Bahamas government wants King Charles to use his reign to apologize for slavery and offer reparations

By Benjamin Flowers: Politicians in the Bahamas are calling on H.M. King Charles III, in light of his recent ascension to the throne, to use the opportunity to atone for the atrocities of slavery committed under colonialism.

King Charles ascended the throne following the death of his mother Queen Elizabeth II, on Thursday, September 8 at Balmoral Castle, Scotland.

Following the King’s ascension, Bahamas Opposition leader Michael Pintard said it would be the right thing to do for him to apologize and take it further by making amends through reparations.

“[Reparations for slavery] has always been a front-burner issue in the minds of descendants of Africans who were enslaved and we know very well that the United Kingdom played a role in that regard,” Pintard said.

“For those persons who say we should take that off the front burner [since] we have emerged as an independent country [and] many of us are doing exceptionally well…I’m saying to those persons that we write the historical wrongs.”

But his view was not one held exclusively by the opposition. Sitting Minister of Social Services Obie Wilchcombe, challenged the King to acknowledge that mistakes were made and to rise above those mistakes.

“It takes a big man, a big organization to be able to reflect, to be able to say we were wrong. And that’s an admittance,” Wilchcombe said.

The call for reparative justice for slavery and its effects which are felt to this day is a regional push of the Caribbean Community, dating back over a decade. In 2013, CARICOM officially formed the CARICOM Reparations Commission to further regional discussion on the form reparative justice should take, among other issues.

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