Is it possible to truly forgive theft?

“We have finished the job, what shall we do with the tools?”

Haile Selassie

With August 1, Emancipation Day quickly approaching, the question above is one that I take pause to ponder.  When one is finished mowing the lawn, one puts away the mower.  When you finish preparing a meal, don't you put the dishes, pots and pans away?  Even the farmer brings his cattle or sheep in from pasture for the night. So then why is it that the Africans who were brought here in chains to be used as tools themselves, why after having rendered their services were they not so too returned en mass?

August 1, 1834 is the date that slavery in the British jurisdictions came to an end, or so to speak.  I say that because while it was now law, those once held in bondage were given back their freedom in name only.  They were still to be held in indentured service for several more years afterward.  Maybe indentured service is a tad harsh.  However, I find it hard to reconsile how forced "apprenticeship" for a period of between four and six years is anything else.  Were it not for the persistent agitation of a group consisting parly of Elder Africans in Trinidad, the new system might yet have continued after August 1, 1838.

It wasn't until a further quarter century more that slavery was abolished in the US with the adoption of the 13th Ammendment on December 6, 1865.  There are several dates on which the emancipation was formally recognized, with April 16 and June 19 or Juneteenth figuring most promising.  Juneteenth most notably as it wasn't until then that the news reached Texas and was announced.

Today, more than two hundred years since Haiti secured their independence, close to two hundred in the Caribbean and almost one hundred and fifty in the US, and still the "tools" responsible for much of the world's great accumulation of wealth, have yet to be returned.  Forget about being properly compensated for the services rendered.  Yes, their progeny should be compensated in their stead.  That point is usually a more consistent human trait than most might realize.  When landscapers accept that their need to consistently purchase new equipment is as a result of their own mistreatment and mishandling, they generally tend to take better care of the new models.  Those with any sense that is.

So why is it that one full week after the newest nation to be recognized on the planet raises their flaf of independence at the United Nations earlier this week, as Africans who have risen up through the ashes of slavery, still given a deaf ear and dumb faces when we mention repatriation?  Formal repatriation, that would afford one the dignity of returning to Africa that the Elders before us were so horrifically deprived of.  It is embarrassing to see that history has heaped up enough people who concern themselves or know little to cover up the matter.

To note, there has long been a persistent bit of culture floating around, that when the brits signed their laws into force, monies were to have been allotted for the slaves return to Africa.  According to the documents though it was only the slave holders who were due compensation for their lost "goods".  It was a second act of aggression against a peoples to not minister a justice in atonement for the wickedness of their former benefactors.  I'll admit that this sentiment too has been circuling around for as long, but still I hold to it as fact.

What am I asking for is somebody to tell me why this has yet to be openly addressed and remedied.  Whie the African Union has concluded that the Diaspora is to indeed be recognized as a sixth region, it doesn't address the return of persons and more importantly to where.  I swear, we really must have pissed off a grieved someone really badly once upon a time.  Give us a seat at the conference table, with fair and proper representation, when matters concerning Africa are being discussed.  Just as the Dinka, Amhara, Ashanti, Yoruba, Igbo, Shona and Masai, recognize we too are one people with different names.  Still we are one family.

We must right this matter.  I contend that the world has never really and truly known any harmony because the matter of the "tools" has not properly dealt with.  Consensus may be taciturn still yet the truth is plain to see.  A people, both on the Continent and spread throughout the Diaspora, who had war declared against them for centuries, still to bear the burdens of indentured servitude.