Activists with a placard at a protest in Berlin on May 28, 2021 demanding "Reparations to descendants instead of development aid" following an admission by the German government that atrocities were committed against Namibia's Herero and Nama people.
Image: AFP
Kim Heller
After decades of seeking reparations for historical injustices, including slavery, colonialism, apartheid and genocide, the African Union (AU) declared 2025 as the Year of Justice for Africans and People of African Descent Through Reparations.
A strong, united Continent-wide call for reparations is intrinsically linked to Africa’s welfare now and in the future. But the AU's mission for historical justice could be eclipsed by the geopolitical havoc caused by Donald Trump’s punitive policies as well as the persistent conflict and devastation across much of Africa.
For the African Union, developing the requisite unity of purpose and enabling framework for reparations, is a mammoth task. The failure of the African Union to unify the Continent on the Silencing of the Gun, conflict resolution, and joint economic and trade initiatives, amongst other pressing challenges, does not bode well for this mission.
With leaders of member countries overwhelmed by domestic challenges, this historically significant Continental reparation drive is on shaky ground and unsteady.
Internationally, even though the United States was heavily implicated in trans-Atlantic slavery, redress has never featured high in the country’s moral matrix. Given Donald Trump's negative disposition towards Africa, his administration will not welcome reparation talks.
In all likelihood, former European colonisers will dismiss the African Union’s legitimate call for reparations as a begging bowl tactic or argue that development assistance and humanitarian aid are ample compensation for historical ills.
This is not the case. While the combined cost of overall development aid to Africa over recent decades is estimated to have exceeded $1 trillion, this is a mere fraction of what reparation payments could amount to. Financial compensation for historical injustices could be as high as $100 trillion.
In 2023, Ghana's President Nana Akufo-Addo said, "No amount of money can restore the damage caused by the transatlantic slave trade ... But surely, this is a matter that the world must confront and can no longer ignore".
While the Global North has a moral duty to correct historical economic injustices, few Western nations admit culpability or legal responsibility. This is a cheap and morally bankrupt attempt to avoid a flood of claims and financial compensation for centuries of economic exploitation and extraction. Understandably so, for it would cripple the current-day budgets of many Western governments.
In 2024, South African academic, Pumla Dineo Gqola stated, “Reparations remain important because the impact of slavery and colonialism is still evident… in trade links, migration patterns, poverty and other inequalities, both globally and nationally."
An appeal to the moral conscience of Western countries is likely to fall on deaf ears. The AU will need to leverage its bargaining power and present reparations as an essential building block for the future to counter the Western narrative that it is a long-expired historical issue.
Expectations will need to be in line with current realities which include global economic uncertainty and decline. Given these realities, reparations in the form of debt cancellation, largescale, sustainable developmental projects and exceptionally favourable trading terms and conditions may be more practical than a wholesale financial payment.
Western governments may use the issue of poor governance and lack of stability in Africa to sidetrack the issue of reparations. Concerns around the possibility that funds may be misdirected into purchasing weapons or used to benefit political elites will emerge.
African governments have, in the main, enriched themselves at the cost of ordinary citizens. Mineral riches, for instance, have not uplifted the people of Africa. Sadly, reparation payments or measures may not either. Mechanisms for the distribution of reparation payments will need to be finely determined, especially given that the imprint and impact of slavery and colonialism were uneven across Africa.
A lack of unity across Africa, ongoing regional conflict, poor leadership, and corrupt governments will negatively impact the African Union’s standing and negotiation posture on the world stage.
At the recent launch of the inaugural Dr Aziz Pahad Peace, Security and Human Rights Dialogue former President Thabo Mbeki spoke of the serious challenge of poor leadership in Africa. He said, “There is no evidence or sign anywhere that Africa’s political and intellectual leadership is not only conscious of the need to define our Continent’s place in the emerging multipolar world but is ready to act on this urgent matter.”
He added, “Given its recent performance about many of Africa’s contemporary challenges, it is very doubtful that the Continental body, the African Union, would be up to this task.”
The quest for reparations has been a long journey. The 1993 Abuja Proclamation implored former colonial powers to redress the “unprecedented moral debt” owed to the Continent. There has been little uptake and reparations have been largely symbolic or inadequate as in the case of Germany’s pledge of just $1 billion to Namibia’s development projects as part of a reconciliation agreement.
For reparations to become a reality, the political will of the African Union’s member states will have to be awoken. The imperatives of historical justice will need to be weighed against economic feasibility. If a practical approach is not adopted, justice will continue to be delayed.
The involvement of the Diaspora by the AU will add voice and pressure.
Reparation is no twelve-month mission. It would be more realistic to declare and develop this as a decade-long project. While the AU's reparation project may not bear immediate fruit it could help reshape the future of Africa.
In the words of South African singer and activist, Miriam Makeba, "We cannot undo the past, but we can demand that the wealth stolen from Africa be returned to its people, not as charity."
* Kim Heller is a political analyst and author of No White Lies: Black Politics and White Power in South Africa.
** The views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of IOL or Independent Media.