The government of Sao Tome and Principe, a small island nation in West Africa, will ask Portugal for reparations for the damage it caused during the colonial era.
Education and Culture Minister Isabelle Abreu told Portuguese news agency Lusa that the African country’s government would draw up a plan to negotiate with Lisbon on reparations, noting that the process would be time-consuming. The issue was on the agenda of today’s cabinet meeting, Abreu said.
Last week, Portuguese President Marcelo Rebelo de Souza claimed his country was responsible for crimes committed during the colonial-era transatlantic slave trade. He underlined the need for reparations, drawing sharp criticism from right-wing and far-right parties.
Lisbon’s centre-right government has made it clear that it does not intend to launch any reparations proceedings, praising “the increasingly intense and close cooperation, on the basis of reconciliation, between fraternal peoples”.
From the 15th to the 19th century, six million Africans were kidnapped and forcibly transported across the Atlantic, where they were sold in slave markets, mainly in Brazil.
During the colonial era, Angola, Mozambique, Brazil, Cape Verde, Sao Tome and Principe, East Timor and some territories in Asia came under Portuguese rule.
In the wake of the Portuguese president’s statement on the need for reparations, Mozambique’s ambassador to the UN did not hide his satisfaction.
Cape Verdean President Jose Maria Neves said on Monday that dialogue was needed in order to “find agreement and consensus”.
Aniele Franco, Brazil’s minister of racial equality, told the G1 network that her partners have contacted government officials in Portugal to discuss the matter.
The issue of reparations for atrocities committed during the colonial-era transatlantic slave trade has remained divisive for decades, but is gaining momentum around the world.
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