The Last Slave

A couple of weeks ago, I saw an excellent Channel 4 programme called "The Last Slave". In it, a British black man, David Monteith traces his family back to one of the last slaves taken from Africa to Jamaica. He was able to do this beacause his ancestor was one of few to write a memoir.

When David went to Jamaica where his parents were born, he saw the plantation where his ancestor worked, and his grave. While there, he also saw the last remaining salve torture tools in Jamaica - horrifying stuff.

To cut a long story short, he then traced the ancestor to Nigeria, and discovered that he was an Ibo man, sold as a young boy by a fellow Nigerian of Calabar.

I knew that black people sold other black people, but I didn't realise it was common for them to sell their fellow countrymen like that.

It made me wonder, were these black people selling their countrymen just as bad as the white people for getting involved. Not as bad as white people as they didn't do it on the same scale that white people did. Or worse, for knowingly selling "their own" like that.

What do you think?

 

Both were just as bad as each other. In a seemingly postmodern world where the nauseating, damaging effects still linger, playing the blame game makes no difference. But the truth of the matter is that a lot of the slavemasters stormed into villages looking for people to take. Now i do not know about all African countries but i do know that many of the slaves from Nigeria were often captured criminals or outcasts and so the king of a particular village would give them to the slavemasters for meagre things like money and European products (all of which were made by slaves).

The point is, rather than whine on and on about this thing - we cannot change history- we should acknowledge it and then never let it happen again. And the effects still exist and so the argument should be alleviating the damages of racism, rather than ask a bunch of cowards for phony ass apologies.

 

Well, were we africans as bad as the whites? I can remember talking about this issue with my grandfather in lagos (RIP) or usually in the village. I've even made trips to lagos island. His father (my great-grandfather) and grandfather were both slave traders. The only thing I can really do is pass off what they told me. To begin with, there were many "worthless" africans. Thieves, criminals, lazy people, etc, were all sold to slave catches. Society jsut didn't want them. Even before the white men step foot into african, africans also had slaves. Those group of people I mentioned were the ones usually sold into slavery. They would capture them usually during the night. Put them in cages like animals in lagos island, until the slave catchers make there usual trips to different areas of africa. Nigeria, Ghana,etc.


The slave trade was the biggest business back then. The king of London, Spain, etc would spend money building huge ships, paying the sailor, and providing food, 6 months worth, to the sailors, and all the africans. Remember it took 3 months or so one way to africa. Another back. The king HAD to make a profit or at least break even. I don't see a sailor coming back, saying "sorry king. The africans did not want to sell themelves. I couldn't get any slaves back"? No way. The king would hang him. Whether we sold ourselves or not, the white man would take us regardless. My whole point is, some people act if some of us didn't sell ourselves, slavery never would have happened. It's like me robbing a bank and getting caught. Then when I go to the judge, I tell the judge "but she gave me the money". Offcourse she did, I put a gun in her face. So offcourse SOME africans sold each other. They would have been taken themselves.

Then you also had the conflict within tribes. If a igbo man fights with someone from another tribe and captures him or her, offcourse they'll sell them to slave catches. This way, they get to get rid of there enemies, and gain some thing in return. A win win situation. I'm sure you already knew this iffy. It's not like a mother would have a baby, then she'd go sell the baby to a slave catcher.

Then you have some foolish blacks who did it just for the sake of making profit. The things the white guys would give africans is useless stuff. Such as hats, gold,etc. So while europe and north american has obviously gained alot by slave labour, we're still foolishly wearing our fancy hat we got. nonsense.

Africans definately should take some blame in the slave trade. Don't get me wrong. It just sad, we should have been united instead of divided. Iffy, I posted a link to a naija movie in the "movie" category. I've been trying to find the full version of the movie myself.

It talks about this issue. VERY realistc. I think it was even filmed in Nigeria. This is not some white man, or someone who's a product of slavery (alex haile) telling a story they barely know about. These are africans telling the story passed down to generations like myself. They even speak igbo in the movie.


This is not the first time I've heard about this story iffy. Can you get a clip of it? Is it on youtube or something?

 

I have no idea if you can get can get clips of it on Youtube or not as I've not looked. I do know someone who recorded the show though, so he may know more than I do.

Cris, I'm not trying to point the finger of blame, as I think it is worthless. I just thought it was an interesting topic to discuss and am interested in other people's opinions.

One of the saddest things about the show, was when David Monteith was in an Ibo village, asking the village elders about what they thought of slavery. Many of them were just not bothered and thought that at least white people brought "civilisation" so that made it all OK...