Calls for Enhanced Cultural Relationship between the Maroon Community and its Ashanti Origins

During a visit to the Maroon Community in Moore Town, Portland Parish, Jamaica, the Chief of the Maroon Community, Colonel Wallace Sterling called for enhanced cultural relationships between the Maroon Community and Ashanti the origin of their ancestors. The Leader of the Maroons emphasised on the role of culture, in the development of countries and facilitating global peace. The visit was facilitated by Chris Addy-Nayo of NDC Europe and NDC Jasikan Constituency.

Chris Addy-Nayo in turn stated the importance of historical linkages for the preservation of national heritages. He also stated that culture can define and enrich people to not only see our differences but the underlying commonalities which unite humanity. He used the opportunity to call for dialogue, exchanges and collaboration between the Caribbean and Africa and to factor the role of culture in social and economic development. This forms part of both countries overarching objectives on development, poverty reduction and our gradual integration into the global economy. He also called for a scholarship to facilitate exchange of academics from both communities to research and preserve the historical linkages between the Maroons of Jamaica and Ashanti in Ghana.

The Leader of the Maroon Community of Moore town, Colonel Sterling also requested for direct air and shipping links between West Africa and the Caribbean to make it easier to facilitate cultural exchanges and trade between the regions. The Jamaican Maroons are descendants of runaway slaves who established free communities in the mountainous interior of Jamaica during the long era of slavery on the island. When the British captured Jamaica in 1655 the Spanish colonists fled leaving a large number of African slaves. Rather than be re-enslaved by the British, they escaped into the hilly, mountainous regions of the island, joining those who had previously escaped from the Spanish. The Maroons established independence in the back country and survived by subsistence farming and by raiding plantations. Over time, the Maroons came to control large areas of the Jamaican interior. Their plantation raids resulted in the First Maroon War. The two main Maroon groups in the 18th century were the Leeward and the Windward tribes, the former led by Cudjoe in Trelawny Town and the latter led by his sister Queen Nanny (and later by Quao). Nanny was born in 1686 into the Ashanti tribe, and was brought to Jamaica as a slave. Upon arrival in Jamaica, Nanny was sold to a plantation in Saint Thomas Parish where she and others toiled in extremely harsh conditions on the sugar cane plantations. She and her brothers, Accompong, Cudjoe, Johnny and Quao ran away from their plantation and hid in the Blue Mountains area of northern Saint Thomas Parish. While in hiding, they split up to organize more Maroon communities across Jamaica: Cudjoe went to Saint James Parish and organized a village, which was later named Cudjoe Town; Accompong settled in Saint Elizabeth Parish, in a community known as Accompong Town; Nanny and Quao founded communities in Portland Parish. She was married to a Maroon named Adou, but had no children. Nanny and her brothers became folk heroes and went on to lead several slave rebellions in Jamaica with the aid of her other brothers. She was very adept at organizing plans to free slaves. For over 30 years, Nanny freed more than 800 slaves, and helped them to resettle in the Maroon community. Maroon folklore, myths and stories are filled with Ashanti and Fanti proverbs, stories and traditional knowledge systems. In 1733 the British governor after suffering repeated defeats, ambushes and loses at the hands of the Maroons signed a treaty with them, promising them 2500 acres (10 km) in two locations. They were to remain in their five main towns Accompong, Trelawny Town, Mountain Top, Scots Hall, Nanny Town, living under their own Chief titled as a Colonel. The Maroon Community have since then maintained a semi-independent status and its own systems of governance in Jamaica led by the Head of Community, a Colonel (Chief) and his Council of Advisors called the Osofu (Asafo). Nanny who died in 1740 is the only female listed among Jamaica's National Heroes, and has been immortalized in songs and legends. She was known for her exceptional leadership skills, especially in guerrilla warfare, which were particularly important in the First Maroon War in the early 18th century. Her remains are buried at “Bump Grave" in Moore Town, the main town of the Windward Maroons who are concentrated in and around the Rio Grande valley in the northeastern parish of Portland. In 1796 about 600 Jamaican Maroons from Trelawney Town were deported from Jamaica to Nova Scotia, Canada following their rebellion against the interference of the colonial government in their affairs. The Jamaican government tired of the cost of maintaining order, had decided to rid themselves of "the problem". After the first winter, the Maroons, raised in an independent culture and not impressed with the apparently servile virtues of cultivating the soil, became less tolerant of the conditions in which they were living. The British government decided it would be better to send them to Freetown in Sierra Leone rather than try to persuade them to farm in a cold climate of Canada, and the survivors were deported to Freetown in 1800. Not surprisingly, exile to Africa was not an easy transition for the Trelawney Maroons. "By 1841, 90 per cent of the remaining Maroons in Freetown -- some 591 people --returned to Jamaica" to work for "Jamaican planters" who "desperately needed workers".

To this day, the Maroons in Jamaica are to a small extent autonomous and separate from Jamaican culture. The isolation used to their advantage by their ancestors has today led to their communities being amongst the most inaccessible on the island. In their largest town, Accompong, the Maroons still possess a vibrant community of about 600.

Chris Addy-Nayo promised to facilitate collaboration between the Institutions of Manhyia Palace and the Maroon Community for enhanced intercultural exchanges for the benefit of both communities and countries.