SIMON BARBER: African political prisoners were part of slaver booty
AU call to engage with diaspora reminds one how soon-to-be slaves were chosen for export
Listed among the “key decisions” of the AU’s latest assembly was a request that the AU Commission “work with well-organised and well-meaning initiatives to commemorate the 400th anniversary of the transatlantic slave trade in 2019”. Member states were “urged ... to consider immigration, economic, cultural and social policies that allow Africans descended from the victims and survivors of the transatlantic slave trade to reconnect and re-engage with their brethren in the African continent”. Perhaps more will come of this than of the AU’s previous attempts at outreach to the African diaspora. Perhaps. Whatever happened to the Sixth Region? What less-than-optimal past experience is implied by the words “well-organised and well-meaning”? What will stop it being repeated? And does this 400th anniversary thing really work outside the US, to which, if it applies at all, it applies uniquely? If one had to pick a date to mark the start of the shipment of African slaves across the Atlantic, a...
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