, we decided to organise the Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations Groundings as a form of peaceful non-violent direct action because we are not being heard in our demand contained in the Stop the Maangamizi: We Charge Genocide/Ecocide Petition that the UK Government establish the All-Party Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry for Truth & Reparatory Justice and commit to holistic reparations. according to the Basic Principles and Guidelines on the Right to a Remedy and Reparation for Victims of Gross Violations of International Human Rights Law and Serious Violations of International Humanitarian Law.
Our peacefully organised non-violent direct action which took the form of these Reparations Rebellion Groundings, was assisted through the Extinction Rebellion Internationalist Solidarity Network and all other sections of Extinction Rebellion for which we made a prior agreement as to how best they could play the roles assigned to them.
The procession of Forever Family and some of the other supporting organisations, which marched from Clapham to Brixton Windrush Square to join the Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations Rebellion Groundings was a significant contribution to our overall very successful event.
This is an edited version of the statement provided to, Beth Ani, a journalist with the Morning Star Newspaper, in response to a request made on Sunday 2nd August 2020
I am a journalist at the Morning Star newspaper – i’m wondering if you could send a comment on yesterday’s march and also respond to Nigel Farage’s comments in which he described scenes at the protest as “terrifying” and accused BLM of “diving society.” Let me know if you’re able to comment, many thanks, Beth.
This is the Morning Star article were some of the above comments were included.
Terrifying scenes in Brixton today.
A paramilitary-style force marching in the streets.
This is what the BLM movement wanted from the start and it will divide our society like never before.https://t.co/7bfaSIelCM
As to Nigel Farage’s completely unjustified comments: “Terrifying scenes in Brixton today. A paramilitary-style force marching in the streets. This is what the BLM movement wanted from the start and it will divide our society like never before”, they should be taken for the racist nonsense and deceitful propaganda that they are. Farage’s comments were an abysmal attempt to frighten away allies from supporting these Reparations Rebellion Groundings of our Afrikan Heritage Communities; and connecting their own actions of rebellion to ours. Far from dividing society, this year’s Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations Rebellion Groundings became a cross-community unifying celebration of the internationalist solidarity, and its best traditions, that have always brought together peoples from diverse communities of resistance, within and outside of the UK, to strengthen their cooperation in fighting to eradicate the divisive weapon of racism.
We deliberately organised this year’s Afrikan Emancipation Day activities in ways to counter the use of racism, by the elitist establishment of Global Apartheid racism, to keep all communities of resistance apart from each other, and therefore make it difficult for us to collectively achieve the desired victory of total emancipation for all Humanity to reclaim the Planet and build a multipolar World of Global Justice for All. The deceptive fear mongering of the white supremacy racist ilk of Nigel Farage is not going to stop us progressing this work of rebuilding principled unity in continuation of similar efforts in the past.
Learning from our predecessors, (whose efforts in this same direction were given recognition in the British champions of internationalist solidarity section of our Sankofasafarinta Exhibition at Max Roach Park), as part of the Reparations Rebellion Groundings, we are better prepared now to defend this work of forging principled unity as a necessity for advancing all of us towards the Rendezvous of Victory that our own Pan-Afrikan freedom-fighters like Aimé Césairelong ago envisioned for us. This is what we mean by our slogan ‘Stop the Maangamizi: Build Maatubuntuman in Ubuntudunia!’
Esther Stanford-Xosei, Coordinator General, Stop the Maangamizi: We Charge Genocide/Ecocide Campaign
The 1 August Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations Rebellion Groundings were organised by the Stop the Maangamizi: We Charge Genocide/Ecocide Campaign in partnership with the Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March Committee. Both formations have, since 2015, been co-organising the Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March on the 1st August. This year however, we decided to organise the Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations Rebellion Groundings as a form of peaceful non-violent direct action.
The reason being that we are not being heard in our demand contained in the Stop the Maangamizi: We Charge Genocide/Ecocide Petition that the UK Government establish an All-Party Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry for Truth & Reparatory Justice and commit to holistic reparations according to the UN Framework on the Right to a Remedy and Reparation for Victims of Gross Violations of International Human Rights Law and Serious Violations of International Humanitarian Law. The theme for the Groundings was ‘Uniting to Stop the Maangamizi: For Our Very Survival – Planet Repairs Now’.
Although our plan could not be fully executed because of unfair UK Government and police impositions, our overall assessment is that of success in the fact that most of what we had planned was carried out.
We did occupy Brixton Road intermittently.
We did disrupt the normal ecocide business as usual that occurs in Brixton.
We did contribute to less air pollution by traffic.
We did challenge environmental racism and other manifestations of Maangamizi crimes of genocide and ecocide in Britain.
We did facilitate the co-organisation of a powerfully unifying commemorative and inspiring protest event, in tribute to our illustrious Revered Ancestors on whose shoulders we stand resolute in our sacred quest to effect and secure holistic Planet Repairs, for all our generations who have resisted the Maangamizi, including guarantees of non-repetition for future generations of ‘Beautyful Ones Not Yet Born’.
We did have a powerful array of Pan-Afrikanist and internationalist contributors to our event, who participated in the Movement of Movements Internationalist Solidarity Groundings with the Pan-Afrikan Liberation Movement, which took place at Max Roach Park, that reflected Pan-Afrikan dimensions of the struggle to effect and secure holistic Reparatory Justice.
We did compel public attention to be paid to our cause of asserting our legitimate intergenerational demand that the UK Government commit to holistic reparations, with the first serious step being that of establishing the UK All-Party Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry For Truth & Reparatory Justice.
Support Received
We received extensive support from diverse sections of our Afrikan Heritage Communities, including many supporting and contributing community based organisations, who came out in their thousands, (not hundreds as many of the media reports are mis-reporting). We take pride in the fact that despite fearmongering and threats from the police and the entire British State machinery, our people still came out defiantly in support of our call to unity for Reparatory Justice action.
We acknowledge the fact that, because of the government and state anti-terrorism policing impositions imposed within less than 24 hours of our Reparations Rebellion Groundings, a few shortcomings made what we had planned as co-organisers not to be fully realised. Such short-comings, some of which were due to interferences and obstructions from central government were taken advantage of, by the British state machinery, to falsify and create situations of make-believe conflict that resulted in 3 arrests and threatened to provoke our Black communities in attendance, into what could have degenerated into rioting.
We have good cause to say so because on the morning of the 1st of August, a member of the public who was driving in his car in the vicinity of where the Reparations Rebellion Groundings were meant to be taking place, observed police officers piling bricks into a police van. The member of the public described the bricks as being “proper house bricks” so Leo Muhammad, a longstanding member of the Nation of Islam, but who was not working in an official capacity, but rather participated in the Reparations Rebellion Groundings as a longstanding member of the Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March Committee, reported this incident to Superintendent Ian Howell (Lambeth Borough), Police Liaison Officer Sergeant Simon Hearn and Community Liaison Officer, Lance Edmondson, based at Brixton Police Station. Leo Muhammad was accompanied by the eye-witness and a security officer supporting our security and stewarding operations for the Reparations Rebellion Groundings, who was wearing a body camera and therefore such reporting of this incident was recorded.
As co-organisers, we in the Stop the Maangamizi Campaign and Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March Committee up till now have not received a satisfactory answer to the request to know why police officers were seen piling bricks into a police van. The explanation provided was that the local authorities, Lambeth Council had been doing some “cleaning up”. Notwithstanding the aforementioned, as co-organisers, we would like to express our appreciation to Extinction Rebellion Police Liaison, Paul Stephens who brilliantly helped us in working reasonably well with the police in general but also particularly with Police Liaison Officer Sergeant Simon Hearn and Community Liaison Officer, Lance Edmondson who genuinely tried to help and facilitate us to ensure that the Reparations Rebellion Groundings ran peacefully according to our purpose.
