MP Dawn Butler under fire over slavery memorial day proposal

Category: Slavery Dated: 03/07/2006
Fledgling MP Dawn Butler has come under fierce criticism by black communities across the country for proposing a national slavery memorial day on a date which has no relevance to Africans and when the Blair government to date has refused to apologize for slavery.


Raymond
Raymond Enisuoh


Why has Butler clumsily jumped on the bandwagon?

Is MP Dawn Butler -doing the government's dirty work?
we don’t want to have a slavery memorial day because ultimately we want a day that speaks to our unique experience. We, as African communities, have to retain the right to actually decide how we mark our dead.

Esther Stanford, FAADR
Fledgling MP Dawn Butler has come under fierce criticism by black communities across the country for proposing a national slavery memorial day on a date which has no relevance to Africans and when the Blair government to date has refused to apologize for slavery.

The MP for Brent South submitted an Early Day Motion to Parliament on June 8 2006 for a National Day of Remembrance for Victims of Slavery.

The proposal reads: “[We propose] That this House acknowledges the atrocities suffered by Afrikan-Caribbeans as a consequence of the crime against humanity that was the slave trade and calls on the Government to ensure that 2007, the 200th year since the abolition of the slave trade, sees the formation of a Government-funded annual UK slavery memorial day, which should be held on 25th March each year to mark the date in 1807 when the slave trade became illegal.”

The proposal for the date when Britain is said to have abolished the slave trade was co-signed by MPs Dianne Abbott, Keith Vaz, Mr. Sadiq Khan, Lyn Brown, Mr Andrew Dismore, Mr. Mike Weir, Chris McCafferty and Dr. Hywel Francis.

Critics of Butler who are at the forefront of research, education and campaigns for ensuring that 2007 is not used as an opportunity by the British government to reinforce the distorted and Eurocentric history of chattel enslavement are furious that Butler has suddenly jumped on the bandwagon when to date she has had no involvement or engagement with any of the grassroots organisations involved in discussions for 2007.

Despite stressing the importance of the issue, Butler refused to make herself available when we requested an interview. However, Black Britain spoke to different organisations across the country to find out whether they supported the bid for a government -sponsored National Day of Remembrance for Victims of Slavery on March 25th - or simply saw the proposal as a token gesture.

Esther Stanford, from the Forum of Afrikans and Afrikan descendants Against Racism, has been at the forefront of campaigns for reparations and attended the third UN Conference Against Racism in 2001, where the UN declared enslavement as a crime against humanity. Stanford said that she was critical of the terminology, date and faces behind the proposal of a slavery memorial day.

Stanford told Black Britain: ” I actually think that if we are going to have any kind of commemorative day we don’t want to have a slavery memorial day because ultimately we want a day that speaks to our unique experience. We, as African communities, have to retain the right to actually decide how we mark our dead.”





Afrikans are not victims but resistors and survivors

I think that it is important to have a day but it’s not up to the Government to put this day forward. The 25th March is not an appropriate day...

Kwame Ose, African Historian, Researcher & Broadcaster
Stanford also questioned the integrity and title of the proposed Slavery Memorial Day. She said: “I think that we should seek to maintain the true integrity and spirit of what it is that we are doing and we should have something like an anti-slavery resistance day. That would send a clear message in terms of our own thinking. What tends to happen with initiatives that we find and fight for is that other people come on board and then it becomes about their issues and loses the dynamism and the power.”

Stanford instead called for a dialogue and national meeting on the topic of a slavery resistance day. Stanford told Black Britain: “We need to have a national discussion about how we should name a day. If you talk about a slavery memorial day you are actually implying that we commemorate that history. What we are actually commemorating is our history of resistance against all forms of extreme oppression and human subjugation.”

Stanford concluded by criticising MPs Dawn Butler and Diane Abbott for putting their names forward when she claims that Abbott has never spoken publicly about these issues before, despite the protests of the late MP Bernie Grant, while Butler is only a recent figure in parliament. She told Black Britain:

“I would go as far to say that the only reason why these two sisters are coming up with this agenda is because it is one that the Blair Government wants to push. And it is an agenda that is around [William] Wilberforce because the date that Dawn Butler has proposed, the 25th of March, is a date that is significant to them. It is not of significance to us.”

Stanford will be attending the International Conference on Pan-African Reparations for Global Justice in Accra, Ghana later this month which aims to co-ordinate a global strategy for reparations among the global African Diaspora.

Kwame Osei, African historian, broadcaster and writer in Nottingham, said that he thought the idea of an anti-slavery day – as opposed to a slavery memorial day, was a good idea but stressed that it meant nothing unless the initiative was organised by the black community.

Osei told Black Britain: “I think that it is important to have a day but it’s not up to the Government to put this day forward. The 25th March is not an appropriate day - the 5th May, which is African Liberation Day or even 1 August Emancipation day, [would be] more appropriate.”





Any initiatives for a slavery day must be led by the community

Does Tony Blair have a hidden agenda?
I think that it is a token gesture especially when we haven’t got a clear apology and no attempt has been made at reparations or to link what happened with slavery to the racism and discrimination Africans in Britain are suffering today.

Sonia Davis, Spokesperson, Afrikan Forum for Education
Osei was also critical of the name of the day proposed by Dawn Butler and the involvement of the government in this proposed initiative.

He told Black Britain: “I have problems with the name. If we had spearheaded the thing ourselves we would have given the day a different title like a commemoration, it’s not a memorial. If it is government funded it doesn’t really have any meaning. How can you fund something that you don’t recognise and you shouldn’t be an authority for? It’s a token gesture to fool our people into thinking that the government is sincere and genuine.”

Sonia Davis, a lecturer and Spokesperson for the Afrikan Forum for Education in Birmingham, also expressed doubts about how effective the proposed day could be. Davis told Black Britain:

“I’m never sure what those national days do. It’s like national smoking day where everybody still smokes. I think that it is a token gesture especially when we haven’t got a clear apology and no attempt has been made at reparations or to link what happened with slavery to the racism and discrimination Africans in Britain are suffering today.”

Davis suggested that a community led initiative for a slavery resistance day would be far more appropriate.

She told Black Britain: “It would make a difference because the community would be doing something together. I think that the government should use its resources to assist the African community to come together and look at what slavery has meant to us and what it means to us. As well as provide something that links all the communities and educates all of us in terms of slavery.”

The Liverpool Slavery Remembrance Initiative, a partnership between National Museums Liverpool, individuals from the city’s black community, Liverpool City council, Liverpool Culture Company and the Mersey Partnership, initiated their own Slavery Remembrance Day on August 23, observing the date declared by the UN in 29 C/Resolution 40 at the General Conference of UNESCO.

The UN proclaimed August 23 of every year should be recognised as the International Day for the Remembrance of the Slave Trade and its Abolition. This date was chosen in reference to the War of Independence on the night of August 22-23 1791 in Saint-Domingue (today Haiti and Dominican Republic) which was to play a pivotal role in the abolition of chattel enslavementand the emancipation of the peoples of Latin America and the Caribbean.

Two years ago the TUC called on the government to recognise August 23 as a remembrance day for the abolition of slavery. In August 2004, the NW Regional Secretary Alan Manning said:

“The North West TUC fully supports this initiative to remember and recognise the impact of slavery in developing our society and to celebrate the events that led to its abolition. By calling upon the Government to recognise this important day in our history it sends out a clear message that racism will not be tolerated.”





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