Barriers to ‘full emancipation’ highlighted

PROFESSOR Tendayi Achiume, United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur,
says one of the barriers to full emancipation of people of African
descent is the failure to provide reparations.

The independent expert was speaking during a virtual forum where she
noted it is very complicated to operate within the UN system for this
reason. The forum was held on Monday in celebration of African
Liberation Day and was held under the theme: “Equality, Equity,
Justice, Human Rights: Imperatives for Africans Now, Not Later”. Vice
Chancellor of the University of the West Indies, Professor Sir Hilary
Beckles, also participated in the online discussion.

During the forum, Professor Achiume commended the “powerful” work
being carried out by the Centre for Reparation Research, which is
headed by Professor Verene Shepherd.

“Part of the failure to provide reparations is also evident in legal
structures that perpetuate inequality, whether it’s in the context of
trade, whether it’s in the context of finance, whether it’s in the
context of how resources are allocated for fighting human rights,” she
said.

“One of the biggest challenges I think that remains is thinking about
what reparations mean for legal structures and for legal frameworks
and institutions like the United Nations. That said, I think that
there is also [more] that can be done with the institutions and with
the structures that we do have.”

Professor Achiume, while explaining her role at the UN, said being a
special rapporteur includes reporting to the Human Rights Council and
to the General Assembly of the United Nations. “My job is to highlight
to them the most pressing issues to do with racial discrimination,
xenophobia and related intolerance, and to give guidance.

“One thing that is important to me is using this mandate as a platform
that allows those who are most impacted by racial discrimination and
xenophobia to have a role within the UN system. And not just a role in
terms of being consulted about the violations that they’ve
experienced, but also having a role in determining what the system is
and what it does because they are the most expert when it comes to
what discrimination means and what it does to your lives. So really
thinking about how people of African descent need to be at the
forefront of shaping systems and not just seeding input into those
systems,” she explained.

She noted that her work also involves reporting on thematic issues,
but also doing country visits.

“It just remains the case that people of African descent all over the
world remain the most structurally marginalised. And so I have done
country visits... In these contexts, we see the legacy of slavery and
colonisation and the very meaning of race in contemporary society
continue to produce forms of exclusion and human right exclusion that
persisted historically as well.”

Professor Achiume said one of the most heartbreaking aspects of her
reporting is natural resource extractivism.

“To give you some thematic examples, one of my first thematic reports
was on the extraction of natural resources. In that report, one of the things I was
highlighting was persisting inequalities between countries in the
global north and the global south, and inequalities within countries
that are also on racial lines.” (JH)