We came to seek healing, not division – Prez Mahama

President John Dramani Mahama says Ghana’s push for reparations is about healing, not division, as he recounted progress made since his pledge at the United Nations a year ago.

“Last year, from this podium, I made a solemn pledge on behalf of Ghana, Africa, and the global African diaspora to secure full international recognition of the transatlantic trafficking and racialised chattel enslavement of Africans as the gravest crime against humanity in human history,” President Mahama said at the 81st Session of the UN General Assembly in New York.

“Some cautioned that we were reopening old wounds. But we came not to provoke division or render empty judgment. We came to seek healing. True healing requires truth; truth requires acknowledgement; and acknowledgement must lead to meaningful repair,” he stated.

President Mahama said the tragedy had for centuries been rendered in passive voice as though millions vanished into shadows.

“For centuries, this tragedy was rendered in the passive voice as though millions of African men, women, and children vanished into the shadows of time. They did not vanish. They were hunted, captured, trafficked, bought, sold, exploited, and exchanged for profit. They were ripped from the families and communities they belonged to,” he said.

“Their unpaid labour built the cities, industries, banking institutions, and empires of the modern Western world. Meanwhile, the African continent was left depopulated, with split families, structural disruption, and generational trauma,” he added.

He disclosed that on 25 March 2026, the International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade, Ghana tabled Resolution A/RES/80/250 in the Assembly.

“One hundred and twenty-three nations voted to affirm this fundamental truth: the transatlantic slave trade and chattel enslavement were the gravest crimes against humanity,” President Mahama said.

By Edem Mensah-Tsotorme