August 2, 2022

 Ghana’s President Nana Akufo-Addo has said the payment of reparations to Africans for the damage caused by the slave trade centuries ago is “long overdue”.

He stated this in a series of tweets this Tuesday, reiterating a speech he made at a summit on reparations and racial healing that laid out the case for money to be paid to the continent.

Akufo-Addo says the slave trade’s effects have been “devastating” to the continent and the diaspora and that the entire slavery period stifled “Africa’s economic, cultural and psychological progress”.

The Ghanaian leader said the subject of reparations “becomes a debate” only when it comes to Africa and Africans, noting that Jewish survivors of the Holocaust have received reparations, as well as native Americans “who have received and continue to receive reparations”.

Besides the reparations, he said “entire continent of Africa deserves a formal apology from the European nations involved in the slave trade for the crimes and damage it has caused to the continent.

He urged the African Union to engage the diaspora to advance the reparations cause.