Canouan – A Gruesome Reminder

Just as a new spate of localised killings re-focused our attention on our seeming murder plague, a gruesome development on the Grenadine Island of Canouan has shocked us into the reality of our real world. We are now grappling with the discovery of 11 decomposing bodies found on a small boat

which was washed up on the shores of Canouan. Preliminary reports from the local police state that, along with the grisly remains, passports were found indicating that those passport holders were from the West African state of Mali.

What an irony! On the day before the discovery,Vincentians had been commemorating African Liberation Day. My congratulations to the organisers, led by Sister Ideisha Jackson, for keeping the 51-year-old tradition alive. A pity that just one day after, a reminder of our centuries-old connection with Africa, both in glorious memories, shameful past and sad present, should turn up on our shores!

Mali is a West African nation, home of the famous Mandingo people with a rich historical heritage. But like many other African nations, it has been subjected to the ravages of European colonisation and from which many Africans were ensnared, subjugated and subjected to the horrors of inhuman slavery. Today many of the descendants of its sons and daughters make up the black population of Caribbean nations.

Most of its existence over the last 500 years has been a sorrowful one, like that of so many of its neighbours in West Africa, at the hands of French colonisation and imperialism. They not only plundered and raped at will, but which even after independence kept what was called “francophone Africa’ in economic, social and cultural chains. Its famed city,Timbuktu, was renowned as a centre of culture, trade and education having one of the oldest universities in the world! Timbuktu is today a UNESCO World Heritage site. That the remains of Malians could today be found in St Vincent and the Grenadines, almost 4000 miles away is not retracing the ills of the slave trade of the past but rather reflective of similar ills being perpetuated today.

French domination of Mali and much of West Africa in the sixties continued up until the recent past with the plundering of its resources and impoverishment. It currently has a military government like Burkina Faso and Chad, but most of its people are still poverty-stricken. This has resulted in a perilous attempt at illegal migration, primarily aimed at Europe.

Modern day human traffickers have been exploiting the situation charging West Africans for voyages in rickety vessels in perilous waters of the Atlantic and Mediterranean to try and make the trip to Europe. Some even try more hazardous routes across the Sahara Desert and via Libya to reach southern Europe.

What has been found in Canouan is a mere replication of many similar ill-fated voyages which have ended up on the shorelines of islands in the Canary and Cape Verde Island chains, or on shores off the coasts of Italy and Greece. Some have miraculously even made it to France attempting to cross the English Channel but have not always had more luck than those washed up on Canouan.

It is an indictment of the conditions in which hundreds of millions of Africans are still being forced to endure today leading to the ultimate desperation to pay for such perilous voyages. It is scandalous that the rape of Africa’s resources, particularly now of its “rare minerals” should be allowed to continue under the supervision and with the collusion of so many of today’s leaders.

This is why the concept of African liberation today carries such urgent meaning. To think of rotting African bodies washed up on our shores, or those of St Kitts and Grenada must heighten our concerns. The genocide currently being carried out in Palestine in full view of the world must be an affront to us as black people. Currently the people of Namibia in Southwest Africa are intensifying their demands for reparative justice from Germany for a similar genocide against their people.

We cannot, must not, stay silent in the face of all this injustice. The vessel found on the shore in Canouan is a powerful reminder of the tasks before us. No longer is the achievement of independence by itself, the appointments of local Prime Ministers, governments and armies sufficient. That much we have learnt, bitterly.

The paramount issues today are the quality of life of our people, the never-ending war against poverty and hunger, the enjoyment of fundamental human rights by all. The vessel in Canouan is there to remind us of all this and of the need to step up the fight for restorative justice world-wide.

• Renwick Rose is a Social and Political commentator.