Remarks by
Hon. Fred Mitchell MP Fox Hill
Minister of Foreign Affairs &
The Public Service

Monday 12th March 2007

Faith Mission Church of God
Launching Our Campaign in Fox Hill
 

I want to thank all of you for coming here this evening to attend this launch of our campaign for the year 2007.  I believe with God’s help we shall win.  We have always started here in this church.  19th March 2007 marks ten years since I have been associated with the Fox Hill constituency.  It is George Mackey who brought me here and introduced me to the late Bishop Austin Saunders and to the Fox Hill community.  I do not plan to leave any time soon.  So I want all of you to put on the whole armour, get ready for the battle ahead.  We have a good general in Prime Minister Perry Christie and I expect that we will win.

Let me say that there is always a spirit of evil in the land, trying to stop the good work from being done.  Last night just after 9 p.m., like thieves in the night, a sign was placed in the centre of Fox Hill on publicly owned lands, with the photograph of a certain person from the other side who shall remain nameless but one who is seeking something which they cannot have.  It is interesting that they, who did this deed, did it in the dark of night, hiding; and hide they must because they knew they were doing something wrong.  I simply want to say that the placing of the photograph is on lands held in trust for the Fox Hill people next to the Old Society Hall.  There is right now a public project to refurbish the Old Society Hall and that sign is not consistent with the use of the property.  I have therefore sought to have the law enforced on this issue and my view is quite clear, if it is not down within a reasonable period, then the law must take its course and it must be taken down.

I want to thank my colleague Melanie Griffin for being here this evening to represent my other colleagues.  Most of them will be attending the Church of God of Prophecy’s annual convention with the Prime Minister.  I apologize that the two functions are clashing but I have a long association with the Church of God of Prophecy and I expect to visit with them later in the week.  I also thank the Chairman of our Party Raynard Rigby for his attendance.

Tonight, I am looking forward to hearing the word from Pastor Shirelle Saunders who is the successor to her father Bishop Austin Saunders.  She is doing and wonderful job and I thank her for allowing us to be here this evening.

Tonight I want to remind us of some history.  A woman told me on Saturday last that because something was not done for her personally that she is not going to vote at all.  What a shame that we don’t see the bigger picture.  We are to go back into Egypt because something was not done as timely as it should have been, no fault attached to it, nothing, I’m not going to vote.   How quickly she may have forgotten that before 1962, more than half of the population of The Bahamas could not have a say in the running of their country because they were born female.  Within our lifetime that changed as a result in part of women like Dame Doris Johnson and other PLPs.

I want us to remember and especially the young women here tonight what a privilege you have, and I want you to remember how hard won the struggle to get the right to vote was.  Remember if you do not use it, you can lose it.

Remember women, females just got the right to vote within the lifetimes of your grandmothers and some of your teachers here today.  So in many cases when your grandmothers, when I was born, many of the women here tonight did not have the right to vote.

Several generations before that neither men nor women who were African or black could vote in The Bahamas.  They were part of what was known then as the British Empire and throughout the British Empire slavery was the order of the day.  That meant that people like and you and me were destined to be owned by other people; bought and sold like chattel.

To bring it home graphically to you, imagine Pastor Shirelle or Raynard Rigby, or me or even you being put on an auction block and bought and sold like an animal.  Yet until 1834, that was what the situation was throughout the British Empire.

That British Empire collapsed in the face of the struggles of women like Doris Johnson, men like Lynden Pindling, Kwami Nkrumah, Norman Manley and Mahatma Gandhi.  It was replaced by the Commonwealth and today the Commonwealth’s values replace the old racism and discrimination of the empire with respect for the rule of law, self determination and equality for all peoples regardless of race, creed or colour.

Tonight, I want you to remember this.  I recalled earlier today the two great philosophical questions: the existence of God and how he created the world; and secondly how did man come to be here.

In connection with the last question, it is very important that you know your history otherwise you put yourself in danger of repeating it.  You must know who your mothers and fathers are, your grandmothers and grandfathers were, who their parents were if you can find out, and you must know what they did to get you here.

