Dutch government should apologize for slavery
2022.12.19 06:35
Dutch government should apologize for slavery
Budrigannews.com – On Monday, Prime Minister Mark Rutte is scheduled to give a speech in which he is expected to apologize for the Netherlands’ historical role in slavery and the effects that it has had today.
The country’s colonial past, including efforts to return looted art and its current struggles with racism, are being rethought more broadly as a result of the apology.
However, groups that argue that King Willem-Alexander, in the former colony of Suriname, should issue an apology on July 1, 2023, the 160th anniversary of Dutch abolition, have resisted the idea of Rutte issuing an apology in The Hague on a December afternoon.
Roy Kaikusi Groenberg of the Honor and Recovery Foundation, a Dutch Afro-Surinamese organization, stated, “It takes two to tango – apologies have to be received by somebody.”
He said that it felt wrong that activists who are relatives of slaves have battled for a really long time to change the public conversation however had not been adequately counseled.
He stated that the government’s handling of the situation “is coming across as a neo-colonial belch.”
Last week, Prime Minister Silveria Jacobs of Sint Maarten, a Caribbean nation within the Kingdom of the Netherlands, stated that she would not accept an apology without having a conversation.
Rutte is responding to a national advisory panel established following George Floyd’s death in the United States in 2020.
The board said that Dutch cooperation in subjugation had added up to wrongdoings against humankind and in 2021 suggested a statement of regret and repayments. Rutte precluded compensations at a news gathering on Friday, however he is supposed to make a 200 million euro instructive asset.
According to Rutte, “it’s about a process in which you talk about recovery, in the sense of jointly acknowledging the past and the consequences in the present, but not, let’s say, salaries that were not paid.”
According to historians, Dutch traders transported more than half a million enslaved Africans to Brazil and the Caribbean in the Americas.
Many Dutch people are proud of their nation’s naval history and trading prowess. However, little is taught to children about the Dutch East India Company and the Dutch West India Company, two important sources of national wealth, in the slave trade.
Racism is a significant issue in the Netherlands, despite its reputation for tolerance.
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