Through the increasing level of awareness and collective discipline that we are cultivating in our Afrikan Heritage Communities and in the building of cross-community alliances and ‘movement of movements’ cooperative relationships, such provocations, were pre-empted and resisted from our peaceful standpoint of non-violent direct action. We are grateful to our own Afrikan Heritage Communities and all who came in solidarity for enabling us to defeat the shenanigans and machinations of the British state machinery and other white supremacy racist agent provocateurs so that our activities on the day were held successfully in accordance with our ancestral Afrikan visions, values and principles of Ma’at and Ubuntu to ensure a peaceful success in tune with our Reparatory Justice demands for Planet Repairs.
We are appreciative of our youth and student contingents from the Tribe Named Athari (TNA) and Rhodes Must Fall Oxford (RMFO) who contributed immensely to ensuring that the participation of the younger generation manifested the ethos of our Afrikan Emancipation Day commemorations as those of Reparations Rebellion Groundings in their real community educational meaning promoted by Dr Walter Rodney. We express our highest regards to various allies particularly those from Extinction Rebellion (XR) who demonstrated some of the best traditions of internationalist solidarity long displayed by progressive forces in Britain by acting in strict accordance with roles we had agreed that they would play, in contributing to the success of our activities on the day, through the facilitation of the Extinction Rebellion Internationalist Solidarity Network (XRISN).
We also express our gratitude to Councillors like Cllr. Scott Ainslie, and Cllr. Cleo Lake, who have been leading our engagement with the Green Party in getting ‘Atonement and Reparations’ motions passed by Lambeth Council on 15th July 2020 and Islington Council on the 9th July 2020. We particularly commend those in Lambeth Council whose version of the motion passed highlighted our need for the UK Government to establish the All-Party Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry for Truth & Reparatory Justice (APPCITARJ). The APPCITARJ is what we, as co-organisers from the International Social Movement for Afrikan Reparations see as the essential starting point for British state action in facilitating the masses of our Afrikan Heritage Communities across the World to access just hearings; which is in itself a reparative measure in accordance with the UN Framework on a Right to a Remedy and Reparations.
We are encouraged by the growing support from our Afrikan Heritage and other Black Communities, as well as wider sections of society in Britain, including diverse communities of the Global South Diasporas. We are glad that many in these communities are increasingly recognising the need for all of us to build the kind of principled unity that will enable the prolonging resistance efforts of our communities in the Global South to merge into the Global Rebellion that will deliver victory to all of us in ways that will not only make us win our specific community Reparations goals but also ensure the achievement of all the necessary Planet Repairs. For it is such holistic repairs to Peoples and Planet that will guarantee a cessation of violations and non-repetition of what we refer to as the Maangamizi (Afrikan Hellacaust), so that we shall have a New World of enduring Global Justice for all.
The Way Forward
We shall continue to work in advancing the momentum reinvigorated by the 1st Mosiah (August ) Afrikan and support the likes of A Tribe Named Athari (TNA) and allies who are working to earn for themselves places of honour in the front-ranks of the International Social Movement Afrikan Reparations (ISMAR) and the Peoples Reparations International Movement (PRIM) respectively.
We encourage community members, supporters and allies to do any of the following 4 things:
Write to elected officials to request their support for the Stop the Maangamizi Campaign demand for the establishment of the All-Party Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry for Truth & Reparatory Justice at the level of the UK Parliament.This is a link to an article we have on our website, with a template Stop The Maangamizi Postcard and template letter which can be amended from the perspective of allies supporting this demand.
In accordance with the Afrikan visionary ethical framework of MA’AT, we are supporting XR, through XRISN, to work towards the successful holding of its next phase of rebellion ‘We want to live – The Rebellion returns to Parliament on 1 September amidst warnings of a 4°C world‘; doing so in ways that will take shared learning from our 1st August Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations Rebellion Groundings into their own manifestations of non-violent direct action – ‘From Brixton Lockdown to Parliament Lockout’. We are planning to organise an interfaith human chain to surround the British Houses of Parliament with ceremonies to exorcise the criminal demons of genocide and ecocide out of such a Maangamizi crime scene to prepare this institution to host the APPCITARJ. Such spiritual cleansing ceremonies will be conducted by Indigenous spiritual practitioners of liberation theology from Afrika and other regions of the Global South assisted by interested people of all faiths in the Global North. By so doing, we shall be strengthening People-to-Peoples Internationalist Solidarity in order to move all progressive forces of Humanity harmoniously towards our common objective of ‘Planet Repairs!’ as expressed in our Reparatory Justice slogan of ‘Stop The Maangamizi – We have Ubuntudunia to Win’.
We are inviting all from our Afrikan Heritage Communities and allies to join us in responding to the internationalist solidarity gesture of the New Tribe and their supporters from the communities of resistance of the South Abya Yalan (so-called Americas) Diaspora, who participated in the edutainment activities of our Reparations Rebellion Groundings in Brixton to support their own forthcoming commemoration of 12th October, as the International Day of Indigenous Resistance. Together, in such actions of true internationalist solidarity, we all shall win.
For us in the Stop the Maangamizi Campaign and others in our ‘coalition of the willing’, preparation for 1st August 2021 Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations Rebellion Groundings start from today, 3rd August 2020. Such Groundings will take place in the same area we were meant to lock-down in Brixton from Windrush Square to Max Roach Park including Brixton Road.
Esther Stanford-Xosei
Coordinator General, Stop The Maangamizi: We Charge Genocide/Ecocide Campaign (SMWeCGEC)
Esther is also the official spokesperson for the Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March Committee (AEDRMC) and Co-founder of Extinction Rebellion Internationalist Solidarity Network (XRISN)
See our response to Nigel Farage’s disparaging remarks here.
Further to our earlier post yesterday (below), it has come to our attention that the Atonement and Reparations for the United Kingdom’s Transatlantic Traffic in Enslaved Africans motion moved by Islington Green Party Cllr Caroline Russell was amended by Labour Party Cllr Gulcin Ozdemir.
Full Council has passed the amended motion “Atonement and Reparations for the United Kingdom’s Transatlantic Traffic in Enslaved Africans”. Click here for more information: https://t.co/BcATxea4NV#IslingtonFC
One of the significant amendments was removal of the text:
Write to the Speaker of Parliament, Chair of the Women & Equalities Committee and Chair of the Home Office committee to request that they establish, and seek UK Government support for the establishment of an All-Party Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry for Truth and Reparatory Justice and calling on the Government to commit to holistic reparations taking into consideration various proposals for reparations in accordance with the United Nations Framework on Reparations.
Unfortunately, the Islington motion moved by Cllr Caroline Russell and also retained in the amended motion by Cllr Gulcin Ozdemir also omitted (we were told by accident due to working with an older draft of which there were several) this key text:
In 2003 the Lambeth based Black Quest for Justice Campaign (BQJC) initiated a class action for Pan-African Reparations for Global Justice against Queen Elizabeth II and agents of the Crown as Head of State and Head of the British Commonwealth calling for the establishment of a Reparations Commission of Inquiry. This action was denied on the grounds that the Crown could not be prosecuted, and these crimes could not be enforced prior to the enactment of the International Criminal Courts Act in 2001.
In 2004 the Rastafarian movement were denied their appeal for reparation because the UK government felt it could not be held responsible for events of past centuries.
Of course these omissions are unacceptable to us and we await the passing of the Lambeth Council Resolution on 15/07/20.
This motion is largely an outcome of engagement with Cllr Scott Ainslie in demonstration of his commitment made at the 2019 Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March to follow-up with a motion on reparations. The motion in Islington was able to pass because of Green Party and Labour Party collaboration and consensus-building around key aspects of the text that the SMWeCGEC contributed and which were added to by members of the Green Party and the Labour Party.
Hearing from #Cofi about how we need to lead humanity back to honouring Mother Earth. @uk_march “we are returning to the wisdom of our ancestors who warned of the dangers of exploiting the earth’s resources” pic.twitter.com/euaiBZ1baK
From the SMWeCGEC’s perspective, one of the highlights of this Islington Council Reparations Motion is recognition of our campaign demand for the establishment of the APPCITARJ, which is an essential phase in a participatory administrative reparations process. In addition to reference to selected landmarks in the UK chronology of campaigning on reparations. We also contributed significant amounts of text to the original Islington and Lambeth motion.
