Carib Chief warns about inter-marriage

Caribs in St. Vincent and the Grenadines are being warned that if they do not protect their race they would soon be extinct.{{more}}

Dominican Carib Chief Charles Williams, who paid a four-day visit to this country earlier this week, said that if the trend of inter-marriage between local Caribs and other races is not reversed, “We would only hear of that heroic race, only from the pages of the history books”. Caribs in St. Vincent and the Grenadines are being warned that if they do not protect their race, they would soon be extinct.

Williams, who has been Carib chief in his country for the last four years, likened inter-marriage between his race and other races to efforts that had been made in the past to “wipe out the (Carib) race from the face of the earth”.

Williams said among his people there are “those who were killed with swords; those who were killed with guns; those who were killed with fighting; those who were stored with African people so they could change the race; those who were given blankets with measles and whopping cough in a bid to wipe out the race.”

Defending his position, Williams said he is not being racist, but rather is making an effort to protect his ethnicity, culture and traditions, a position he said, is supported by the United Nations.

The Carib Chief, who was speaking at a Press conference on Tuesday at the University of the West Indies School of Continuing Studies, said his visit was one of ‘fact finding’.

Williams, who said his visit here was made in an effort to bring together the Carib communities of this country and Dominica, also stated that the Caribs in this country are still suffering because they are so isolated.

He said that in the past, Europeans suppressed both the Caribs and the Africans, but now that there is no more European influence, “African descendents have now taken the place of the Europeans, and the Caribs are now the slaves or servants of the day.”

He also lamented that “in most instances … a Carib woman is seen as a sex object.”

Williams refutes the claims by colonial masters that his people were ‘savage, warlike, cannibal people’. He describes Caribs as ‘laid back’ people who allow others to take the front. This is why he felt the need to see what is taking place with his counterparts in St Vincent.

The Chief said that in Dominica, they have a Carib cultural village, which he describes as a living museum that explains Carib life and their way of living. He considers the village to be the flagship product for tourism in Dominica.

Williams emphasised that as Caribs, his people should be proud of who they are. (VM)