Africa Deserves Reparations

Humanity, all of us, we owe our very existence to Africa because our DNA sprang out of its savannas and canyons. All of us, we are all African. Our ancestors walked on African soil, ate African plants and African animals. We developed our large brains in Africa.

Today, African people are extremely poor. But why? Is their continent poor in resources? Was Africa gifted with nothing?

No, that’s not true. Not remotely.

Africa has 40% of the world’s gold, Africa has 65% of the world’s uncultivated arable land, Africa has 45% of the world’s freshwater, but still, today, out of the world’s 26 poorest nations. 22 are in Africa. In the bottom 10 poorest nations, 9 are in Africa. Only Afghanistan sneaks into that list.

Today, there are first world nations that are more than 250 times richer, per capita, than African nations.

What happened?

525 years ago, in 1500, the average African had a per capita income that was 55% of an average European’s income. that’s not great but… Today, it is the average African has a per capita income that is only 6% of an average European’s income.

And the worst statistic of all - 61% of Africans live on less than $2 day.

What happened in the last 525 years…?

Around 1500, Europeans started the African slave trade - they transported 15 million Africans as human cargo to the Americas, an activity that impoverished Africa, and enriched the European enslaving nations - Portugal, Great Britain, France, the Netherlands, Spain.

After slavery ended, the majority of Africa was colonized by Europeans from 1885-1945 -

Here’s some examples -

King Leopold of Belgium enslaved the Congo, forcing the inhabitants to produce ivory and rubber. His brutality killed an estimated 10 million people.

Cecil Rhodes of Britain led mercenary gangs that killed, tortured, and displaced millions of South Africans in his greed for diamonds and gold.

Germany killed 80% of the Nama and Herero people of Namibia.

France killed 1.5 million Algerians and hundreds of thousands of Cameroonians, Senegalese, and Malagasy.

Portugal killed and brutalized hundreds of thousands of Angola and Mozambique freedom fighters. Italy, under Mussolini, killed tens of thousands of Ethiopians and Libyans.

Slavery followed by Colonization - It is obvious - Africa deserves reparations!

How much money are we talking about?

Scholars estimate the total cost of reparations due to Africa to be as high as $300 trillion dollars - this sum represents 60% of all the total wealth on Earth.

That total is never going to be repaid, so let’s steer our thinking towards what can be done. Here’s three practical steps:

Step #1) Return all stolen artifacts.

• Return the Benin bronzes! The Golden Stool of the Asante. The Ethiopian Sacred Ark of the Covenant replicas. They were all stolen from Africa and today they are all in the British Museum.

• Return the Bust of Nefertiti, the Egyptian Queen - it is now in the Berlin museum.

• Return the Kota Figurines from Gabon - they are presently in the Louvre, in Paris.

Step #2) Africa should have its debts forgiven, especially debt owed to its former colonizers.

Sudan owes the United Kingdom $1.1 billion, Senegal owes France $2.5 billion, Benin owes Germany $711.

In 1987, Thomas Sankara, the President of Burkina Faso, delivered a speech on debt forgiveness. He said:

“Those who lend us money are those who colonized us. Debt is neo-colonialism. Debt is a skillfully managed reconquest of Africa, intended to subjugate our growth and development. Every one of us is a financial slave. We are told to repay, But if we repay, we are going to die.”

Sankara was assassinated shortly after this speech in a coup d’etat, aided by the French intelligence service.

Step #3) Establish Trade Agreements that correct the injustice of slavery and colonialism.

• give African nations guaranteed prices for their raw materials like coffee, cobalt, oil.

• require trade partners to build processing factories - like chocolate factories in Ghana,

• eliminate tariffs on African goods entering European markets

Africa is currently working to get all these reparations, and I encourage their success.