A similar motion was submitted by Green Party Cllr Cleo Lake in Bristol on 7th July 2020.
The first draftedmotionspearheaded by Cllr Ainslie will actually be voted on by Lambeth Council at the forthcoming Council meeting on Wednesday 15th July 2020.
The SMWeCGEC is truly appreciative of Cllr Ainslie and all others that worked with him from the Lambeth Green Party, Greens of Colour, including Cllr Lake and also Cllr Russell, to ensure that such motions could be submitted.
Cllr Scott has truly been exemplary in working in such a way which honours the guidance in the INOSAAR Principles of Participation in recognising the existence of the International Social Movement for Afrikan Reparations (ISMAR); and the necessary ethics that this entails. This includes respecting the existence of historical and contemporary reparations work, research and other initiatives at regional, national and transnational levels.
We are also pleased that engagement with the Green Party which was commenced years earlier (between 2002 – 4) with other Green Party elected officials under the auspices of the then Rendezvous of Victory, has now borne some outcomes that help take the goals of the International Social Movement for Afrikan Reparations (ISMAR) Further.
We also take this opportunity for recognising the efforts of Lucie Scott in Hackney who recently got in touch to inform us that she had proposed a motion passed in 2018 which recognised the demand for the APPCITARJ. See here Hackney NSN 2018 IR motionFinal (1) for further info.
The following are a few relevant tweets and other publicity:
Last night Islington Council passed our Green Party motions on reparations and glyphosates 💚
Dr #WalterRodney‘s wisdom is relevant to #Afrikan struggle 4 #Reparations “A struggle doesn’t drop from the sky; it has roots, it has been going on for years; people’s energies, their consciousness, their organizations have evolved in response to specific historical conditions.”
The following video featuring Esther Stanford-Xosei, legal advisor to then existing Black Quest For Justice Campaign (BQJC), is one of the earliest video recordings which tracks the demand for what has now become known as the All-Party Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry for Truth & Reparatory Justice (APPCITARJ). However its modern-day antecedents, as well as that of the Ubuntukgotla People’s International Tribunal For Global Justice (U-PITGJ) can be traced back to the the work of Kofi Mawuli Klu who wrote the following paper Charting an African Self-Determined Path of Legal Struggle for Reparations as a contribution to the 11 December 1993 working conference of the African Reparations Movement (ARM UK), co-founded by the late Bernie Grant MP and others.
The following comments from SMWeCGEC Co-Initiator and Co-Vice Chair, Kofi Mawuli Klu provide another layer of historical context to the significance of this motion for the SMWeCGEC and the wider ISMAR.
Also this comment from Kofi is in response to a dialogue between him and Akyaaba Addai-Sedo based in Ghana about the same motion.
Yes, the awesome beauty of this historic action of the London Borough of Islington, to which the work of yourself, Brother Akyaaba and others of the GLC, contributed upon the foundations laid throughout the ages by Kodwo Enu (Ottobah Cuguano), Olaudah Equiano, Frederick Douglas, Henry Sylvester Williams, John Archer, Marcus and Akosua Boahemaa Amy Garvey, CLR James, Claudia Jones, Paul Robeson, George Padmore, Ras Makonnen, WEB DuBois, Osagyefo Kwame Nkrumah and his stalwarts of the Pan-Afrikan Congresses, is the change in Language and concepts insisted upon by our Stop the Maangamizi: We Charge Genocide/Ecocide Campaign (SMWECGEC), backed strongly by our colleagues of the INOSAAR based at the University of Edinburgh, and friends of the Green Party! So, for example, instead of the so-called very derogatory insulting ‘Slave Trade’, which the likes of Walter Rodney had very well repudiated as no trade at all, there is now acceptance of our PARCOE formulation that it is the Transatlantic Trafficking of Enslaved Afrikans (TTEA)!
Not yet Uhuru; but there is now being galvanized by new waves of Rebellion at home and abroad our Long March to the victorious Reparatory Justice achievement of the Pan-Afrikan revolutionary winning of Planet Repairs, in order to secure our own MAATUBUNTUMAN Pan-Afrikan Union of our Communities of Resistance, stronger unifying those in our Mothercontinent with those in the diaspora, in a New Global Justice World of UBUNTUDUNIA, not by opportunistically riding upon the topdown ramshackle bandwagons of Neocolonialism like the so-called African Union (AU) of misleaders, but rather by the independently organised grassroots-embedded Worldwide Black Power of our Afrikan People in our own Afrikan Communities of Resistance!
Forward Ever Onward! There is Victory for Us! Amanda Ngawethu!
Elsewhere, Kofi says this:
Thanks, Sister Esther, Yes, our Stretch of the Maangamizi Counteraction Intergenerational Long March of our ancestral Freedomfighting Afrikan Sheroes and Heroes has now come to one of its major decisive Reparatory Justice Turning Points towards our long desired total Pan-Afrikan Liberatory Rendezvous of Planet Repairing Global Justice Victory! Now is Our Time to Seize WISER than ever before to ensure our Pan-Afrikan Reparatory Justice Making of, and Black People’s Power contributions to, the Global Justice Writing of true World Ourstory/History is accelerated to its definitive, irreversible and completely victorious destination! Our MawuLisaga, the almighty God of Afrika and the entire World of, and beyond, Miano Nana Asase Yaa Mother Earth be thanked, with all the gratitude due also to our revered Ancestors, for the day we met to begin battling together for the more systematic movement building harmonization of the collective and individual efforts of our Afrikan people glocally towards the better intellectually organic and organisationally disciplined achievement of this sacred purpose! Akpe: Thank you very much!
The rest of us also agree with Kofi who has rightly stated elsewhere:
The biggest gratitude goes to the God of Afrika and the Pluriverse, to our revered Ancestors and also to all of us who have kept faith with them for a true Reparatory Justice that can only be holistic Planet Repairs in its Global Justice for all meaningfulness! Lots more work to do!
Until next time!
‘Stop the Maangamizi: We Charge Genocide/Ecocide! Campaign International Steering Committee Spearhead Team (ISC-SMWeCGEC)
‘Stop the Maangamizi We Charge Genocide/Ecocide!’ Campaign & Global Afrikan Peoples Parliament
Statement on the Relevance of Roger Hallam’s Comments Regarding the Shoah to Recognising, Counteracting & Preventing the Recurrence of the Maangamizi
Songs we would never hear! Histories we would never know! Art we would never see! Because the European had the capacity to destroy and didn’t have the moral restraint not to.
Professor Maulana Karenga
As an Afrikan Heritage Community-based formation engaged in building an affinity relationship with Extinction Rebellion (XR), our ‘Stop the Maangamizi: We Charge Genocide/Ecocide!’ Campaign (SMWeCGEC) and its sister body the Global Afrikan Peoples Parliament (GAPP) feel compelled to say for history something about the globally significant conflict now brewing in Extinction Rebellion (XR) pertaining to one of its co-founders, Roger Hallam.
In the English-language interview in Die Zeit published on the 20th November 2019 it is reported that Roger Hallam said: “The fact of the matter is, millions of people have been killed in vicious circumstances on a regular basis throughout history.” He listed other mass killings in the past 500 years, including the Belgians’ slaughter in the Congo Free State; which was a corporate state in Central Afrika that King Leopold II of Belgium claimed private ownership of and evolved into evolved into a colony (the Belgian Congo) in the land now known as the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Roger Hallam pointed out: “They went to the Congo in the late 19th century and decimated it.” For the information of those not yet aware of this conflict, it is necessary to note that he was also quoted as having said that, seen in this context, the Jewish Holocaust was “almost a normal event … just another fuckery in human history”.