For example, did you know that in the predecessor to the Commonwealth, the British Empire, in The Bahamas, prior to 1925 there were no high schools for people like you and me?  This was in the life time of your grandmothers and fathers, great grandmothers and fathers.  The first public high school in The Bahamas came in 1925 the Government High School and it was not free.  Up to 1967, you had to pay to go to the only government secondary school and it could only take 20 pupils each year.  Dr. Gail Saunders writes that in 1925 when the school was started for every one high school place available in The Bahamas there were 67 primary school children waiting to get that place.  That remained the case until 1967 when the Government changed and created a situation where secondary education was made available for all and free of charge. Presumably those who ran the Government would have continued with that practice if the PLP had not won in 1967.

Must we forget?  Doris Johnson, Lynden Pindling and George Mackey fought the British Empire for that for you. Mr. Mackey had to leave Government High because he could not afford to pay.  So when you see what we have today, Freedom Park, the Fox Hill Parade, the basketball courts, do not take it for granted; take care of it, for that did not just drop out of the sky.  Our fore parents worked for that so you could come and sit on that park in bright night lights and enjoy yourself.

Do you know that before 1967 in the old British Empire, that the only churches that could be heard on ZNS radio on the Sunday morning religious broadcast were the Anglicans, the Roman Catholics, the Methodists and the Presbyterians and some time Zion Baptist Church?  It rotated amongst them.  From 1967 onwards, any church could have their religious services aired on radio and today on television.  Do not take what you have today for granted.

On 31st March 2007, we in Fox Hill will mark African Heritage Day, observing the 200th anniversary of the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade in the old British Empire.  The streets are going to be closed and we are going to have Fox Hill Day in the winter.  Please mark it on your calendars.  I make the point that we are not celebrating this anniversary; we are observing or marking the occasion.

The fact is that slavery was wrong, morally wrong.  There is a requirement for an apology by all those who were officially involved in slavery even centuries after the fact, in the same way that the German government has had to make amends for their conduct during the Second World War toward Jews.

Millions of African peoples perished in the middle passage; the numbers exceed those who died in the Holocaust.  Their names are not known and never will be.  Even though they are nameless, they must not be forgotten.

I made the point about observances because there are many in the country who want to pretend that this never happened, and that we ought to in some kind of 21st century love fest forget about the past as if it did not exist.  We cannot do that.  Our history is our history; and we ought to be sure that the young know their history.  We must also tell them, though, that history should not be used as an excuse for their failings but rather as a source of inspiration for their success.

On 25th March 1807, the British Parliament passed an Act that would forbid the transportation of slaves from Africa to the new world.  It came into effect in 1808 and once it did, the British Navy had the responsibility of enforcing it.  This meant that vessels of countries that still carried slaves were subject to seizure and forfeiture by the navy on the high seas.

Amongst those countries where slavery had not yet been abolished was the United States of America who did not abolish slavery until 1865 and in Brazil where slavery continued until 1888.  Slavery itself was not abolished in the British Empire of which The Bahamas was a part until the year 1834.

Fox Hill owes its beginnings to some extent to the settlement of freed Africans who were set down by the British in what was then called New Guinea or the Creek Village, later named Fox Hill and then Sandilands Village.

Here is what Michael Craton writes in his History of The Bahamas:
“After the abolition of the British slave trade in 1807, the Royal Navy maintained a special squadron to suppress the traffic.  From 1830, slaves seized on the high seas were freed absolutely.  The first such cargoes reached Nassau in September 1832, when 370 Negroes were settled on Highbourne Cay, 514 at Carmichael, six miles from Nassau, and 134 at Adelaide in the southwest of New Providence.  In 1833, there was a serious drought and the Negroes at Highbourne Cay were brought back to New Providence and settled just ‘over the hill’ from Nassau, in an area already known as Grant’s Town after Governor Lewis Grant (1820-29).”

