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“Many in the Church have today gone silent on the work of justice!”

These are the words of a well-known Anglican priest, Father Sean Major-Campbell. His bold critique to the Church and his loud, courageous advocacy for a Jamaican Republic and Reparatory Justice, as part of the Advocates Network, is an important reason for my presentation here this evening.

Let’s reflect a bit on the journey to this “silence” today!

Without seeking to provide a comprehensive overview of the Church’s role in advocating for human rights and justice, I would remind you of a few outstanding church advocates. Apart from Jesus Christ himself, whose teachings have guided and motivated church advocates across the centuries, the advocacy of our national heroes: The Right Excellencies Paul Bogle, George William Gordon and Sam Sharpe, all Baptist deacons, speaks volumes.

Although some members of the Baptist Missionary society choose to remain silent and argued that slavery was a “political matter” which should not involve the Church, Sam Sharpe rejected silence and orchestrated the 1831 Christmas Rebellion (or Baptist War) which led to that Emancipation milestone in 1838…the rest is history!!!

In 1864, in the face of certain death, Paul Bogle, and George William Gordon fearlessly stood up to the tyranny and injustice of a colonial system that perpetuated the enslavement of our ancestors well after the Emancipation era. These church advocates, among other lesser-known church advocates, risked their lives and that of their families in challenging the status quo to enable us to sit here today without many of the chains of slavery that tied us to the brutality and inhumanity that characterised the British Empire. But some of these chains persist today through mental slavery and in the institutional legacies embedded in:

– Our  school system that perpetuates educational inequality;

–  Our Justice system that perpetuates an external final Court of Appeal that citizens can only access if they can afford to pay for an Attorney to fly to London (if a visa is granted) to defend their rights and freedoms.

–  Our structure of land ownership that perpetuates landlessness,  homelessness, squatting, and demolition of homes by the state, as seen recently in Clifton, St Catherine – today 600,000 Jamaicans (about 20 per cent of the population) are living as squatters across Jamaica;

– And our socio-economic system that perpetuates inter-generational poverty and criminality. Today, we are one of the murder capitals of the world!!!

Many of us have remained SILENT in the face of these institutional legacies that lie at the root of the problems we see today and continue to thwart our development.

So I ask, what will it take to BREAK OUR SILENCE? What are we prepared to risk to finally and permanently BREAK THESE CHAINS…these institutional legacies, and emancipation ourselves from mental slavery… to enable future generations to achieve their full potential in a more humane and just Jamaica?

I say we  risk  NOTHING compared to the ultimate sacrifice our Heroes and others made for the relative liberties and freedoms we have today.

REPUBLICAN ADVOCACY

So my task this evening, is to encourage you to take even a very small step to advocate for a Jamaican Republic & Reparatory Justice.

I want to urge you to think about this advocacy through the lens of our own historical experience… as a continuation of our long 528 years struggle against the injustice and inhumanity at the hands of the Spanish and the British. The Right Excellencies Sam Sharpe, Paul Bogle, and William Gordon and other church advocates are a part of this long struggle. So too was the Right Excellency Marcus Mosiah Garvey! 

He encouraged us to be proud and confident about ourselves; to decolonise our education system and to pursue self-determination, anchored on self-reliant economic development.

By 1962, the hope for real change was anchored on the promise of self-government at Independence. This was an expression of self-determination, which by 1960, under the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) Resolution 1514 (XV) was a “fundamental human right.”

According to Norman Manley the mission of his generation: “…to win self-government for Jamaica,” which he saw as: “to win political power which is the final power for the black masses.” Although he felt that this mission was accomplished, we know now it was NOT.

Self-government was expressed through constitutional provisions which deeply entrenched the monarch as Head of State and centralised executive powers in Cabinet under the control of the Prime Minister…we effectively moved from MONARCHICAL sovereignty to EXECUTIVE sovereignty.

Executive sovereignty is another legacy rooted in colonial/post-colonial institutions which centralised executive power in the hands of governors. These powerful men, supported by a state bureaucracy rooted in elitism, acted  solely in the interest of the planter class.

