A demonstration was organized this Tuesday in front of the British representation, in Kingston (Jamaica), to protest against the visit of Prince William and Kate Middleton in the country. The royal couple must go there on the occasion of the jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II.
The protesters demanded that the British monarchy pay compensation and apologize for its role in the slave trade which brought hundreds of thousands of Africans to the island to be enslaved. “I’m here to represent my ancestors who died as slaves and were killed by white oppression,” said Clement “Jawari” Deslandes.
A tour that has already experienced another failure
The Jamaican takes it as an insult to his ancestors that “a member of royalty comes here without a care, without feeling remorse”. “They have this privilege of nobility,” he added. They can get here and we have to roll out the red carpet for them. That era is over. »
William and Kate’s Caribbean tour has already failed on the first leg. In mid-March, the couple’s visit to a village in Belize was canceled due to a dispute between the local population and a charity organization sponsored by Prince William. The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge are then due to travel to the Bahamas.
This trip comes as voices are raised in Jamaica to follow the example of Barbados, which became a republic in 2021. Jamaica, colonized by the Spaniards after the arrival of Christopher Columbus, passed in 1655 under the yoke of the British crown, which developed the economy there through slavery. Having become independent in 1962, the island remains a parliamentary monarchy whose head of state is the Queen of England.
