{"id":171499,"date":"2023-03-29T10:36:56","date_gmt":"2023-03-29T14:36:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/antiguanewsroom.com\/?p=171499"},"modified":"2023-03-29T10:36:56","modified_gmt":"2023-03-29T14:36:56","slug":"letter-rest-in-peace-my-african-brothers-and-sisters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/antiguanewsroom.com\/letter-rest-in-peace-my-african-brothers-and-sisters\/","title":{"rendered":"LETTER: Rest in peace, my African brothers and sisters"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Dear Editor,<\/p>

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Let me deal with our African brothers and sisters who are here and some of whom lost their lives in the recent boating tragedy.<\/p>\n

I blame the world in turmoil and an uncaring world for this tragedy. Africans have been taking rickety boats and risking their lives for many years to get out of Africa to Europe.<\/p>

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This is nothing new. Many have died. Africans do it every day. The Haitians do it every day.<\/p>

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The Cubans have been doing it for over 50 years. Antiguans and Barbudans did it in the old days by boat to St. Thomas and St. Croix.<\/p>\n

The Antigua and Brabuda government in its naivety, established an air link to the motherland, Africa.<\/p>

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Naive because they did not take into account that Antiguans and Barbudans do not love their skin, their colour or their own.<\/p>\n

Just consider their hatred of our black Caricom brothers and sisters, while we love the Arabs, Chinese and Caucasians.<\/p>

\"\"<\/a><\/div>\n

The idea was a good one. Who could have imagined that the Cameroonians, trying to escape civil\u00a0war and persecution, would see these flights as an opportunity, with a direct flight to the Caribbean, as the first step to their determined\u00a0destination, the promised land of America.<\/p>

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But their timing was wrong. They arrived during the election period and the UPP used their arrival to stir up resentment and suspicion by suggesting that the ABLP brought these people here to vote.<\/p>\n

Our African brothers were bad mouthed and ostracized\u00a0by many of our citizens, who like the Republicans in the US after a school shooting, are offering crocodile tears.<\/p>\n

As a result of all this negative publicity, Barbados, Trinidad, Guyana and Suriname closed its doors, so our African brothers and sisters became stranded and desperate.<\/p>\n

Antigua was never their final destination. It was always America. They were here in-transit.<\/p>\n

Had we as a people been more welcoming, this may have been avoided. But desperate people do desperate things and now we have a tragedy.<\/p>\n

There is enough blame for all to share.<\/p>\n

Proud of my African Roots.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dear Editor, Let me deal with our African brothers and sisters who are here and some of whom lost their lives in the recent boating tragedy. I blame the world in turmoil and an uncaring world for this tragedy. Africans have been taking rickety boats and risking their lives for many years to get out […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":171441,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-171499","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\nLETTER: Rest in peace, my African brothers and sisters - Antigua News Room<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/antiguanewsroom.com\/letter-rest-in-peace-my-african-brothers-and-sisters\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"LETTER: Rest in peace, my African brothers and sisters\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Dear Editor, Let me deal with our African brothers and sisters who are here and some of whom lost their lives in the recent boating tragedy. 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