Tag Archives: Africa

Britain’s Perfect Caribbean Crime: Ignored Genocide, Faked Emancipation…

7th Annual George Lamming Distinguished Lecture

Streamed live on Jun 13, 2017

On Tuesday, June 13, 2017, Vice-Chancellor of The University of the West Indies (The UWI) Professor Sir Hilary Beckles, delivered the seventh Annual George Lamming Distinguished Lecture at The UWI Cave Hill Campus’ Errol Barrow Centre for Creative Imagination (EBCCI) in Barbados. Vice-Chancellor Beckles spoke on Britain’s Perfect Caribbean Crime: Ignored Genocide, Faked Emancipation, Insincere Independence, and No Reparations.
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I arrived by birth

By Raffique Shah
May 30, 2017

Raffique ShahThere was a minority view back in the 1980s/1990s when the lobby for a holiday to mark the presence of Indians in Trinidad & Tobago was loudest, that the termination of indentureship in 1917, not their arrival in 1845, should be celebrated. If that had prevailed, this year the Indo-Trinidad community would have marked the centennial of end of their semi-slavery. But the very vocal majority had their say and their day, hence the declaration of a public holiday on Arrival Day, May 30, the date when, in 1845, the Fatel Rozack docked in Port of Spain and deposited 200-odd wretched Indian souls on these shores.
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Living in a State of No-Whereness

By Dr. Selwyn R. Cudjoe
May 15, 2017

Dr. Selwyn R. CudjoeOn August 1, 1849, the Friends of Freedom sponsored a dinner at Juteaux’s Building in Port of Spain to celebrate the anniversary of their emancipation. Two hundred and fifty of the most distinguished black and colored citizens attended the dinner. Only three government officials (white) attended: the registrar of the Supreme Court, the clerk of the Petty Civic Court and the police inspector. The celebrants were joyous at having been emancipated and proud of the achievement of their race in spite of the obstacles that had been placed in their way.
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Why Black History Month Is Important to Me

By Dr. Selwyn R. Cudjoe
November 10, 2016

Dr. Selwyn R. CudjoeThis message was read to the children of the Robert Clark School, Dagenham, Essex (part of greater London) England, on Wednesday, November 9, 2016, in celebration of Black History Month. I thank Lara Akinn for offering me the opportunity to contribute this message to their celebration.
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Black Advocacy in T&T

By Dr. Selwyn R. Cudjoe
October 18, 2016

Dr. Selwyn R. CudjoeI wish to take up where I left off last Sunday to examine the implication of the “Report of the Working Group of Experts on People of African Dissent on Its Mission to the United States” for Trinidad and Tobago since there is an assumption that these reports have no relevance to our society. Sometimes we even refuse to believe that the slave experience lies at the base of our society masking our origin under the umbrella of an illusionary multiculturalism.
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Always Remember

By Dr. Selwyn R. Cudjoe
October 09, 2016

Dr. Selwyn R. CudjoeIn academic and political lectures, when I refer to the negative psychological and economic impact slavery has had on black people, my questioners usually retort: “You have to bring up slavery again?”

The same people who object to my bringing up slavery’s impact upon black people have no objections when Jews urge their people: “Never forget!”
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On the Chief Servant Makandal Daaga….and latent ignorance

Makandal DaagaTHE EDITOR: To any young person under 25 who may somehow be reading this, please look carefully at those of us over 40 and kinda pattern your life doing the exact opposite of whatever it is you see.

Because, listening to some callers to Power 102 and i95.5fm the morning after the passing of Makandal Daaga, one has to wonder why we bothered changing flags in 1962.
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PM: Are we perpetuating a mindset of entitlement?

August 1, 2016 – guardian.co.tt

Dr Keith RowleyIn the new pages of history currently being written in T&T, questions that arise include whether people are facilitating new prejudices and divisions in T&T’s society and also, if a mindset of entitlement is being perpetuated, says Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley.
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Balancing the Scales of Reparatory Justice

By Stephen Kangal
August 21, 2014

Stephen KangalI regard myself as an objective and detached observer of the legitimate current claim being prosecuted across the Caribbean for European nations that participated in the infamous Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade to pay reparations to the descendants of those who suffered this inhumanity in the hands of the slave-masters/traders and tribal chiefs in Africa who mobilized them and sold them to the slave-traders.
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Emancipate Yourself from … Yourself

By Corey Gilkes
August 06, 2014

EmancipationYears ago, the late economist and social thinker Lloyd Best pondered over the question of how does one save a culture from itself. This is a question we have not collectively dealt with as we continue to entangle ourselves more and more in the destructive aspects of this culture that we’re partly responsible for creating. Somewhere along the line, Emancipation, understood as “freedom” – and I’ll come back to that later – was hijacked to become something that was tolerant of mediocrity, the spurning of ambition, industriousness and intellectual pursuits. Small wonder some people say “dey should bring back de white man” because we’ve made a mess of our Independence (and our Emancipation). I don’t necessarily subscribe to such a self-loathing sentiment but much of what we’re doing to ourselves and our space certainly gives credence to it.
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