USAfrica: Like France, Britain should offer apology, reparations to its African (former) colonies. By Chima Dike

Exclusive commentary for USAfrica magazine (Houston) and USAfricaonline.com, the first Africa-owned, US-based newspaper published on the Internet.

USAfrica: Like France, Britain should offer apology, reparations to its African (former) colonies.

By Dr. Chima O. Dike, a management consultant and business capacity-building specialist with Unichal Consulting Services Ltd, and public affairs contributor to USAfrica.

Emmanuel Macron, the President of France since 2017, is a very brave man. He did what many of the European leaders, past and present, never had the courage to do. 

He made an unreserved apology to African nations colonized by France for the injustices and plundering of their resources during the period of colonization.

It is important to note that he was born on December 21, 1977. Almost all of the colonial territories of France in Africa achieved formal independence in the late 1960s.

Macron pledged to begin negotiating the reparation starting from $8.6 trillion.

Macron’s acceptance on April 30th, 2023, that’s a global forum that France plundered and stole the resources of Algeria, Cameron, Burkina Faso, Guinea, Benin, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, Cote d’Ivoire, Djibouti, Madagascar, Mali, and Senegal. He openly acknowledged the historic injustices, abhorrent and sickening actions taken by France during these periods of repugnant colonization. 

He acknowledged that the actions of colonial France were brutal, evil, and barbaric which damaged the people and left indelible scars of underdevelopment and exploitation.

It was a clear sign of bravery for President Macron to acknowledge that France took a significant number of resources from these colonies including cultural artifacts, gold, diamonds, oil, timber, and human beings, in addition to confiscating vast areas of land that disrupted traditional lives.

I believe I speak the minds of millions of Africans as I state: President Macron, Africa accepts your apology! 

However, France was not the only European country that colonized Africa. Others are Britain, Germany, Germany, Portugal, Spain, and Italy.

One of the biggest colonizers was Britain that colonized my country, Nigeria. 

Whatever atrocities were committed by France were also perpetuated by Britain; I will say far much worse in multiple terms and times! 

Why hasn’t Britain apologized to her colonies for all the atrocities and injustices Britain inflicted on the colonized Africans? Apart from apologizing for its colonial crimes, Britain should introduce an ‘unvarnished’ truth about British colonialism in schools as well as museums. 

The British has an impressive war museum to showcase their imperial conquests. Why can’t the British establish a museum to showcase their subjugation and victims of unjust plundering and pillaging?

Britain should therefore take steps to apologize and make remedies to its African (former) colonies, especially Nigeria. 

In Africa, the British Empire was responsible for exporting 3.5 million African Slaves to the Americas. The British Empire changed our mindset and reset our brains to depend on Britain for commerce, education, and language. Britain made Africa a net exporter of the basic raw material for their industrial goods while they made Africa dependent on British finished goods and food. 

The British carted away fine arts and artifacts from Benin, Ife, Lokoja, Igboukwu, Arochukwu and other areas in Nigeria. To date, the delicate artworks and pottery of Kanu Nwaka of Atani Village, Arochukwu are still found in British museums. In fact, if African artifacts are removed from Britain, the Royal museum will be empty! 

The most appropriate apology that Britain can render to Nigeria is to initiate an urgent annulment of the 1914 amalgamation of the Northern and Southern Protectorates. This process of amalgamation was ill-motivated and designed to fail. It was meant to continue the perpetuation of colonial rule and continue the exploitation and plundering of the resources of Nigeria. Britain did this with utmost disregard for the multicultural nature of the two protectorates and the plural ethnicity of both. It is mind-boggling to imagine Britain combining a Christian south with a Muslim north unless the motive was purely financial. They continued their neocolonial link with the North to make Nigeria depend on Britain for her development.

The British created several conflicts in Nigeria that cost lives and mass displacements of natives. Notable ones were the Ekumeku movement of 1883 – 1914 and the Anglo-Aro war of 1901-1902.  The Ekumeku movement was a series of uprisings against the Royal Niger Company by the Anioma (Igbo people) in present-day Delta State. 

The Ekumeku uprisings were a result of the British reneging on numerous trade agreements structured in English, which was a language that the natives had little or no understanding. Significant losses in these conflicts were King Jaja of Opopo and King Koko of Nembe Brass. In fact, the entire Nembe town in present-day Bayelsa State was levelled by the British. British triumph in the Ekumeku uprising resulted in the creation of the Southern Protectorate.

The Anglo-Aro war of 1901-1902 was another example of the British decimating an entire kingdom. The British claimed the war was to stop the slave trade, but the real reasons were to control the lucrative palm oil trade routes by the Royal Niger Company.

The Arochukwu kingdom was the last holdout in total control of the resources of the Southern Protectorate. This war completely displaced the prosperous Arochukwu Kingdom including the execution of their King, Eze Kanu Okoro and his trusted lieutenant, Mazi Okoro Torty. Arochukwu people deserve an apology and reparation from the British, including the return of all the works of art from the kingdom.

In addition to a formal apology, the British government and its monarch should offer a minimum of $45 trillion as reparation for the damage done to Africa.

There will be no better time to champion the process of initiating getting British reparations and an official apology to Africa and Nigeria than following the April 2023 example of President Macron.