As organisations campaigning on our Afrikan Heritage Community experience of the particular manifestations of a special type of genocide and ecocide that we refer to as the Maangamizi, which is not only in the past but continues into the present, and to which Roger Hallam was making reference to, we cannot keep silent on this matter. For us, the issue that is being missed, if you read Rogers comments in context, and which none of the statements being issued officially by XR have recognised or commented on so far, is the reference to the genocide of Afrikans in the Congo which is only one of the many heinous crimes of what we in the SMWeCGEC and GAPP refer to as the Maangamizi. The Maangamizi has represented an existential threat to the peoplehood, self-determination and agency of Afrikan people for the past 500+ years of world history.
This is not a Genocide Olympics. In the rush to condemn Roger Hallam for his comments there is an equally epistemically and structurally violent denial of the omnicides against Afrikan, Aboriginal and Indigenous Humanity, (non-European humanity in short). In the reactions to Roger Hallam’s quoted comments in newspapers, what is inferred is the view that the Shoah, (Jewish Holocaust) was exceptional above all other Holocausts and genocides. Whilst it is true, as the axiom goes “no one cries more than the bereaved”, from the quoted comments, it is clear that Roger Hallam, like many others especially from the affected communities take the view that other genocides also need recognition prevention and redress. To do so is not to deny, denigrate or reduce the significance of the Shoah.
At the International Conference on Genocide Prevention that took place in Brussels from 31 March – 1 April 2014, Yehuda Bauer stated that “The Holocaust is not unique; it is unprecedented, and that means that it is a precedent that can be repeated (though not in the same way), unless we prevent that ”
A Matter of Comparison, The Holocaust, Genocides and Crimes Against Humanity: An Analysis and Overview of Comparative Literature and Programs by Koen Kluessien & Carse Ramos, International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance
Incidentally, the Committee on the Holocaust, Genocide and Crimes Against Humanity of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) was established to work on how best to support teachers who choose to relate the Holocaust to other genocides and crimes against humanity. According to the above report: A Matter of Comparison, the Holocaust, Genocides and Crimes Against Humanity a central accomplishment of the Committee was the publication of the series of documents including The Holocaust and Other Genocides which offers ideas and recommendations to educators teaching about the Holocaust and its relationship to other genocides and crimes against humanity. In the Why relate the Holocaust to other genocides and crimes against humanity?
section of the aforementioned report, the authors “summarise a number of important reasons why it can be valuable to offer such a comparative approach, points out some challenges, and concludes with some reasons or agendas that should not lie behind a comparative approach.”
So, we in the SMWeCGEC and GAPP are making this statement to highlight the fact that whilst not in favour of the unacceptable type of language that accompanied the main point in Roger’s original statement, we seek to highlight the most important fact is drawing attention to the currently ongoing genocide and ecocide, of which our continuing present-day Maangamizi is part of. This is the first time that someone racialised as white in a prominent campaigning organisation in Europe, a campaign that is currently in the global mainstream media limelight, has dared to lend support to something that our Afrikan Heritage Communities across the world has been drumming up for centuries. Our Maangamizi is one of the most horrendous, traumatizing and long-enduring up until now special types of genocide and ecocide of over 500 years duration. It continues into the present, even though the white supremacy racist establishment of Global Apartheid has terroristically compelled even some among our own Afrikan Heritage Communities and most Peoples of the world to be in denial of it.
The Shoah has quite rightfully been recognised and there are laws that protect against Jewish Holocaust denial. Yet people deny the Maangamizi of the past and present every day with impunity. We in the SMWeCGEC partner with the Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March Committee to co-organise the annual 1st August Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March and hand in the ‘Stop the Maangamizi!’ Petition to the Office of the UK Prime Minister at 10 Downing Street simply with a demand supported by thousands that we can have a dialogue with the British state and society via the establishment of the All-Party Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry for Truth & Reparatory Justice (APPCITARJ).
Yet from 2015 until now, we have been denied a fair hearing and consistently been told “we do not believe that reparations are the answer” by officials of the British State. Speaking about the Afrikan case, we have no recognition and no justice!!!, even in this United Nations declared International Decade for People of African Descent (2015-2024), in which the United Nations on behalf of the international community recognises that that people of African descent represent a distinct group whose human rights must be promoted and protected. Despite this progressive declaration the British State has said it will not recognise the Decade. Even within XR our demands for recognition of our Afrikan humanity gone unmet, with some pushing unto us the unfairly homogenizing descriptor ‘People of Colour’ as a way of not recognising the specific experiences of People of Afrikan heritage.
We therefore overstand why, to those insisting on this denial of our Maangamizi, particularly in its present phase of neocolonial enslavement, with all of its horrors of Afriphobic and anti-Black racism, Roger Hallam is being lynched for being a ‘white racetraitor’.
We dare all those all those who are ganging up to lynch Roger Hallam, beyond assisting him to correct his errors, to act in accordance with the XR demand to ‘tell the truth’. This means to confess truthfully that, actually, the one unspoken thing they are ganging up to mercilessly assassinate the character of Roger Hallam for, without any of the XR compassion for his human errors, is his daring to put the case we are making about our present-day experience of life as Afrikan People across the world as being a Hellacaust of continuing genocide and ecocide; of omnicide crimes continuing for centuries into the present as our Maangamizi!
Yes, this open pointing to the current situation of Afrikans and other still oppressed and super-exploited Peoples of the Global South, who are still being terrorised with genocide and ecocide by those in the Minority World of the Global North holding the reins of so much Global Apartheid racist power as to be perpetuating the vestiges of colonialism and the ravages of neo-colonialism, including forms of eco-fascism, against the will of our Peoples of the Majority World, is his real offence to them and others of their ilk.
We are not deceived by the claims being made by some of these elements condemning Roger Hallam that they are doing so in pursuit of Global Justice. What we really mean in our long-standing, painstaking and experiential learning Pan-Afrikan Freedom Fighting for Global Justice bears no resemblance to what they are claiming. As Activist-Writer Alice Walker says: “No person is your friend who demands your silence or denies your right to grow.” A climate of fear is being created within and around XR to terrorise those who do not share views similar to those now putting out blanket condemnatory statements about Roger Hallam’s comments.
Part of the context in what is being claimed to be hateful anti-Semitism and Jewish Holocaust denial on the part of Roger Hallam by some, is the Maangamizi against the OvaHerero and Nama People (1904–1908) by Germany’s Second Reich, under Kaiser Wilhelm II, which was a precursor to the Jewish Holocaust. True champions of Global Justice would know that the OvaHerero and Nama People have an ongoing movement for genocide recognition and redress.
“How far back can the roots of the Holocaust be traced? The events that took place from 1941 – 1945 bore a striking resemblance to atrocities carried out years before in German South West Africa. Many of the ideologies that fuelled the Holocaust, as well as the means of systematic confinement and extermination of a people, began at the turn of the 20th century with the Herero and Nama.”
“Key perpetrators of this African genocide became high-ranking Nazis 30 years later. Names are chillingly familiar: Dr. Heinrich Ernst Goering was Namibia’s governor. His son, Hermann Goering, became a top Nazi leader. Eugen Fischer, a physician and professor of medicine, conducted experiments on the Herero that included forced sterilizations and injections of smallpox, typhus and tuberculosis. One of Fischer’s students was Dr. Joseph Mengele, known as the “angel of death” for sending people to the Auschwitz gas chambers and performing cruel medical experiments that he learned from Fischer. Franz Ritter von Epp commanded German troops against the Herero and later was a Nazi leader until he was captured by the U.S. Army in 1945. The list of names linking the Herero genocide to the Holocaust is horrifying.”
See also the following articles available on the worldwide web:
• Article on ‘Black People’ and the Holocaust on the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust website.
• It is also recommended one reads Germany’s Genocide of the Herero: Kaiser Wilhelm II, His General, His Settlers, His Soldiers by Jeremy Sarkin in which he argues that the history of the OvaHerero genocide remains a key issue for many around the world partly because the German policy not to pay compensation for the genocide contrasts with its long-standing Jewish Holocaust reparations policy.
