Ablakwa: Reparations not direct payment to leaders or profit-making venture

He explained that rather it is about addressing long-standing inequalities through investments in education, infrastructure, skills training and development in affected communities.

The Minister said this when he was addressing a press conference on March 31, 2026 in Accra.

“As leaders, we are not interested in direct payments to us. This is not a profit-making venture. But there is a need for financial compensation to support courses, empowerment programmes, skills training, capital for entrepreneurs, and all of that, even psychosocial support,” he said.

“I would encourage you to read the CARICOM 10-point plan, which addresses some of these things. Research has even demonstrated that some of the disease burdens which Africans carry trace their roots from how Africans were treated in those ships, in those dungeons, in the forts and castles,” he added.

He stressed that no amount of compensation could fully account for the scale and lasting impact of the atrocities but said the resolution provides a framework for structured global engagement on issues including compensation, institutional reform, research, and cultural restitution.

He rejected narratives suggesting that the transatlantic slave trade was a mutually beneficial system involving Africa, describing such claims as misleading and divisive. He emphasised that the process lacked the fundamental elements of trade, such as consent and agency, and instead involved coercion, violence, and systemic exploitation.

“What transpired was organised human trafficking driven by external demand and enforced through transcontinental systems,” he explained, adding that while local intermediaries may have existed, they did not control or own the system.

The resolution A/RES/80/250 championed by President John Dramani Mahama in his capacity as the African Union Champion on Reparations was adopted on March 25, 2026 by the United Nations.

123 Member States of the United Nations voted in favour of the resolution, 3 against and 52 abstentions,

Ablakwa expressed profound gratitude to the African Union, CARICOM and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) and all the 123 Member States who voted in favour of the resolution and all our international partners.