The
significance for the people of Bonaire on the highly anticipated Dutch King
Willem Apology for Slavery
With the
possible apology by King William on July 1, 2023, the commemoration of 160
years abolition of slavery in the Dutch Kingdom, that same day there will be a
public event organized by the government of Bonaire in cahoots with Holland’s
government which will be televised in a grand ceremony on Bonaire. One, wonders
what the people are thinking on Bonaire of this latest development. What would
motivate the Prime Minister Rutte then, and now the Dutch King, to apologize as
recently the beginning of 2022, as they have been constantly denying any
accusation about the Dutch’s role in Slavery, or anything to do with the past
slavery, as they refer to it as if it was not them, by saying that they were
not part of it.
Well, it
could be a few things:
1. A smoke screen to hide the fact that
Bonaire is still a colony, as of the dissolution of the Netherlands Antilles on
October 10, 2010. Our island Bonaire was
then imbedded in the Dutch’s Constitution, without her people equal rights. Our
autonomy that we once enjoyed since 1954 was erased and reversed, and Bonaire
returned to colonial-era-direct-rule from The Hague. All of Bonaire’s decisions
and tax money are controlled by the Dutch Parliament.
2. To control the narrative and stop
James Finies’ Human rights group of Bonaire gaining ground on the International
and United Nations awareness campaign by a pilgrimage of over 460 days on the
road to lobby and create awareness of the violations of Human rights on
Bonaire.
3. Our people are caught off guard and
accept the illegal status because they remain unaware of their own enslaved
history, and the history of their ancestors for the last 80 years, as it was
never taught in schools.
The Bonerian
people’s emancipation process was stopped,
and we could not understand what really happened to us, as we never were told,
taught, educated, or informed of our colonial slavery past, and our people have
no knowledge of, or a defense against this new Dutch contemporary
institutionalized recolonization. It is a more atrocious systemic depopulation,
and native genocide that directly emerged by abuse of powers by the Dutch
government.
A few years
ago, my 75-year-old mom went with me and listened to my sermon called “lest we
forget –July 1, 1863, is the most important day of our history” at the church
in Rincon. As we were driving home, she commented that she heard, as old as she
was, for the first time that July 1, 1863 was the abolition of slavery. It was
a hard time as James Finies started writing and raising awareness of our
slavery past, and the island leadership and elite publicly started attacking
him for being “negative”. We should not talk about the past, victim-syndrome,
and other abuses.
James Finies
was denounced in 2014 as a troublemaker, controversial, outcast, and even
called a racist by some of the leaders of Bonaire, as he set out to show the
renowned movie, “Tula: the Rebellion”. This movie is an account of the unequal
fight for justice in 1795 on the island of Curacao, a Dutch colony. We showed
this first film/documented slave-history of our islands that premiered on
Curacao. There were no theaters on Bonaire, and the film producers and agents
backed off from showing this film in Bonaire. James Finies then decided to show
it in all the neighborhoods of Bonaire. He got mayor support from Mr. Albert
Sillie with equipment and expertise to show the movie.
In November 2014,
James Finies, with a determined group of Bonerians and conscious of their
rights, rose again and walked the emancipation journey, for freedom and
equality on the commemoration day of the only documented slave uprising in
Bonaire of November 10, 1834. We organized a freedom protest walk “The Spirit
of Martis Di Katalina Janga Is Alive” in honor of Martis di Katalina Janga,
leader of the slave-rebellion of 1834. Our freedom walk started at the
saltpans/salt-plantations in the southern part of our island, and we walked day
and night non-stop through all the neighborhoods of Bonaire to Rincon, the
first settlement on Bonaire, and then returned to Kralendijk. At the governor’s
and government office, we started a 222-day, 24/7 protest, not leaving till a
referendum was granted to the people of Bonaire.
Statements
by a noticeable historian, political activist, and media commentator who since
then and up to today refuses to recognize and respect the actions and efforts
of our organization and addresses our organization by the name of “Group of
Martis di Katalina Janga”.
Another
political leader wrote a press article to try to discredit our actions by
describing our months of protest as if we “are calling on spirits of Martis di
Katalina Janga from the past as obi, or some kind of voodoo.”
The
significance of an apology from the Dutch King Willem for the Bonaire people would
be next to nothing and could be considered as “crocodile tears”. A smokescreen framed
up for the international community with the intention to blur and hide the reality
of the Bonaire people that were denied their history and would not understand
for what or why an apology as the people of Bonaire never enjoyed equality and remained
up to present day subordinated and colonized by same Dutch King Willem and his
government.
Dutch’s
apology is insincere.
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