“We Jews champion the phrase “Never Again” in regard to the Final Solution. We also enshrine throughout our religion and culture the principle of remembrance or zachor. We should make every effort to hear the pain, and to validate the suffering, of other ethnic groups who also anguished under the nightmare of genocide. To do so is not to diminish our own tragedy. It is not to make comparisons or parallels. It is not to engage in an absurd exercise in gamesmanship over who suffered more terribly, us or them. It is, instead, to ennoble our own perseverance as a people. For if we fail to remember the genocides of the Armenians and the Herero, then we abdicate our own moral standing to ask the same of ourselves.“
It is clear to see that in the case of the Genocide of Afrikans in the Congo as well as that of the OvaHerero and Nama, Afriphobic racism belittles the memory of its victims and accounts for the differential outcomes of struggles for redress by their descendants.
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These are photos from Esther Stanford-Xosei’s 2017 trip to Namibia as a guest of honour of the Ovaherero & Ovambanderu Genocide Foundation (OGF) for the 111th Commemoration of the Extermination Order which ushered in the OvaHerero-Nama Genocide
Our very track-record of activism on counteracting the Maangamizi demands that we do not succumb to this climate of epistemic and structural violence growing in XR at this time around this issue; but must rather truthfully speak in defence of those from amongst our allies who are seeking to do what the likes of: Abolitionists John Brown, Thomas and Lydia Hardy, Thomas Spence, Thomas Clarkson, Mary and John Estlin; Suffragette Sylvia Pankhurst; Scholar-Activist Historians Basil Davidson, Noel Ignatiev and Peter Fryer; as well as Black Liberation Army member, Marilyn Jean Buck have. Despite risking public condemnation we know, as Warrior-Poet Audre Lorde in her ‘Litany for Survival’ says, for those of us who have been “imprinted by fear“… it is better to speak, remembering we were never meant to survive.”
We hope the likes of Roger Hallam will be inspired and strengthened by such gallant predecessors and unswervingly walk their talk with striving even harder in internationalist solidarity with our Afrikan and all other oppressed Peoples, to finally put a full-stop to the Maangamizi and other continuing forms of genocide and ecocide. This is necessary to unify truly progressive forces in addressing the Climate and Ecological Crisis with holistic Planet Repairs in their Reparatory Justice meaningfulness; with a view to delivering the Global Justice for All that will enable us to win our own Maatubuntuman as one of the cornerstones for building Ubuntudunia together with all Humanity.
Stop the Maangamizi!
Build Maatubuntuman for Ubuntudunia!
Signed
Esther Stanford-Xosei
Coordinator General,
‘Stop the Maangamizi: We Charge Genocide/Ecocide!’ Campaign (SMWeCGEC)
Jendayi Serwah
Global Afrikan People’s Parliament (GAPP)
Leadership Facilitating Team
Kambanda Veii, Jendayi Serwah, Esther Stanford-Xosei & Utjuia Esther Muinjangue Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March (2017)
FILE – This November 1978 file photo shows the bodies of Peoples Temple mass suicide victims led by Jim Jones in Jonestown, Guyana. Dozens of Peoples Temple members in Guyana survived the mass suicides and murders of more than 900 because they had slipped out of Jonestown or happened to be away Nov. 18, 1978. Those raised in the temple or who joined as teens lost the only life they knew. They have journeyed over the past 40 years through grief over lost loved ones, feeling like pariahs, building new lives and, finally, acknowledging that many had a role in enabling the Rev. Jim Jones to seize control over his followers. (AP Photo/File)
A crew of 1 Director, (Joan Joan), 2 camera men (Sean Cassell #RastaCamp and Khevyn Ibrahim) and 1 photographer (John Matthews/JM Photography) filmed content to be used for an APPCITARJ promotional video consisting of over 25 people from Afrikan Heritage Communities, including children, youth, adults and elders, willing to give their time to support this project.
We really appreciate all those witness who took part in the filming. We are particularly thankful to Brothers Caul Grant and Sibusiso Tshabalala for being the first to be willing to speak to camera and tell their stories of the impact of the Maangamizi on them, their families and their future, unless we #StopTheMaangamizi!
“We will not let the British state get away with historic and contemporary crimes against African people”
Reparationist Esther Stanford-Xosei, @Xosei, is organising today’s Afrikan Emancipation Day March fighting for justice for the descendants of slavery pic.twitter.com/7huy6rZnh2
London UK 1st August 2019 (L to R) Cleo Alberta Lake, Lazarus Tamana , Hon. Kweme Abubaka and Dr Barryl Biekman present the ‘Stop The Maangamizi!’ Petition calling for the establishment of the All-Party Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry for Truth & Reparatory Justice for the Afrikan Hellacaust at 10 Downing Street as part of the Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March on Emancipation Day, . Emancipation Day marks the anniversary of the 1833 Slavery Abolition Act.
Please note, only copies of the additional 2,828 signatures collected between last year (14,590) and this year (17,418) were handed in with a copy of the ‘Stop the Maangamizi!’ Petition. Every year we tend to copy the same petitions and re-submit them with additional signatures collected. For environmental reasons, it was determined that we would only hand in the additional signatures collected this year until we reach 100,000 signatures that will be handed in all together when that figure is reached. Or in the alternative that the lobbying efforts of MPs and other elected officials via the ‘Stop The Maangamizi!’ Postcard yield the desired results. However, the SMWeCGEC is not relying on securing 100,000 to secure the campaign objectives, as ultimately reparatory justice will be effected, secured and taken by our own People’s Power, supported by other People’s of Conscience as well as our non-Afrikan Allies as part of PRIM-building.
In total 17,418 people have now signed the petition, this includes those who sign the online petition and the paper version.
Although 6 Petitioners were present as identified in the covering letter to the UK pRIME Minister which accompanied the petition, only 4 of the 6-member delegation were able to hand in the petition this year due to 2 members of the delegation unfortunately forgetting their ID.
This is a link to info about the petition hand-ins in the three preceding years:
Co-Vice Chair, Pan-Afrikan Reparations Coalition in Europe (PARCOE
Coordinator-General, ‘Stop The Maangamizi: We Charge Genocide/Ecocide!’ Campaign (SMWeCGEC)
Spokesperson, Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March Committee (AEDRMC)
Since last year, when Brother Steven Golding spoke at the 5th annual Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March, we stayed in contact. He got in touch earlier this year about the possibility of me visiting Jamaica to do a lecture in recognition of the 2015 – 2024 United Nations International Decade for People of African Descent. Such a trip was finally organised to take place at the end of May 2019.
From the 29th May to 5th June 2019, I was invited by Brother Steven to deliver a couple of public lectures on Reparations. This included doing a public lecture on the ‘The Reparations Challenge‘ at the UNIA Jamaica Mass Meeting, which took place at Liberty Hall, as well as being the first international speaker to deliver the annual Tacky Day Lecture in the Parish of St. Mary themed ‘Chief Tacky 1760 – 2060: The Struggle Then, The Struggle Now‘.
When I arrived in Jamaica, I was pleasantly surprised to be met at the airport by Sister Marva Pringle-Ximinnies from the Ministry of Culture, Gender, Entertainment & Sports, Brother Steven as well as Brother Derrick Robinson aka ‘Black X’. I did not know at the time but Black X had actually walked 57+ miles from Port Maria in the parish of St. Mary to Norman Manley International Airport in Kingston to officially welcome me to Jamaica as the international speaker for the Tacky Day Lecture.
