Ghana’s President Nana Akufo-Addo on Tuesday called on his African counterparts to unite to seek redress for transatlantic slavery and damage caused during the colonial era.
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“The entire African continent deserves a formal apology from the European nations involved in the slave trade,” Akufo-Addo said on Tuesday at a reparations conference of African leaders in Accra.
“No amount of money can repair the damage caused by the transatlantic slave trade and its consequences. But this is a problem the world can no longer ignore,” he added.
However, the Ghanaian president gave no details on what financial reparations might look like for transatlantic slavery, which organized the trafficking of millions of people from West and Central Africa.
The Ghanaian president, whose country was the first country on the continent to gain independence in 1957, had already called for compensation at the UN General Assembly in September.
Mr Akufo-Addo called on Africa to work with the Caribbean to advance reparations, adding that it was a “legitimate demand for justice”.
The Cape Coast Fort in Ghana, a former colonial trading post, has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1979.
President of the Union of Comoros and Chair of the African Union, Azali Assoumani, described slavery and colonialism as “Africa’s dark period” and said during the conference that the shadow of the colonial era “still has a devastating impact on our people.” .
This month, German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier expressed his “ashame” at the crimes his country committed in Tanzania during the colonial era.
Earlier this year, the owner of the British newspaper The Guardian apologized for the media founders’ role in transatlantic slavery and announced a “10-year restorative justice program.”
Recently, some Western leaders have begun to acknowledge the injustices committed in Africa during this era, and museums have begun returning stolen African treasures and art.
Nigeria is in the process of recovering thousands of metal plaques, sculptures and objects from the 16th to 18th centuries that were looted from the ancient Kingdom of Benin and ended up in museums and with art collectors in the United States and Europe.
Benin, Nigeria’s neighboring country, last year opened an exhibition of its artworks and treasures returned by France after two years of negotiations.