Ghanaian President, Nana Akufo-Addo, has said that financial reparations are long overdue to Africans and the diaspora as compensation for the enslavement of people of African descent.
He said this on the first day of a conference on how to tackle such historical injustices.
Advocates have long requested for paying reparations or making other amends for slavery, but the movement has recently gained momentum globally amid growing demands from African and Caribbean countries.
While launching the four-day reparations conference in the Ghanaian capital Accra, Akufo-Addo said: “No amount of money can restore the damage caused by the transatlantic slave trade … But surely, this is a matter that the world must confront and can no longer ignore.
“The entire period of slavery meant that our progress, economically, culturally, and psychologically, was stifled. There are legions of stories of families who were torn apart. You cannot quantify the effects of such tragedies, but they need to be recognized.”
According to a list of planned outcomes on its website, the event is expected to produce an African-led action plan to clamour for reparatory justice, establish an African committee of experts to oversee the plan’s implementation and deepen collaboration with the bigger diaspora.
Between the 15th and 19th century, no fewer than 12.5 million Africans were kidnapped and transported by European ships and merchants and sold into slavery. Africans who survived the brutal voyage ended up working on plantations under inhumane conditions in the Americas, mostly in Brazil and the Caribbean, while European settlers and others benefitted from their labour.
A United Nations report in September said countries could consider making financial payments among other forms of compensation, but warned that legal claims are getting more complicated with time and it is difficult to identify perpetrators and victims.
The Ghanaian President said he welcomed what he called an unequivocal call from Caribbean nations for reparations.
“We in Africa must work together with them to advance the cause,” he said to applause from the audience that included Heads of States of other African and Caribbean countries and other high-level delegates.
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