Posted on 12/19/2022 3:26:28 PM PST by nickcarraway
On the same day that the Netherlands officially apologised for 250 years of slavery, MPs in neighbouring Belgium failed to agree on how to seek atonement for colonial-era abuses.
The Belgian parliament set up a commission in 2020 in the wake of protests triggered by the Black Lives Matter movement to examine their country's record in its former central African colonies.
But the panel admitted they had failed to reach a consensus on how to formulate an apology for the notoriously bloody excesses of Belgian rule in what is now DR Congo, Rwanda and Burundi.
They had been due to meet on Monday to approve 128 recommendations drawn up by the commission. But in the end none went to a vote.
For the left, the fault lay with liberal coalition partners, whom they said had refused to vote to approve a report that included an apology for the historical crimes.
"The liberals sabotaged the work of the commission through pure colonialist dogmatism," said green MP Guillaume Defosse, blaming Prime Minister Alexander De Croo's political family. "It's a wasted opportunity, a great disappointment," Defosse added.
The Ecolo party MP noted with bitterness that the failure came on the same day that another liberal premier, the Netherlands' Mark Rutte, had apologised for slavery on behalf of the Dutch state.
"Today, over here, our liberals are unwilling to acknowledge that past," Defosse said.
In 2020, in the wake of a movement against police violence in the United States, Belgium saw protests targeting statues celebrating King Leopold II and other figures of the colonial era.
The 19th century king is a controversial figure.
(Excerpt) Read more at barrons.com ...
“We apologize for stooping to the level of Africans. We should never have traded with those African slave masters.”
Maybe all the Belgians could walk through the streets striking themselves with flagella.
Leopold II was beyond that.
The past is the past move on to the future
“Mistakes were made”
Just “agree”. Not “agree on” of “agree upon”.
The revolution will be complete when the language is imperfect.
I imagine you as a captive of another African tribe had a couple of destinations Arabia or the Americas. If neither then likely death no?
They should “string up” any slavers who apologize for owning slaves. And in Cauliphonya’s case, they should be required to prove they had slaves there before they can use taxpayer dollars for “reparations”.
I have read multiple sources that say Belgium and Leopold’s government of The Congo was brutal even by the standards of European colonialism in the 19th Century.
Good post.
Slavery was common in Africa before the white man came to Africa. That is truth. Slaves were just a commodity that were captured and sold by black men to white men, or other black men. It should also be noted a great slave trade existed in the Mediterranean. White Europeans were captured and sold in the salve markets of North Africa by Muslims.
I would also like to note that the United States is the only nation on earth to start an internal war to defeat this vile act of slavery.
The debt of slavery by the white man has been paid in full by the horrendous deaths of both North and South soldiers in the civil war. The deaths in the Civil War exceeded all our wars hence in total. Our populations was a fraction of what it is today thus in percentages the death rate was huge.
Something is about to happen like the West dumping billions of dollars in Africa
Who is going to apologize for all the slave children working in the cobalt mines today?
So the Biden’s are slavers.
They can pay reparations.
It's done. We can't go back. The Nazis used to rule Germany. But their grandchildren are not responsible for the crimes of the Nazis 80 years ago.
Maybe Belgium should build a factory in the Congo today? That will actually facilitate some economic development.
As I understand it the ‘Congo Free State’ was the personal property of King Leopold II completely separate from the government of Belgium. Conditions were so terrible that the Belgian government finally seized it from him.
Under Belgian rule things in the Congo had to be better. How much better I don’t know.
Global redistribution on steroids. Our ruling class is doing it also.
“Heart of Darkness” was inspired by the Belgium abuses in the Congo. In the 1960’s control was maintained by mixed race mercenary armies. Their excesses lead to basically the outlawing of mercenaries until they were reactivated by the US in Iraq.
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