This is a message that Black X had sent out to various networks before my arrival:
Dear friends, Today Tuesday May 28 at 3pm, I will be embarking on a 24 and a half hours walk from the Tacky Monument in Port Maria St Mary Jamaica to the Norman Manley Airport in Kingston, to be a part of the team that will be welcoming our Guest Speaker for Tacky Day to Jamaica! she is due to arrive in Jamaica from England (UK) at 3.30pm. Her Name is Esther Stanford-Xosei a Pan-African Speaker, a leading voice in the global Struggle in the call for Reparations to be paid for the atrocious and the beyond repair damage that was done to our African fore Fathers and Mothers. So it is with great conviction of duty in honourable memory of the Great Chief Tacky that in our Ancestors Name, I will challenge this 24 and a half hours walk to the Norman Manley Airport in Kingston from Port Maria St Mary. Thank you for your support.
Derrick Black X Robinson, Chairman Tacky Foundation, Tacky Heritage – Pan-African Garden Of Assembly 1760
The first public lecture I did was on Sunday 2nd June, 2019 at the famous Liberty Hall at 76 King Street, Kingston which was (at one point) the Hon. Marcus Garvey’s headquarters and that of the UNIA-ACL. The U.N.I.A’s constitution required each UNIA to have a Liberty Hall, which was its headquarters. Jamaica’s Liberty Hall was the centre of activities for the Kingston division of The UNIA. The two-storey building was the first meeting hall in Jamaica that was fully owned and operated by people of Afrikan heritage. First opened in 1923, the site has been restored to serve as a museum of the life and work of Marcus Garvey, who was the first man to be declared an official National Hero of Jamaica.
Programme for the Mass Meeting
This is a link to an Instagram post of Emprezz @emprezzgolding with a video clip from my lecture at the UNIA Mass Meeting.
On Monday 3rd June 2019, I was hosted at a reception organised by the St Mary Chamber of Commerce, Agriculture & Industry. I spoke at their meeting about the relevance of reparations to addressing local community development issues and challenges spoken about at the meeting.
I was a guest at the St. Mary Chamber of Commerce Meeting & Reception
Tacky Day Commemorations
Before I come unto the commemoration, it is important for me to say a little bit about Chief Tacky. Tacky’s War or the Easter Rebellion of Port Maria, one of the bloodiest revolts that took place in Jamaica, was an uprising of enslaved Afrikans from the central region of Ghana then referred to as Koromantse which started on Easter Sunday 1760 and went on until July 1760. The Rebellion broke out in St. Mary and spread throughout most of the country. The leader of the rebellion, Tacky (Akan spelling: Takyi), was originally from the Fante ethnic group in West Afrika and had been a Paramount Chief in Fante land (in the Central region of present-day Ghana) before being captured and sold into slavery after the Koromantse Wars. Tacky was subsequently enslaved on the Frontier Estate, in Jamaica where he was subsequently made foreman. However, he used this position to plan and influence some fellow enslaved Afrikans on his estate and neighbouring Trinity Estate to revolt. He, along with the Asante Queen Nanny or Nana, both, with the support of fellow rebels, planned to defeat the British and all enslavers and make Jamaica a separate and independent Black country. They began by seizing control of Frontier and the neighbouring Trinity plantation, killing the masters or estate managers and freeing the enslaved before heading to the nearby town of Port Maria.
One of the most-well known people seeking to gain greater recognition of Tacky is Black X, Chairman of the Tacky Heritage Group, who is truly a legend in Jamaica and is doing excellent work to help conscientise the Jamaican public about the importance of Chief Tacky. A waterfall close to the cave where Takyi and his fellow rebels planned the revolt was named Tacky Falls and is currently open to visitors. A school has also been named after Chief Tacky.
At the end of the lecture, I was presented with a picture by Chelsea Chin, administrator for Dr Morais Guy, J.P., Member of Parliament for Central St. Mary.
These are some of the pictures from the Tacky Day Commemorations, it was truly a beautiful day. Local MPs, the Mayor, business leaders, community members as well as children from 8 local schools in St. Mary attended the lecture!
Pics courtesy of Steven Golding.
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Left to Right: Steven Golding, Dr Morais Guy, J.P., MP, Central St. Mary, Dr Norman Dunn, BH, J.P., MP South East, St. Mary, Derrick Robinson aka ‘Black X’
This is a link to Minister Olivia Grange’s speech that was read out by Dr Norman Dunn, BH, (M), J.P. Member of Parliament, South East, St. Mary:
Esther Stanford-Xosei with Derrick Robinson aka ‘Black X’ at Tacky Day Lecture
Make Chief Tacky A National Hero Resolution
Since my return to the UK, I have been forwarded the following text of resolution to be put forward at the local Parish Council in St. Mary on Thursday 11th July 2019:
MAKE CHIEF TACKY A NATIONAL HERO OF JAMAICA
On Easter Sunday, in the year 1760 in Jamaica in the Parish of Saint Mary, the great rebel leader called Chief Tacky led our ancestors in a rebellion against the establishment of chattel slavery in the country. They raided the English garrison at Fort Haldane and attacked the estates at Frontier, Trinity, Ballard’s Valley, Esher, among others. Tacky’s revolt/war spread to several parishes across the country and lasted for over 18 months even when they thought it had ended. The brave Chief Tacky lost his own life but his vision and actions had struck a blow for freedom that helped to hasten the end of the act of inhumanity and the bondage of chattel slavery. Ultimately, history has proven that freedom was irreversible from that point on.
As a result of this trip, PARCOE decided to update our banner/flyer to include Chief Tacky and to also lobby for his inclusion as one of the revered Ancestors commemorated as part of the Ancestors Bloc of the Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March.
In addition, Esther was a panellist for the UWI ‘African Liberation Day Lecture’ on 29th May 2019 featuring keynote speaker Dr Julius Garvey who spoke to the theme ‘Moving Towards A United Africa: Fulfilling Marcus Garvey’s Dream‘.
Meeting with Minister Olivia Grange & Representatives of the NCR
Another important aspect of the trip was the meeting I got to have with representatives of the Ministry of Culture, Gender, Entertainment & Sport, including the Hon. Olivia (Babsy) Grange, MP, CD, Minister of Culture, Gender, Entertainment & Sport and Barbara Blake-Hannah; in addition to meeting with several members of the National Council on Reparations (NCR), in particular, NCR Co-Chair Mrs Laleta Davis-Mattis (who attended the Reparations Challenge Lecture), Mr Frank Phipps, Q.C., Lord Anthony Gifford, Q.C., Attorney Bert Samuels, Dr Jahlani Niaah, Dr Michael Barnett and Ras Ho-Shing. Barbara Blake-Hannah was also in attendance at the meeting with members of the NCR and Minister Grange.
I did not get to meet or speak with NCR Co-Chair Professor Verene Shepherd on my trip.
Pics courtesy of Steven Golding.
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During the meeting, Minister Grange updated me on some of the developments taking place pertaining to reparations, including the work being championed under the auspices of the Ministry of Culture in relation to the absolution of the resistance efforts of National Heroes. Minister Grange made a special presentation to me of a copy of The National Heroes and Other Freedom Fighters (Absolution from Criminal Liability in Respect of Specified Events) Acts, 2018 No.2
The following is a copy of the front and back page of the act of the act. A link to the act can be found below:
In the meeting I also shared information about what reparations activism was taking place by the UK contingent of the International Social Movement for Afrikan Reparations (ISMAR). The main updates I shared pertained to:
The alliances being forged by elevating a reparatory justice approach to tackling the climate and ecological crisis which will disproportionately impact on our communities in Afrika and the Caribbean; highlighting developments made in this regard by the ‘Stop the Maangamizi!’ Campaign developing an affinity with Extinction Rebellion (XR). As a result of the advocacy and involvement of reparationists in the ‘Stop the Maangamizi!’ Campaign, this has resulted in the subsequent development of the CEE the Truth Campaign by some members of XR and the emerging Climate & Ecological Independents championing Planet Repairs and reparations, as one of their core demands of their political manifesto in the 2019 European Parliamentary Elections.
The importance of state and non-state actors, recognising their distinct but possibly complementary roles and working together on the common cause of effecting and securing reparatory justice by seeking to join up actions and initiatives where possible. An example being the Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March which takes place on 1st August.
