President John Mahama has condemned attempts to justify slavery using past social norms, describing the forced removal and exploitation of Africans as a serious crime.
Speaking at a High-Level Special Event on Reparatory Justice at the United Nations Headquarters on Tuesday, March 24, themed “Reparatory Justice for the Trafficking of Enslaved Africans and the Racialised Chattel Enslavement of Africans,” he stressed the need to confront the injustice of slavery and address its lasting impact.
“People will sometimes put a disclaimer to say that you cannot use the social norms to judge the actions and events that took place in the past. Well, such people are loud and wrong. Just because everybody is doing something doesn’t make it right. Slavery is wrong now, and it was wrong then.”
He further noted that although Africans experienced enslavement throughout history, abolitionists consistently challenged the injustice.
“The entire transatlantic slave trade denied African people their humanity.The system relied on a false racial hierarchy that elevated whiteness above Blackness without any scientific basis.”
Mahama delivered the remarks amid growing global calls for reparations and recognition of the long-term effects of slavery on African communities and the diaspora.
