Jamaica 60
Dr Ayshah Johnston
This year’s independence theme, ‘Reigniting the Country for Greatness,’ has generated a year-long programme of cultural events in Jamaica, including street parade, music, film and a grand gala in the national stadium. The theme has been followed in the diaspora, with events taking place around the Commonwealth games in Birmingham, UK. But as ever, while we celebrate with national pride the activities of the last 60 years that have placed our small island firmly on the world map through the achievements of our cultural icons, Independence Day is also a time for sober reflection.
Reverend Father Sean Major-Campbell, Anglican priest and human rights advocate, asks ‘Greatness for Whom?’ in an article in the Gleaner 31 July 2022. He mixes patriotic celebration of national and individual acts of citizenship with concern over the stifling of economic hopes, ‘the elusive goal of transformational development.’
As a historian with no expertise in contemporary global economic and political processes, I fall back on the historical record to relate the evolving sentiments of Jamaicans around Independence.
A selection of BCA’s archived material on Jamaica Independence, dating from 1971 to 2002.
At the 25th anniversary in 1987, Prime Minister Edward Seaga’s Independence message honoured the citizens of the diaspora and highlighted that it was also the centenary of the birth of Marcus Garvey, ‘foremost in kindling the flame of a national identity.’ In 1971, the African Caribbean Committee, a New York-based Pan-African organisation, produced a pamphlet Truth, Jamaica Independence which started with the pre-independence history of enslavement and exploitation for profit, and lamented the ongoing control of banks, factories, housing, etc. by colonial elites after Emancipation. Since Independence, the country was transferred to the hands of the USA and Canada economically, with some politicians amassing great wealth.
Black people made up 90% of the population but owned only 10% of the island’s wealth. Meanwhile the tourist industry was promoting Jamaica as a place of ‘fun and sun’ while Black living conditions remained poor and the government was not controlling the island’s resources for the benefit of the people. Thus, Black people remained ‘in service’ as waiters, maids, cooks and drivers. True independence, according to the Committee, was to be achieved through African unity. They called on people to dispel the negative view of Africa implanted in our minds by colonisers, and likewise refrain from identifying as Jamaicans, Trinidadians, Dominicans, etc. and come together as one race with a common heritage and common experience of racial discrimination ‘so that a united Caribbean would be ensured of the protection of the richest continent in the world.’
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The heyday of Garveyism may be in the past, and the Pan-African ideal may seem far from realisation. However, at the annual Emancipation Day celebrations in Brixton the tone is one of Pan-African unity and Reparations. While Emancipation and Jamaican Independence are two separate commemorations, the sentiments expressed at this time of year are common to both: Reparations and Development.
The 25th anniversary of Independence coincided with the silver jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II, and the Association of Jamaicans (UK) produced a programme of joint celebration. This year also marks the Queen’s platinum jubilee, but the contrast is self-evident. The future of the Caribbean in the Commonwealth is speculative, following Barbados’s exit in November 2021, and 2022 royal tours marked by protests during which the prime minister of Antigua and Barbuda raised the question of Reparations directly with the royal visitors. Though African unity as envisioned by Garvey is as yet unattainable, Reparations is very much on the political agenda and cannot be dismissed as a pipe dream. Sir Hilary Beckles, vice-chancellor of the University of the West Indies and chair of the CARICOM Reparations Commission, makes a twofold call: firstly, for the British state to acknowledge its debt, and secondly for Britain to return to the Caribbean as a development partner. Beckles’s book, How Britain Underdeveloped the Caribbean: A Reparation Response to Europe’s Legacy of Plunder and Poverty, was launched to coincide with the 60th anniversary of Independence of both Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago.
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At BCA, the material we hold in our library and archives speaks to the evolving views and opinions of activists, academics and cultural leaders. We continue to archive key moments in our histories, and encourage people to make appointments to visit our reading room and research the fascinating materials for themselves.