02/03/2024
March 2nd – A Day Afrikan People Must Remember
March 2nd must be part of the Afrikan calendar in the UK – where we recall and remember, for two reasons.
Firstly over 25,000 Afrikans in the UK and those showing solidarity marched in London on March 2nd 1981 at the outrage of the overtly racially motivated mishandling of the police investigation into the New Cross Fire that took place on January 18th 1981. This day became the annual National Black People’s Day of Action (NBPDA). Many who are now elder veterans in the fight against racism and state oppression were the young and middle aged leading this charge over 40 years ago. More about this historic day can be found here https://www.ucl.ac.uk/racism-racialisation/black-peoples-day-action-40-years and a link to the documentary made about the New Cross Massacre and the NBPDA by the late Menelik Shabazz entitled ‘Blood Ah Go Run’ can be watched here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mJdfu5nD2AQ
Secondly but equally important is a Bristol occasion where an Atonement and Reparations Motion was passed by Bristol City at a Full Council meeting on March 2nd 2021. This motion, authored by the Stop The Maangamizi We Charge Genocide/Ecocide Campaign (SMWeCGEC) - https://stopthemaangamizi.com/ , had seen previous versions pass before full councils in Lambeth and Islington Borough Councils in 2020. At the national level, the Green Party, a key contributor, worked with the SMWeCGEC to pass all three motions but in Bristol there was a much more collaborative effort in drafting a Bristol-centric version between Cleo Lake, then a Green Party Councillor, Afrikan ConneXions Consortium (ACC) as well as Mayor Marvin Rees and Deputy Mayor Asher Craig (both Labour Party) whose name was alongside Cleo’s in presenting the motion to council.
A video of the said meeting can be found on https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L43ZD93rZog&t=603s and those wishing to digest the full motion can read it here https://democracy.bristol.gov.uk/mgAi.aspx?ID=22977 but the four resolutions of note that we (the people) are charged with enforcing are listed below.
2.3.21 - Full council resolves to:
1. Write to the Speakers of both Houses of the UK Parliament, Chair of the Commons’ Women and Equalities Committee, and Chair of the Commons’ Home Affairs Committee to express Bristol City Council’s view that they should consider establishing, and seeking UK Government support for, an All-Party Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry. The purpose of this unprecedented commission would be to work on the scope of how reparations may be delivered and may also include for example raising concerns about how tax payers were until 2015 paying back compensation paid to enslavers.(4)
2. Support Afrikan Heritage Community (AHC) organisations in Bristol to galvanise support for the emerging Bristol AHC led 'Reparations Plan' from, and in collaboration with, wider stakeholders including institutions, city strategic leaders, corporate leaders, key strategic programmes/initiatives and cross-party politicians.
3. Implement Community Wealth Creation strategies that support and encourage community wealth building to produce more sustainable equitable growth whilst alleviating systemic poverty. The social economy, civil society and community wealth are the key to fair employment and equitable growth. The community wealth building model of economic development is emerging in our cities and communities offering real, on-the-ground solutions to localities and regions battered by successive waves of extraction, disinvestment, displacement, and disempowerment. If the source of racial injustice in the twenty-first century is the economic injustice or domination of the global economy established in the seventeenth century, then a more just economy is the only way to sustainably achieve racial justice.
4. Recognise that reparative justice should be driven by Afrikan Heritage Communities experiences, voices and perspectives to ensure that advocacy messages not only reflect but also respond to the real needs of the community in order to recognise inequalities.
So today March 2nd 2024, Afrikan ConneXions Consortium are in the throes of ensuring the resolutions of this motion are implemented. ACC are active members of the Bristol Legacy Foundation and were a key steer in the development of Project TRUTH (Telling, Restoring Understanding our Tapestry and History), a consultation in 2021 with Afrikan Heritage Communities (AHC) about their views on how Bristol should atone for it role in the Transatlantic Trafficking of Enslaved Afrikans (TTEA) and what positive legacy should be put in place to repair the damage caused by the legacies of this history and its current impact on affected communities. The Project TRUTH report, co authored by lead consultant Cleo Lake can be found on the Black South West Network website https://www.blacksouthwestnetwork.org/acc , as they are another key contributor the Report and the Bristol Legacy Foundation (BLF).
So in relation to the implementation of the atonement and reparations motion, ACC through Sis Jendayi Serwah, now chair the Reparatory Justice Task Group of the BLF and are working on several of the 14 recommendations of the Project TRUTH Report through the creation of Zenzele Village.
Zenzele Village intends to be an Afrikan Heritage Cooperative Community of Self-Repair Land Legacy Initiative. It is a key aspect of the Bristol Pempamsie Reparations Plan, which Full Council agreed to support back in 2021. Zenzele Village is not just another name for a building or service but actively seeks to be spaces and places or repair for Afrikan Heritage Communities (AHC) and therefore will contain an element of land for agricultural, training, education and ceremonial purposes. It will through partnerships, also utilize existing spaces already used by AHC.
As Omowale Malcolm X tells us:
'Revolution is based on land. Land is the basis of all independence. Land is the basis of freedom, justice, and equality…. A revolutionary wants land so he can set up his own nation, an independent nation.'
So Land in Bristol is critical to the repair of Afrikan heritage communities economically, socially and critical to improving health, well being and STEM skills development. Land in Bristol therefore provides the opportunity for Afrikan heritage communities to play their part in their own repair and contribute to the wider ambition of planet repairs which is the terms used to express the nexus between environmental justice, cognitive justice and reparatory justice. The institutions of Zenzele Village will therefore take from the best of our rich Afrikan heritage; traditions, ethics, values, customs and governance to serve as a replicable model for Afrikans in the Diaspora and beyond.
You can find out more about Zenzele village from the Afrikan ConneXions Consortium social media and also accglocal.org which will be launched in April 2024. If you would like to discuss the vision and implementation of Zenzele Village or express an interest in training to become a ZV Ambassador, please email us on [email protected].
Key to ZV graphic:
The Vision:
1. FARM TRAINING
2. Cooperatives Trading Centre
3. CONFERENCE/EVENTS CENTRE, MEETING ROOMS & OFFICES
4. Storage
5. SKILLS WORKSHOP
6. Gardening supplies
7. CHILDRENS EDUCATION & PLAY SPACE
8. Green space
9. ACCOMODATION
10. Storage
11. WELLBEING SPACE
12. Hydroponics lab
13. AGRICULTURAL EQUIPMENT
14. Green houses
15. WIND POWER
16. Solar power
17. CROPS
18. Fishery
