Jamaicans urged to spend more vacation in region and Africa

Claudia Gardner, Hospitality Jamaica Writer

WINSTON SILL/FREELANCE PHOTOGRAPHER Professor Verene Shepherd, Department of History University of the West Indies.

PROFESSOR OF Social History at the University of the West Indies (UWI) Verene Shepherd has called on Jamaicans to spend more vacation time in Africa and the Caribbean, and to lobby for direct air links to the Motherland.

Professor Shepherd, chairperson of the Jamaica National Heritage Trust (JNHT), was speaking at the 268th Annual Accompong Maroon Festival in Accompong Town, St Elizabeth on Friday.

"Very few people in Jamaica spend or even think of spending their vacation in Africa," Professor Shepherd said. "As we make plans to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the abolition of the Trans-Atlantic Trade in enslaved Africans, let us support the project to retain our links with Ghana. But of course, this means we will have to agitate for air links, a discontinuation of the visa requirements for African diasporian citizens, and the waiving of transit visas to pass through the United States, United Kingdom and Europe ­ until such time as direct airlinks are established."

She told the large gathering that they were to vow to enrich the African diaspora by spending more of their money in Africa and the Caribbean instead of continuing the enrichment of other countries, especially those unfriendly to melanin-abundant people.

Professor Shepherd said the links, especially Ghana, should be maintained, as the ancestors from Ghana made "lasting contributions to the Jamaican economic, cultural, political, linguistic and social life.

"As part of the enslaved labour force, they helped to establish the sugar and other industries in the island. The fruits of their labour developed banks, cities and industries in England," she said.

According to Professor Shepherd the area once known as the Gold Coast, (now modern Ghana) was a significant source of the estimated one million enslaved Africans transported forcefully to Jamaica during the period of the Trans-Atlantic Trade and accounted for Jamaica's close affinity with people of various ethnic groups from Africa.