UCF CARIBBEAN RESPONDS TO SUSPENDED EXCAVATION ST. EUSTATIUS
TILBURG / ST. EUSTATIUS / 19 July 2021 / -- Ubuntu Connected Front
"One Step Forward – Let’s Work Towards Memory, Repair and True Descendant Engagement" - Says UCF Caribbean Chair
Despite suspension of archaeological excavations carried out on
enslaved ancestors on the small Dutch Caribbean island of St. Eustatius,
objections are still being raised. Protest organizers, Ubuntu Connected
Front (UCF) Caribbean, Brighter Path Foundation, and SEAD applaud this
change in approach by the government, but “We still have many questions
and concerns”, says UCF Caribbean chair Kenneth Cuvalay, “it is one step
forward, but we are not quite there yet.”
Kenneth Cuvalay, "It is smart that our unelected administrators on
St. Eustatius have suspended their soulless digging and are going to set
up a St Eustatius Heritage Research Commission," Cuvalay points out.
"Suspension does not mean discontinuance. Does this mean scientific
suspension and discontinuation of our ancestral remains in laboratories
outside of St Eustatius? Many people on St Eustatius do not trust the
work of SECAR, the local archaeological society. The same organization
secretly disturbed graves on the West side of the island and left them
in a deplorable state."
True transparency and community engagement
“And who will be on this commission? Friends of SECAR? More
parachuted civil servants from the Dutch mainland? The local government
talks about this "group of experts". We have no conservation experts on
St. Eustatius – apart from the very self-proclaimed experts who decided
to poke around, remove hallowed human remains and artifacts if only to
declare that it was scientific work. None of them were born on St
Eustatius and yet they broke the faith of their own international
archaeological codes.”
We have raised concerns, have written letters, and have almost a
thousand signatures under the petition. Still no response from the
government. From what we read in the government’s press release, our
urgent call for more transparency and structural engagement with the
descendant community is still not guaranteed. We want a seat at the
table; we want to have an input in e.g. knowledge production and the
decision-making process; we want our voice included in research
planning, design, and interpretation as well. The announced decisions of
the government all sounds nice, but is in fact a farce to appease the
growing public pressure we made through our letters, the online
petition, and media exposure.
Objectives still not met
“We still would like to get a response to our initial letter to the St. Eustatius government”, the protest organizers state. Questions asked in that letter were:
- A written plan on the excavation and commemoration with input from the descendant community and scientists from the Afrikan diaspora;
- Establishment of a scientific research protocol including a definitive timeline for completion;
- Establish a commemorative proposal that is distinctive and rooted in the history and culture of the Afrikan and Afrikan diaspora. This memorial proposal should include plans for: (a) A respectful treatment of these ancestral remains; (b) Plans for their reburial at the original site of rediscovery; (c) Plan for appropriate Afrika-focused ceremonies as selected by the offspring community; (d)Placement of a permanent memorial on the site of sacred ground (at the airport).
In addition to the above listed questions, we ask:
- Input into who will be on the committee of experts, and the Research Commission;
- A research and memorialization agreement established between the descendant community and SECAR/St. Eustatius Government;
- For SECAR to restore the burial site on the Godet plantation and return the human remains;
- All remains of the Golden Rock burial ground to be returned to the island, since the project is now suspended;
- Investigation on the granting of taxpayers' money for public relations activities carried out by the wife of the former Commissioner of St. Eustatius for the SECAR digging. It is a matter of record, and we have the records. The souls of the enslaved are tortured twice by this graft.
- Make a stand for protecting slave burials, walls, and all monuments that are testimony to heritage.
Decolonize Archaeology
We hold the researchers of the excavations accountable for not to
have followed common practices of community archeology. Structural
engagement with the public is a common practice in modern archeology.
The research team has failed to properly implement this. Especially
considering that it concerns a burial ground of our Afrikan ancestors
who were victims of horrendous crimes committed against humanity, we
regard this as evidence of deep contempt and academic misconduct. It
reflects the hundreds of years of racism and white supremacy that we are
not prepared to deal with any longer. We therefore want the research
team to be replaced and have more Afrikan centered archeologists in
charge.
Call to the Research Community
We need a more collaborative and participatory archaeology in the
Netherlands, that has the ethics and sensibility to go into dialogue
with us, as the Afrikan descendant community. We need to start an urgent
debate on decolonizing Dutch archaeological regulations and practices.
Moreover, we need to extend that debate to a global level for there are
many more African Burial Grounds at risk in the Americas.
###
Further Information: Kenneth Cuvalay
Press Release agreed and approved by:
- Xiomara Balentina - President Brighter Path St. Eustatius
- Derrick Simmons - Coordinator Ubuntu Connected Front (UCF) St. Eustatius
- George Berkel - Vice-president of grassroots movement St. Eustatius Awareness and Development Movement (SEAD)
- Kenneth Cuvalay - Chair Ubuntu Connected Front (UCF) Tilburg & Caribbean
UCF Black Agenda
Ubuntu Connected Front (UCF) won an absolute majority (50,5%) on
St. Eustatius in the elections to the House of Representatives this
spring. It is a grassroots community-based movement. Decolonization is
on her Black Agenda as part of the party program calling for the
decolonization and transformation within structures and systems in the
Kingdom to combat systemic racism. The recognition of the impact and
legacy of the Dutch transatlantic slave trade and colonization is
subject of debate in the Netherlands. Dutch Afrikans in the diaspora are
asking the government for apologies for the slavery past, calling for
reparatory justice and declaring 1 July (Emancipation Day) a national
holiday.
Our 'Black Agenda' can be found in the "Manifest for NL Transformation" at the UCF website (Chapter 5).
Ubuntu means "humanity" in Afrikan Bantu
languages. It is often translated as "I am because we are", or "humanity
towards others". It is Ubuntu Connected Front’s core belief that all
people have rights, which promotes equality of treatment and eliminates
marginalization and deprivation.
