President John Dramani Mahama has moved a motion at the Plenary Session of the United Nations (UN) General Assembly in New York, declaring the trafficking of enslaved Africans and the racialised chattel enslavement of Africans as the gravest crime against humanity.
President Mahama, who is the African Union Champion for Reparations, moved Ghana’s Motion on behalf of the Africa Group at the UN.
He said progress was made in little steps and that it was a forward motion towards something better, and changes often come incrementally.
March 25th each year marks the International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade.
The President said it was a Day on which the world honours the memory of the approximately 13 million African men, women and children who were enslaved over the course of several centuries.
“We remember them through articles, oral histories, through broadcast programmes, books, music, visits to museums, monuments, and memorials such as the Ark of Return, located right here at the Visitors’ Plaza of the United Nations Headquarters,” he said.
He added: “Through these activities, we do more than remember. We document and educate. We gain greater perspective. We find a delicate balance of learning from history so that we do not repeat it while leaving our pain behind.”
He said in doing so, the affected begin to heal individually, within their immediate communities, and within the global community.
“This Day of Remembrance did not happen by accident. In 2006, our global community gathered here, just as we have done today, and resolved to designate the 25th of March of the following year a Day of Remembrance. It marked significant progress,” he said.
“Then, the following year, in 2007, we decided to make the event an annual one, so that the 25th of March of every year would be the International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade. That marked an additional step in our forward motion.”
The President said it was indeed, fortuitous to be there at the UN, two decades later, addressing the General Assembly on behalf of the African group, regarding the draft resolution entitled Declaration of the Trafficking of Enslaved Africans and Racialized Charter Enslavement of Africans as the Grievous Crime Against Humanity.
He recalled that in September last year, at the 80th session of the General Assembly, he stood in the exact place at the UN Plenary and served notice that Ghana would move a motion to declare the transatlantic slave trade the grievous crime against humanity.
He said this current draft resolution was a result of months of consultation and consensus building by continental bodies, nations, experts, scholars, and jurists, with the sole aim of achieving a united front and grounding the final outcome in truth, compassion, and moral conscience, remembrance, education and dialogue.
“So today we come together in solemn solidarity to affirm truth and pursue a route to healing and reparative justice,” he said.
The President noted that the adoption of this resolution serves as a safeguard against forgetting. It also challenges the enduring scars of slavery.
President Mahama concluded his address with two significant quotes by two great leaders of history, one of them white and one of them black.
Quoting former President Theodore Roosevelt of the United States, he said: “With a great moral issue involved, neutrality does not serve righteousness.
“For to be neutral between right and wrong is to serve wrong.”
President Mahama also cited Civil Rights Leader Dr Martin Luther King, saying, “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.”
The President said: “We travel this long road, each step guided by a desire to be better and to do better, each step bringing us closer to the kind of world we would want to leave for our children.”
To the Delegates at the UN, the President said: “On this beautiful day in March, we are called to stand on the right side of history.
“Let it be recorded that when history beckoned, we did what was right.
“For the memory of the millions who suffered the indignity of the slave trade and those who continue to suffer racial discrimination. “
“Let our vote on this resolution restore their dignity and humanity,” he added.
