Pan-Afrikan Meaning of Reparations: All Party Parliamentary Group on Afrikan Reparations Link
On the 27th September 2023, communities, people of conscience, activists, and international supporters joined to discuss the Pan-Afrikan Meaning of Reparations at Portcullis House, of the British Houses of Parliament, London, United Kingdom. The event was organised and co-hosted by the All Party Parliamentary Group on Afrikan Reparations Link, the Maangamizi Educational Trust (MET), the Pan-Afrikan Reparations Youth Forum, under the auspicies of the SANKOFAKUUMBA - Pan-Afrikan Community Glocal Educational Complex. The event was chaired by Bell Ribeiro-Addy MP, Labour MP for Streatham. The event was supported by various organisations, networks and partners including the Stop the Maangamizi: We Charge Genocide/Ecocide Campaign, Afro ID, the Collective des Nigériens delle Diaspora (CND), the Extinction Rebellion Being The Change Affinity Network (XR-BCAN), the Extinction Rebellion Internationalist Solidarity Network (XRISN).
The event has come as part of the #ReparationsSeason Activities being organised by SANKOFAKUUMBA-PACGEC and various networks for October Black History Month in the UK, and at a historical moment of rising awareness and organising for the rights to Afrikan Self-determination, Pan-Afrikan Sovereignty, as well as escalating repression, violence, and afriphobia as part of the Maangamizi. We, the co-organisers, herald this event as a success for Afrikan peoples worldwide; building on the long legacy of Pan-Afrikan Reparations organising at all levels including with the example of the late great Bernie Grant MP, the first parliamentarian in Britain to champion the cause of Pan-Afrikan Reparations.
The panel members strongly opposed the "offensive" and "opportunistic" attempts of movement capture by elite classes and collaborators with the plantocracy, and neocolonial establishment who make out Reparations to be only about compensation and corrupt deals amongst the elite and comprador "collaborators", rather than holistic Reparations including the restitution of resources, stopping the harm, Planet Repairs, and other Pan-Afrikan frameworks for Reparations. 1 Panel members confronted the latest attempts of Governments such as those in Ghana, Kenya, and Guyana to attempt to hijack true Reparations efforts while their communities are ignored, and violated by unaccountable governments, worsening poverty, and reactionary violence. The panel also emphasised the Maangamizi (the Afrikan name for the continuum of chattel enslavement, colonialism, and neocolonialism) Counteraction that communities and states alike are taking through their own efforts to stop the harm of theft and extractivism in places like Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger. The APPGAR-L session was opened by greetings and solidarity messages from Indigenous Chiefs in Afrika, Osie Adza Tekpor VII, Paramount Chief of Avatime, Ombara Otjitambi Mutjinde Katjiua of the Ovaherero, and an educational message of solidarity from Nani Explo-Kofi of the Pro-Nkrumah Unity Movement in West Afrika (Ghana).
The day challenged the idea that any Reparations for Afrikan people are legitimate without a Pan-Afrikan approach rooted in Rematriation and that there is a continuation of colonial violence when Reparations ignores the grassroots efforts of freedomfighting communities. The APPGAR-L session affirmed the need for positive action steps on Pan-Afrikan education and Educational Repairs as true Preparation for Reparations!
Drawing from the wider International Social Movement for Afrikan Reparations (ISMAR) key demands emphasised the call for the All Party Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry for Truth and Reparatory Justice (APPCITARJ) as a space where all peoples of the world could be heard and steps taken together for a true world of global justice; Substantive Afrikan Representation in political processes including in the Brazilian legal establishment; and for continued support of the peoples' efforts for sovereignty and self-determination and a return to internationalist solidarity progressive efforts.
Esther Stanford-Xosei, Principal Executive Director of the Maangamizi Educational Trust (MET) said:
“This event was significant in amplifying the meaning of Pan-Afrikan Reparations as rematriation which centers restitution of Afrikan Sovereignty, lineage, land, wealth and quality of life as the quintessence of true holistic Reparatory Justice. In a time of increasing state orchestrated anti-reparations propaganda, as well as reparations movement-capture and elite-capture, it is a matter of life and death that our struggle for Planet Repairs secures the winning of a repaired Afrika i.e. Maatubuntuman in a repaired counter-imperialist multipolar, pluriversal world of global justice known as Ubuntudunia.”
Gail Bradbrook, co-founder of Extinction Rebellion and the Extinction Rebellion Being the Change Affinity Network (XR-BCAN) said:
“This was a hugely powerful and vital meeting bringing together people from across the world, and human family, to understand that only together and in dialogue will we truly understand the reparatory needs of all our communities, and the work necessary to win together.”
Communities will be continuing the push towards the 19th October APPCITARJ practice hearing session at the Houses of Parliament on the Maangamizi crimes against the Ovaherero, Nama, and other indigenous peoples continuing the Internationally held Indigenous Peoples Resistance Day on the 12th October and commemoration activities taking place in Brixton, London, United Kingdom on the 14th.
Reparations Season will conclude with the International Conference on Reparations being hosted by the All Party Parliamentary Group on Afrikan Reparations (APPGAR) at the Friends House, Euston, London, United Kingdom on the 21st and 22nd of October.
Contact SANKOFAKUUMBA.ED@GMAIL.COM; +44 7737 602 484 for more information.