A SENIOR Jamaican government minister has said the country remains committed to demanding reparations for slavery.
Jamaica’s Minister of Culture, Gender, Entertainment and Sport, Olivia Grange, said the government will be seeking reparations for the Transatlantic slave trade and the long-lasting impact its had on the Caribbean country, The Jamaica Star reports.
Grange made the comments while accepting an apology from the United Reform Church (URC) in the United Kingdom (UK) who issued their apology for its role in slavery at a church service at Webster Memorial Church in St Andrew.
“It is this complicity of the church that gave solace and comfort to the citizens and governments of UK and Europe as they endorsed and defended with their military project, that saw the capture, the torture, the dehumanisation, and devaluation of African people, legacies of which we experience today as racism, white supremacy, and discrimination,” Grange said
“We struggle to build peaceful, stable societies because of the perpetration of violence which was the platform on which enslavement was executed yet, in spite of this, we have been good converts to these same religions.
“Our people have adopted and adapted the doctrines and rituals of these new religions and in many instances have energised and revitalised them with cultural practises of African spirituality,” Grange added.
Over the last few years, the Caribbean has seen a growing movement supporting the call for reparations.
In July 2023, the landmark Brattle Report reported that Britain owes a staggering £18.6 trillion in reparations – over five times the country’s annual gross domestic product.
The calculation of money owed to the Caribbean and the Americas was made by academics for the prestigious University of the West Indies.