Barbados President Sandra Mason stands after being sworn in at the presidential inauguration ceremony to mark the birth of a new republic in Barbados at Heroes Square in Bridgetown, Barbados, on November 30 2021. Picture: REUTERS/JEFF J MITCHELLBarbados ditched Britain’s Queen Elizabeth as head of state, forging a new republic on Tuesday with its first president and severing its last remaining colonial bonds nearly 400 years after the first English ships arrived at the Caribbean island.
“The creation of this republic offers a new beginning,” said Prince Charles, whose mother sent her warmest wishes. “From the darkest days of our past and the appalling atrocity of slavery which forever stains our history, people of this island forged their path with extraordinary fortitude.” It may also be a harbinger of a broader attempt by other former colonies to cut ties to the British monarchy as it braces for the end of Elizabeth's nearly 70-year reign and the future accession of Charles.
“I’m overjoyed,” Ras Binghi, a Bridgetown cobbler, said ahead of the ceremony. Binghi said he would be saluting the new republic with a drink and a smoke.Prince Charles’s speech highlighted the continuing friendship of the two nations despite England’s central role in the trans-Atlantic slave trade. “Our movement would also like the royal family to pay a reparation,” Denny said in an interview in Bridgetown.
More than 10-million Africans were shackled into the Atlantic slave trade by European nations between the 15th and 19th centuries. Those who survived the often brutal voyage, ended up toiling on plantations.
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