Bernie Grant and the reparations movement in the 1990s
Introduction
Reparations are meant to be payments made to compensate for damages
unjustly inflicted on an individual, group or country. Historically,
reparations have only been exacted by victors from the vanquished. There
is no international legal mechanism by which weak countries and
exploited groups can claim reparations from their oppressors.
In a just world, Vietnam would collect reparations for French and US
aggression from 1954 to 1975. Vietnam failed to get a penny by way of
reparations and indeed was subject to 18 years of isolation organised by
the aggressor. Huge sums are due the American Indian survivors in
Central America, Mexico and the US as well as the descendants of black
slaves in the US for continued racism and discrimination. Similar sums
are owed by Britain for its part in the transatlantic slavery.
Reparations are also due from the West for systematic economic
enslavement after decolonisation.
Bernie Grant, black MP for Tottenham, attended the Abuja Conference on
Reparations in April 1993 at which Lord Gifford presented a legal basis
for redress. Bernie went as chair of the small group Africa Reparations
Movement- UK (ARM-UK) and returned with a new vision on how to claim
Africa's dues. In mid-1993, he introduced an early day motion (EDM) to
the House of Commons that attracted around 100 MPs. But nothing concrete
followed.Bernie
Grant's efforts
Bernie addressed a large turn-out (some 500) at the Lambeth Town Hall in
November 1993. "Nobody has given a red cent to us. We have suffered
more than all the other people and are still suffering. The important
aim is to get the principle of reparations established...the queen
should apologise to black people for Britain's involvement in slavery
and colonisation; the Star of Africa in her possession after the Boer
War should be returned to black S Africans..."
Bernie Grant also spoke to an audience at SOAS: "In 1830, Britain
paid £30m in compensation when the slave trade ended. But the money went
to the slave-owners, not to the black slaves who suffered centuries of
murder, rape and bestial conditions. The Jews get an annual cheque from
Germany; Americans compensated the Japanese Americans for being
imprisoned in WW2; the Australians are beginning to pay some
compensation for the aborigines slaughtered and dispossessed. Mr Major
went to Japan to beg a few shillings those who suffered in concentration
camps. Even Saddam was forced to compensate the Kuwaitis. But we blacks
have never had anything. If we got a dollar for every hour of slave
labour over the last 500 years, they have would have to transfer the
entire wealth of the developed world back to Africa."
Mr Grant said that the Africa Reparations Movement (ARM) was in the
process of building a water-tight compensation case to put before the
UN. But, before that, Britain should hand back stolen works of art to
her old colonies as a form of restitution.
He said: "We need to get our act together before we go out in a blaze
of publicity. Once the principle of paying back black people is
accepted, there will be no difficulty with the practice. Some sort of
forum will have to be set up to represent the Diaspora and Africa, the
forum being the body to receive the reparations and share it out."
Sadly, the movement could show little concrete results during his
lifetime.
References
1. Weekly Journal 25 Nov 1993
2. Voice 20 Sep 1994
3. Caribbean Times 16 May 1996
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Some scattered
developments 2002-06
Voice 19 Aug 2002
A coalition of black groups vowed to sue the Queen and PM Tony Blair for
compensation on slavery. The Black Quest for Justice Campaign (BQJC),
a pressure group, held a rally for reparations in Lambeth the previous
week. Crowds marched through the streets of Brixton with slogans such as
'Reparations now' and 'United against 500 years of terrorism'. The
street rally was designed to show solidarity with the Millions for
Reparations March to capitol Hill in Washington on the same day.
Esther Stanford,
of the society of Black Lawyers and
legal adviser to BQJC said they had
received no response from the Queen or the PM
but still planned to proceed with the action in May 2003. She told
Voice: "We are not only asking for reparations for enslavement of
our ancestors but also for present crimes - high rates of exclusion of
our children, high rates of detention in the psychiatric system, high
rates of incarceration of our people - these are all direct results of
the mass kidnapping of our people."
Voice, Oct03
The Black United Front Parliament (BUFP) prepared a petition
charging the UK govt with genocide
and hoped to collect one million
signatures. It was decided to submit the petition to the UN on
International Human Rights Day on Dec 10, 2003. Earlier in the year,
BUFP had filed a legal action against the Queen and Tony Blair for
crimes against humanity on people of African origin. But
the Attorney-General took refuge in a
technicality, saying the law did not
recognise slavery as a crime. [The pity
is that the action was filed within the legal system of the oppressors,
which would protect its own state from indemnity. So the Attorney
general's ruling was hardly surprising. The case should have been filed
with a World Court or equivalent, as Nicaragua successfully did in 1986
against US aggression. Or the petitioners should have appealed to the
Church of England on moral grounds.]
Esther Stanford,
president of BUFP, announced the petition during a 4-day festival in
London exploring the effects of slavery on British culture. She detects
a new type of racism – Afro-phobia which includes failing blacks in
education, employment, prisons & psychiatric system, racist immigration
policies.
Lord Gifford
in his 1993 submission at the Abuja Conference had spelt out three
propositions:
a. The mass kidnap and
enslavement of Africans was the most wicked criminal enterprise in
recorded human history;
b. no compensation was ever paid by any of the perpetrators to
any of the sufferers, and
c. the consequences of the crime continue to be massive, both in
terms of the enrichment of the descendants of the perpetrators, and in
terms of the impoverishment of Africa and the descendants of Africans.
If these propositions are accepted, the justice of the claim for
Reparations is proved beyond reasonable doubt.
BUFP is working with the National Black United
Front (NBUF) of the US and the UK’s Nation of Islam.
TV Channel 4, 15 Aug 2005
Dr Robert Beckford presented a documentary the Empire Pays Back
for Channel 4 about reparations for slavery. He is a lecturer
at the Uni of Birmingham on African Diasporan religions and cultures. He
said: “The slave trade was about the size of the IT industry today –
5% of the economy. We accounted for 3m slaves shipped to the Caribbean
and another million into slavery. In the film, we estimated that
Britain
would have to pay £7.5 trillion in compensation to Caribbean
descendants of slaves alone. We based it on unjust enrichment, pain
and suffering – standard measures in compensation cases.
“Scholars estimate that more than 30,000 slave
transatlantic voyages took place. Between 1700 and 1810, British
merchants were said to have transported 3m Africans. Overall, slavers
from Europe brought more than 10m slaves to the Americas between 1450
and 1900.”
Campaigners are calling for a national commission
to discuss the issue in depth, with the full engagement of the African &
Caribbean diaspora. Said Kofi Klu, joint coordinator of
Rendezvous of Victory, an anti-African pressure group, is calling
for reparations and a commission to address truth, justice and
reconciliation.
“It’s sharing stories and responding that we can
have cohesion and integration. Racism won’t go away until this happens.
When you look at the state of black Britain, you cannot say our lives of
the vast majority are better We have modern forms of slavery in a system
of global injustice. Black Britain is still battlking with racism which
denies humanity to now.”
Beth Herzfeld of Anti-slavery Int
said: “All states involved in the slave trade have a moral duty to
acknowledge the implications and apologise publicly. Countries that
profited from the trade should take specific action to support projects
to support countries and communities most affected by the slave trade.
That means the UK govt making more funds available to support community
projects in the UK, more development funds and unconditional debt
write-offs.”