On Wednesday, the United Nations passed a resolution recognizing the transatlantic slave trade as “the gravest crime against  humanity.” The resolution was started by Ghana’s president John Mahama who rallied the world to ratify a landmark vote against the transatlantic slave trade. The decision has been welcomed throughout Africa. It is believed that over 15 million people were deported from the continent, moved across the globe and enslaved in totally inhumane conditions for over 4 centuries. Some question the numbers: how could the transatlantic slave trade show numbers like 15 millions over 4 centuries when we all know that a ship carried about 250 to 400 people, and that at the height of the trade, 30,000 people per year were taken from Elmina castle alone (Reclaiming African History: Elmina Castle – West Africa’s Oldest Slave Fort), that’s 3 million people in one century from Elmina alone; now do the math, and add all the other slave forts across Africa! … you would agree that the math is not math-ing.  And to think that it took so long to be recognized! Now that it is recognized, what does this mean? Is it just an empty “we recognize the wrong we did to you…” and nothing else?

By the way, guess which countries voted against the resolution? Argentina, Israel, and the USA. Guess who abstained? Most European countries!

Excerpts below are from the Guardian.

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… On Wednesday, less than two years after completing a remarkable comeback as Ghana’s president…, [John Mahama] rallied the world to ratify a landmark vote against transatlantic chattel slavery, despite major opposition from the same western entities that drove it for centuries.

The resolution to declare the practice as “the gravest crime against humanity” passed with a decisive majority at the UN general assembly and has been largely welcomed across Africa. Yet the details of the tally reveal a world still deeply divided on the gravity of the sin of enslaving more than 15 million people as chattel over the course of 400 years.

Thus, the 123 states who voted for it were just as noteworthy as those that did not. Most of the assembly was in support including Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, most of Latin America, all former victims, as well as the Arab world, who themselves have the dark history of trans-Saharan slavery under their belt. Russia called it a “long overdue recognition”.

Perhaps because of their history of subjugation of Indigenous people and perpetuation of chattel slavery, the western bloc of Australia, Canada, the UK and the EU states all abstained in the vote, electing to postpone their day of atonement.

The three states to publicly vote against the resolution were Argentina, where two-thirds of the value of all imports arriving at the port of Buenos Aires between 1580 and 1640 were enslaved Africans; Israel and the US, where 11 states seceded rather than obey the Emancipation Proclamation freeing enslaved Africans.

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