This issue of sovereignty was addressed in 1995, by the Joint Select Committee on Constitutional and Electoral Reform.  Among other things, there was bi-partison agreement to create a Republic by removing the Monarch as Head of State. They also agreed to “Jamaicanizing” a new constitution, making it a “product of the Jamaican people” and to “rid our basic law of its present colonial form.”

Since then, in spite of commitments by Jamaica’s two main political parties to end Jamaica’s constitutional monarchy, successive administrations retained the old political order and the centralised structure of government intact. Today, Jamaica’s 1962 independence constitution is still a British “Order in Council” and not a product of the Jamaican people. After 60 years of independence, the centuries old dreams of freedom and the aspirations for self-determination remain unfulfilled.

So will our move to a Republic enable us to break these colonial chains? And, importantly, will  it address the post-independence challenges that WE created with political power in our hands…not only by the actions and inactions of our political leaders, but also by the actions and inactions…the SILENCE of the Jamaican people, including the Church?

I suggest it depends on what WE, the people of Jamaica…people in the Church, choose to do. If we continue our SILENCE, it will be more of the same!

The idea of a Republic may be confusing for some!

The key conception of a Republic is a form of government where the nation belongs to the people, where the people are sovereign. This is often ignored as it is typically assumed that our “representative democracy” is a government of the people reflecting the will of the people. But we know in reality this is not so.

The popular interpretation of a Republic is a government without a monarch as head of state. This was the focus in Caribbean countries that have become Republics: Dominica, Guyana, Trinidad and Tobago and, most recently, Barbados. Although the head of state changed to a local head of state, the inherited, centralised structure of government remained the same, and with it a number of related problems, including:

–  no effective oversight or constraint of Executive action by the non-executive members of Parliament; and

–  Importantly, no specific mechanisms to involve citizens directly in the process of policymaking.

So our advocacy for a Republic must have two key elements:

1) Mechanisms to enable the people’s representatives to hear the voice of the people and to understand their will. This involves constitutional and other legal changes as well as policy changes to create mechanisms such as:

a)    Regular town hall meetings;

b)    Parliamentary hearings;

c)     Impeachment or Recall of corrupt politicians;

d)    Participatory budgeting where we can shape budget priority and find financial solutions

AND

2) We must also replace the monarch as head of state with a local head of state who signs laws on behalf of the people and with additional powers to be defined by the people of Jamaica.

REPARATIONS ADVOCACY

It is a real shame that Jamaica, the first country in the Caribbean to gain independence from the British, is today one of the last countries in the Caribbean to break with the British Monarchy that built its wealth on the blood, sweat and tears of our ancestors.

It is now well-known that the Monarchy had a direct role and  benefited financially from the trafficking and enslavement of Africans, and that the £20 million in compensation was paid to slave owners and their ancestors and that these payments ended in 2015. In fact, Jamaicans who migrated to the UK and paid taxes up to 2015 were contributing to these payments to the ancestors of slave owners.  Imagine that!!!!

The financial benefits of the British Empire that was accrued by the Royal family is not a thing of the past… it persists today. Prof Hilary Beckles on the cover of his book Britain’s Black Debt: Reparations for Caribbean Slavery and Native Genocide has a picture of the Queen Elizabeth II touring a sugar plantation in Barbados owned by her first cousin, (Earl) of Harewood, in 1966. The property was owned by the Harewood family since 1782 with 282 enslaved persons.

At its peak in 1941, the British Empire had extracted wealth and, in so doing, devastated the lives of millions of people in 84 countries and territories across the world. 17 of these territories and countries are in the Caribbean. Five (5) are STILL colonies… among the last remnants of the Empire (called British Overseas Territories today). The wealth plundered from these countries in South Asia, Africa and the Americas for more than 400 years, not only by the Royal family, but also by companies, churches and universities, – have led to a GLOBAL reparations movement building the case for REPARATIONS. There’s real debt that is owned and it can be quantified and paid over 178 years. This was the timeframe for payment to slave owners and their ancestors…from 1837 (Slave Compensation Act) to 2015 when British taxpayers finished ‘paying off’ the debt which the British government incurred.