In seeking accountability from European nation states, the importance of factoring engagement strategies with country diasporas living in the UK/Europe as well as the wider Afrikan Diaspora communities in Europe. This being necessary to ensure that there was harmonisation between distinct reparations strategies and tactics by state and non-state actors.
Likewise, the necessity of also seeking to influence European and other civil society populations in Europe and win support from them in standing in solidarity with the cause of reparatory justice. In this regard, it was pointed out that the notion of Britain and Europe coming to help “clean up the monumental mess of Empire” they left in the Caribbean is not being taken seriously or endearing support from wider constituencies in the UK. This is largely because it is clear, even to many white people, that the British Parliamentary System is in crisis, with Brexit and the emergence of Extinction Rebellion which is challenging the inadequacies of governance and failure of moral leadership of British parliamentarians who have failed to act to avert the climate & ecological crisis etc. The popular overstanding being how can Britain be asked to clean up the mess in the Caribbean when it cannot clean up the mess in its own back-yard?
Meeting with Minister Mike Henry
I also met with the Hon. Minister Mike Henry, MP, CD, Minister without Portfolio in the Office of the Prime Minister of Jamaica who spoke to me about the legal action he was pursuing against Queen Elizabeth II, as part of a reparations strategy, which is further explained in the newspaper articles section below.
I raised similar points made in the meeting with Minister Grange and members of the NCR, in particular, regarding:
The importance of those in the Caribbean linking with country diasporas and the wider Afrikan Diaspora in UK/Europe as well as paying greater attention to winning over those of European ancestry to be in solidarity with our cause of reparatory justice.
Us as state and non-state actors recognising differing strategy and tactics even when making legal and political challenges to the British State and seeking to have dialogue with each other and share information other about these different approaches so what we do does not conflict.
On behalf of the Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March Committee, I thanked Minister Henry for the solidarity message he gave for the 2018 Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March.
Minister Mike Henry made a special presentation to me of a copy of his book ‘Many Rivers To Cross: A Political Journey of Audacious Hope‘ (2013).
Pics courtesy of Steven Golding & Ras Ho-Shing.
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Newspaper Articles
The following are the newspaper articles about my visit:
This article clipping is taken from section C10 of the Gleaner on Monday 3, June, 2019
Anonlineversion of the Jamaica Information Service appeared in the Jamaica Observer on Thursday 30 May, 2019
Meeting with Lord Anthony Gifford
Due to the fact that Anthony Gifford could not attend the meeting with Minister Grange and members of the NCR, he invited me to visit with him. I was accompanied by Steven Golding and I discussed the work being done here in the UK, particularly with reference to some of the new developments on the work being done by representatives of the UK ISMAR to broaden constituents of engagement and influence in relation to reparatory justice through working with Extinction Rebellion Internationalist Solidarity Network (XRISN) and The CEE The Truth CampaignClimate & Ecological Emergency Independents.
I explained that The CEE Independents have adopted reparations as part of the core demands and there was much scope for those in the Caribbean also doing more to link the struggle for reparatory justice to the growing consciousness of the necessity of reparations for climate and ecological breakdown. I reiterated the messages given at public lectures on the importance of those in the national councils and committees for reparations in the Caribbean recognising the importance of the country and wider Afrikan Diasporas living in Europe and secondly the importance of messaging which can also win hearts and minds of allies of European and other non-Afrikan ancestries in Europe. This is a Gleaner newspaper article which Lord Gifford wrote aspects of which he has subsequently notified me were influenced by some of our discussions.
Since returning to the UK, I shared info regarding a recent interview with music artist and write Gaika given by Leader of the UK Opposition, Jeremy Corbyn where he speaks about his support for reparations to former colonies to combat climate change with Steven Golding and Lord Gifford which in my view affirms the approach that we in PARCOE and the ‘Stop The Maangamizi!’ Campaign have long been championing in relation to ‘Planet Repairs’ and the importance of including reparations for climate and ecological destruction (ecocide) as part of the advocacy strategies coming out of Afrika and the Caribbean.
Visit to Pre-View Windush Murals
I visited Studio 174, a Kingston based Art Academy in downtown Kingston, to preview a series of murals being finalised as a mobile exhibit featuring a series of murals to honour the Windrush Generation; people from Jamaica and the Caribbean who left the region, beginning in 1948, on The Empire Windrush. This exhibit is part of the Paint Up Ya Creative Space Initiative of the Ministry of Culture, Gender, Entertainment & Sports in partnership with the British Council. Some of the discussions myself and Steven Golding had with the artistic director and artists was the possibility of such an exhibit of murals to come to the UK and possibly feature as part of the events leading up to the annual Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March.
Pics courtesy of Steven Golding
Media Interviews
I did the following interviews:
‘Rootsology’ show on Roots 96.1 FM,
‘Beyond the Headlines’ show on RJR 94 FM,
‘Talk Up Radio’ show on Nation-wide 90 FM
‘Sunrise’ show on CVM TV.
Unfortunately, although I contacted Pan-Afrikanist Activist-Journalist and host of the ‘Running African’ show on IRIE FM, Ka’Bu Ma’at Kheru ahead of the trip, with a view to meeting up during her visit, unfortunately I did not get to connect or speak with Ka’Bu on my trip. Ka’Bu was also the initiator of the ‘UofG Consult With Grass – Root Reparation Movements NOT Colonial Institutions!’ Petition on change.org (and also supported by the SMWeCGEC).
On the tentative schedule I received before my trip, it was planned that I was to do an interview on Thursday 30th May 2019 at 3pm on IRIE FM ‘Stepping Razor’ show with Mutabaruka and on Sunday 2nd June on IRIE FM at 7am on the ‘Running Africa Forum’ Radio with Ka’bu Ma’at Kheru. However, this changed with the updated schedule I received when I arrived in Jamaica. I was notified that Ka’bu had to travel urgently so had cancelled her show on 30th May.
Pics courtesy of Steven Golding.
Linking with Empress Esther of the EABIC ‘Bobo Shanti’
Through a link provided by Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March Committee, Co- Vice Chair, Prophet Jah B, I made contact with Empress Esther from the Ethiopia Africa Black International Congress (EABIC) on my visit. Although we did not get to meet in person, we did have discussions about the need for further outreach and connections with Rastafari community members and other Afrikan heritage communities in the Montego Bay Area who often do not get to go to Pan-Afrikan and Reparations focused events and activities in Kingston.
Courtesy Call on Permanent Secretary, Mr Denzil Thorpe
The last stop I made before leaving Jamaica, en route to the airport, was to return to the Ministry of Culture, Gender, Entertainment & Sport for a curtesy call on Mr Denzil Thorpe, Permanent Secretary for the Ministry. I was accompanied by my Steven Golding and Black X. Permanent Secretary Denzil Thorpe also made a special presentation to me of NCR memorabilia and we spoke about my visit to Jamaica.
Pics courtesy of Steven Golding & Marva Pringle-Ximminies
Greetings Supporters of the ‘Stop the Maangamizi: We Charge Genocide/Ecocide!’ Campaign (SMWeCGEC)
We in the SMWeCGEC wish to notify you of some exciting developments in our ability to build influence for achieving our cause as highlighted in the aims of the campaign.
SMWeCGEC co-initiator, Kofi Mawuli Klu has decided to champion programmatic aspects of the SMWeCGEC as part of standing as an independent candidate in the forthcoming European Parliamentary elections starting on 23rd May 2019. Kofi is one of nine climate and ecological emergency independent candidates who are collectively standing as part of the ‘CEE the Truth’ Campaign, (#CEEtheTruth).