Dr. Gail Saunders writes in her book Slavery In The Bahamas:
“The arrival of Liberated Africans had a profound effect on the growth of the population of The Bahamas between 1808 and 1840… Most of the displaced Africans were condemned at Nassau at the Court of Vice Admiralty and between 1811 and 1832 over 1400 Africans had been put ashore under the protection of the crown.

“On being landed in The Bahamas they were placed in the hands of the Chief Customs Officer, whose duty it was to bind them to suitable masters or mistresses, in order for them to learn a trade or handicraft, for periods not exceeding 14 years... In the 1830s, there were at least eight free black villages or settlements outside the town of Nassau.  They were Grants Town and Bain Town just south of the city, Carmichael and Adelaide in the southwest, Delancey Town just west of Nassau, Gambier in the west and Creek Village (New Guinea and Fox Hill) in the east…

“Fox Hill was named after Samuel Fox who arrived in New Providence in the 1820s and purchased property in the eastern district of New Providence.  Fox Hill comprised a series of villages, for example, Congo Town, Nango Town, Joshua Town and Burnside Town.  Congo and Joshua Town were probably settled by slaves or freed men who had been born in Africa. Congo and Nango Town probably took their names from the tribes that lived there.”

When I attended the celebrations for the 136th anniversary of St. Paul’s Baptist Church in Fox Hill, the history there says that their congregation formed out of Mt. Carey Baptist Church and arose in part because of differences between the Congos and Yorubas.

The Yorubas came from West Africa and the Congos came from the Congo.  Most British slaves came from West Africa and the Portuguese took their slaves from what is now the Congo and were transporting them to Brazil.

It is said that after the abolition of the slave trade a slaver carrying Congo slaves was captured by the British and set down in Fox Hill.  They were looked down on by the Yorubas because the Congos could not speak proper English, having come later to The Bahamas and the English language.  When the split took place over some doctrinal matters, the Congos moved to found St. Paul’s.

Dr. Nicolette Bethel speaking at the New Covenant Church some three Sundays ago told us that Junkanoo as we know it today was shaped by the freed African slaves set down after the abolition of the slave trade in 1807.  When Junkanoo first started, they used to use the English military and their snare drums for the rhythm but the freed Africans introduced the goatskin drum to Junkanoo and changed it into what it is today.

Language is very interesting because as you know we have all been stripped of our African languages.  I recall how the people of Barbados who migrated to Panama at the turn of the 20th century and stayed in Panama, even though they were born and raised in Panama and have not been to Barbados in their lives still speak English with a Barbadian accent, 100 years or more after the fact.

You can tell then that language is a difficult thing to erase and yet you see how slavery was so dehumanizing that it wiped out all traces of the original languages that came with our forefathers.

So I hope you see how the modern history of The Bahamas is influenced by what happened 200 years ago.  We are still struggling with the meaning of this for our people, their self esteem, and their right to exist as human beings within their own skin and not suffer because of it.  It is important that our children continue to know the story and continue to tell the story.

This year on 5th March, Ghana celebrated the 50th anniversary of its Independence gained in 1957.  That started a march to independence throughout Africa and ultimately here to the Caribbean where we gained our independence in 1973.  We became full members of the Commonwealth in 1973. The old empire fell away, not because of time but because our people fought and resisted.  We cannot turn back now.

In 1969, two years after majority rule in the life time of your mothers and fathers, 18 year olds got the vote for the first time.   Our fore parents, some of you in this room fought hard for all those who are 18 years or older to vote.

There is a saying if you don’t use it, you will lose it.  Use it, don’t lose it.

On this night when we reaffirm the values of freedom which your mother and fathers, you fought for, Austin Saunders fought for, Doris Johnson, George Mackey, Georgianna Symonette, Sir Lynden Pindling fought so hard to provide for you; all those patriots who went before us, let us remember: dare to struggle, dare to win.  In the words of Patrice Lumumba:  Forward ever!  Backward never!

Let us go out now and win this election for George Mackey and Austin Saunders.

Thank you and God bless you all!