The irony of Britain as colony

THE EDITOR, Sir:

BRITAIN IS headed for the status of ‘ colony’ to the European Union, Boris Johnson has warned, just hours after news broke of his resignation as foreign secretary, effective July 9, 2018.

“We are truly headed for the status of a colony – and many will struggle to see the economic or political advantage of that particular arrangement,” Johnson said in his resignation statement.

The ironies of history are many. However, the warning that Great Britain is under the threat of becoming a colony must stand out as the irony of the centur y. We, i n Jamaica, are among citizens of the 63 countries ruled for centuries by Britain as their colony.

AGGRESSOR BEING AGRESSED

Britain is now fearing the same imperialism she practised after invading indigenous peoples’ homelands, capturing them, and declaring t hem British territories, flagrantly practising its notorious mightis-right policies upon the weak and defenceless peoples of the world. That which is threatening tobe the mildest form of colonialism is now scaring the daylights out of a nation that practised the most extreme form of colonialism on almost half of the world for centuries! Worse yet, Britain, in some of her captured‘ territories ’, setup labour camps where her citizens were enriched from the enslavement of millions of people from the continent of Africa.

When sugar was no longer economical, she was compelled to ‘free’ the enslaved, compensating her citizens for their loss of our labour, and thereby changing the mode of economic plunder from chattel slavery to colonial rule.

Paul Bogle, the son of an enslaved man, felt the terror of British colonialism when, 27 years after slavery’s abolition, she executed 400 residents of St Thomas, including a Baptist deacon, and a member of the Assembly (Parliament) for daring to raise their voices against colonial rule!

We understand more than you do, Boris Johnson, that colonialism ‘nuh pretty ’. Your lesson learnt from all of this is “don’t do unto others that which you would not like done unto you”.

Reparation now, we say!

BERT SAMUELS Member Reparation Council of Jamaica