Although we in the SMWeCGEC have advocated multi-layered tactics in achieving our goals, which include lobbying of MPs via the ‘Stop The Maangamizi!’ Postcard Campaign, we cannot wait for people who are in mainstream political parties to act in support of our cause. They are too slow in doing so! Whereas the official British Government position is “we do not believe reparations are the answer”; the opposition Labour Party support reparations, but have their own agenda as to how they feel they can address the matter. Their agenda, which has been highlighted here disregards Afrikan Heritage Community agency in shaping what reparations programmes are in our own self-determined best interests and therefore it is questionable in whose interests such plans really are. In reality, it flies in the face of our often repeated principle, which has been highlighted during the Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations Marches: ‘Nothing About Us Without Us!’. So just like the Ruling Party in the British Government, the official opposition and their representatives, are also refusing to have a dialogue with us in terms of taking to address the goals on the ‘Stop the Maangamizi!’ Postcard, hearing the voices of those of us who every year sign the ‘Stop The Maangamizi!’ Petition and mobilise as part of the wider SMWeCGEC, as well as those who participate in the annual Afrikan Emancipation Day Reparations March.
Rather, we in the SMWeCGEC take the view that we cannot rely on others to plead our cause; we must do that for ourselves! In this regard, the SMWeCGEC and the Global Afrikan People’s Parliament has taken steps to further adavance its policy position on electoral politics via the candidacy of Kofi Mawuli Klu as an Independent Climate & Ecological Emergency/Planet Repairs Candidate.
See here for more info about Kofi and other #CEEindependents.
The three core demands of the climate and ecological independents are:
1. The Council of Ministers and the European Parliament must tell the truth and take action to declare a Climate and Ecological Emergency.
2. The Declaration on a Climate and Ecological Emergency must demand a zero carbon Europe by a date no later than 2030.
3. National Citizens Assemblies on Climate & Ecological Justice must be instituted to oversee policy making, including those of Planet Repairs embracing Reparations, and have a leading role in shaping a zero carbon Europe.
Kofi takes into this #CEEtheTruth Campaign, all that represents the perspectives of the SMWeCGEC with emphasis upon Pan-Afrikan Reparations for Global Justice as advocated by the Pan-Afrikan Reparations Coalition in Europe (PARCOE), in its Planet Repairs meaningfulness. For us this is such an exciting campaign because it links the struggle for effecting and securing Pan-Afrikan Reparations for Global Justice with the struggle to end ecocide, hold accountable those responsible for perpetrating environmental crimes and harms and honour human, peoples and Mother Earth Rights by instituting Planet Repairs. This cosmic and holistic approach to reparatory justice (repairs) as highlighted by the Professor Chinweizu conceptual framework on reparations in addition to those ancient Afrikan approaches to repairing, renewing and transforming our World making it much more beautiful than what we found it, such as the Kemetan (ancient Egyptian) verb seruja ta
“Let me begin by noting that reparation is not just about money: it is not even mostly about money; in fact, money is not even one percent of what reparation is about. Reparation is mostly about making repairs. self-made repairs, on ourselves: mental repairs, psychological repairs, cultural repairs, organisational repairs, social repairs, institutional repairs, technological repairs, economic repairs, political repairs, educational repairs, repairs of every type that we need in order to recreate sustainable Black societies….More important than any monies to be received; more fundamental than any lands to be recovered, is the opportunity the reparations campaign offers us for the rehabilitation of Black people, by Black people, for Black people; opportunities for the rehabilitation of our minds, our material condition, our collective reputation, our cultures, our memories, our self-respect, our religious, our political traditions and our family institutions; but first and foremost for the rehabilitation of our minds”
Professor Chinweizi
It is the view of this campaign that in terms of cessation of the current manifestations of the Maangamizi including violations of genocide and ecocide as well as ensuring guarantees of non-repetition. Not only do we have to end genocide against us but we also have to work with other progressive non-Afrikan forces to stop ecocide and also draw them into taking responsibility for repairing Mother Earth, their nations and communities, in order to safeguard the rights of future generations. If not, any gains we make will not be sustainable as they will be undone by disrepaired members of the human family, including those among of us who have been so dehumanised by the Maangamizi that they are incapable of being the reparatory justice change we need to see.
Reparations are the totality of repairs that individuals and groups of people have to do for themselves and for the rest of their communities as well as humanity in order to make amends for the harm that has been done to them by historical and contemporary wrongs; which have so structurally affected them as to devalue their humanity. In this understanding, reparations are something that individuals and groups of people have to do for themselves, internally and externally and ensure that the wrongs done will not be repeated to themselves, the communities they belong to and the rest of humanity Kofi Mawuli Klu
Aims three and four of the SMWeCGEC are to:
• Mobilise petition signers/supporters to organise as a community of advocates for ‘Stopping the Maangamizi’ as a force within the International Social Movement for Afrikan Reparations, (ISMAR);
• Catalyse the development of such a force into an integral part of the Peoples Reparations International Movement (PRIM) to ‘Stop the Maangamizi’, build MAATUBUNTUMAN and establish UBUNTUDUNIA* as the most effective way to prevent its recurrence as well as effect and secure measures of reparatory justice from the ground-up;
Similarly, two of the seven political goals of a Pan-Afrikan reparations strategy that the SMWeCGEC adheres to include measures which:
• Restore Afrikan Sovereignty by redressing with MAATUBUNTUMANDLA (Pan-Afrikan Government of People’s Power) the disrepair in our Power and usher in a fundamental change of the existing world order that would definitively bring about new geopolitical realities such as MAATUBUNTUMAN; the anti-imperialist sovereign Pan-Afrikan Union of Communities/polity of Afrikan People’s Power.
• Institutionalise Maat and ubuntu in People to People internationalist solidarity relationship-building that will advance humanity to a Rendezvous of Victory where UBUNTUDUNIA emerges as a Global Justice ‘World of Many Worlds’ i.e. an equitable multipolar World of Pluriversality.
It is only through effecting and securing Pan-Afrikan Reparations for Global Justice that we will be able to ensure that the Maangamizi will not only be stopped but also not repeated.
This a message from Kofi:
Kofi’s political strategy is to help build the new alliance of progressive forces whose politics are rooted in Environmental Justice and all other related issues which marginalised communities, including his own minoritised Afrikan Heritage Communities in and beyond Europe, deem of importance to themselves; and about which no effective remedies have so far been implemented to their satisfaction.
This is a campaign which our Afrikan Heritage Communities and all other marginalised sections of the population in Europe, including migrants, denied their right to be legally present in this part of the world, where the wealth of their nations have been looted and continue to be plundered to enrich privileged groups, ought to see this as their opportunity to build a unifying power that can be flexed to give themselves Substantive Representation; and thereby enable them to effect their own solutions to the problems they are encountering. That is why Kofi’s campaigning is not about elevating himself as being the one who will provide the solutions, instead, he seeks to amplify the voices and actions of those already making efforts to find effective solutions to the problems they are encountering.
Some of our people talk about not engaging because the ‘reds’ (Labour) and ‘blues’ (Conservatives) are two wings of the same bird. Now, particularly for those living in London, there are alternatives. We now have a candidate standing as part of a collective who is pushing a reparations agenda, as per aim three of the core demands of the climate and ecological Independents. The point here is about amplifying voices and getting Afrikan Heritage Communities issues elevated in these spaces. This has not happened before with a genuine pan-Afrikan orientated candidacy not subservient to existing political party lines. We have several MPs and Councillors that look like us but it’s highly questionable as to their efforts to bat for us. Why? They did not stand on any kind of Black, Afrikan or Pan-Afrikan platform and they are not accountable to our Afrikan Heritage Communities. Some think because we looked alike that they represented US. Not so! And they never said they were standing for US. They are firstly accountable to their party and their constituency. Kofi Mawuli Klu has no such constraints. So, if you are in London check out what he is saying and the refreshing approach to electoral politics he is taking.
Until such time please familiarise yourself with the Global Afrikan People’s Parliament Policy Positions and learn more about the principles Kofi is standing for. It’s a start, not the sum total of our political strategies and quests for National Self-Determination. Seeds are being sown. In other places shoots are being watered. This is a process. Be patient and take action.
If you would like to contact Kofi on 07956431498 or email kofi.planetrepairs@gmail.com
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