Our new Head of State King Charles III has inherited much of this stolen wealth and is now at the centre of this debate about REPARATIONS and reparatory justice. Although his track record and the words in his first speech as King suggest not much, if any thing, will change, his ascension to the throne with real power in his hands may provide a glimmer of hope. His acknowledgement that “time has come” for conversations about slavery in June 2022 at the Commonwealth meeting in Rwanda and his willingness to continue understanding “slavery’s enduring impact” brings some hope that he will initiate and foster meaningful engagement around reparatory justice. But rather than simply hope for this outcome, we must ACT. We must break our silence and ACTIVELY ADVOCATE for change.

It will take persistent and consistent advocacy to achieve the  outcomes that we want. Advocacy from the church, as it was in the past, is critical in building the momentum for change.

Since I am at St Luke’s Anglican Church, I want to talk to the Anglicans.

I am reliably informed that you have awesome advocacy tools: The Anglican Alliance and the 5 Marks of Mission.

The Anglican Alliance, is an initiative of the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Anglican Communion, mandated to bring together development, relief and advocacy work across the Anglican Church globally. The intention is for it to belong to everyone in the Anglican family committed to working for a world free of poverty, inequality and injustice; to give voice to the voiceless and vulnerable, reconcile those in conflict and ‘safeguard the earth’. 

This work is grounded in the Anglican Five Marks of Mission,  which includes the mission to “transform unjust structures of society,” and to  “pursue peace and reconciliation”.

The Anglican Alliance has been engaged in a range of empowering activities, including advocacy to address:

–  Migration @ The UN, New York

–  Child immigrants (in Rome)

–  Climate justice (in Peru and UK); and

–  Human trafficking (in East Asia, South Asia, Africa, Latin America, Middle East).

I am also informed that the Alliance has a representative for the Province of the West Indies. He is the Regional Facilitator, Clifton Nedd from Antigua.

So I want to challenge the Rt. Rev. Garth Minott, Bishop of Kingston, to engage Clifton Nedd about including Republican and Reparations advocacy on the list of advocacy initiatives of the Anglican Alliance.

Here’s are my suggestions about what this could look like:

1) Forge an alliance with the Advocates Network and other advocates to strengthen advocacy around the move to become a Republic and reparatory justice:

a)    Note that since June 7th 2022, the Minister of Legal and Constitutional Affairs, in her sectoral presentation in Parliament, promised to establish the Constitutional Reform Committee (CRC). To date, NOTHING!

b)    We must advocate for the establishment of the CRC as well as information about how the public will be involved in reforming the Constitution;

c)     Minister Malahoo-Forte also agreed that public education is important.  To date, NOTHING!

d)    We must advocate for a public education process to inform Jamaicans about the process of becoming a Republic, including the importance of constitutional reform;

e)    We must also advocate for tabling the required legislative bill in Parliament to ensure the removal of the King as Head of State by Jamaica’s 61st celebration of independence on or before August 6, 2023.

f)     As Jamaica’s Head of State, we should engage King Charles III in conversations about “slavery’s enduring impact” in Jamaica since he has expressed his willingness to understand. In so doing, let’s strengthen the Caribbean reparations movement in seeking a formal apology and pursuing a process of reparatory justice in the context of CARICOM’s 10 Point Plan. Let’s encourage him to sow the seeds of a better future, where generations to come can live in a world where racial superiority/inferiority is finally “discredited and abandoned,” and where “basic human rights and justice are equally guaranteed to all.”

The Church has a very powerful voice. Ist has a network  of people in almost every community across Jamaica and the Caribbean. I encourage you to use your voice, leverage your network, and END THE SILENCE!

– Professor Rosalea Hamilton is CEO of the LASCO Chin Foundation and chair of the Caribbean Philanthropic Alliance