How The British Monarchy Sponsored Poverty in South Africa
The visit to Africa this week by Harry and Meghan is merely colonialism 3.0. If the British want to develop meaningful relationships with Africans, they must return the land they own. The Queen of England is the largest landowner in the world. She controls 6.6 billion acres of land worldwide with some of it in Africa.
During Prince Charles’ 2018 visit to Ghana dubbed as” The commonwealth towards a common future”, the British royal family for the first time unveiled it’s plans for a new relationship with Africa. This week, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex are now visiting South Africa under the banner of a modern U.K. and South Africa partnership. It is worth exploring how the British exploited Africa and want to continue this exploitation in modern times. Colonialism was a system sponsored by the British royal family that relegated Africans to second class citizens while exploiting their natural resources.
Some of the earliest involvement of the British monarchy in Africa came through the Royal African Company. The Royal African Company was started under the guise of the exploration of the African continent in the 16th century. The main purpose of the company was of course the transportation of gold and slaves. The Royal African Company traded in gold before they started transporting slaves from the Gambia and Ghana to the Americas. The United Kingdom took responsibility for the horror of the slave trade as Prince Charles stated, “To have this stain that it was an appalling atrocity that left an indelible stain on the history of the world”. BUT they did not pay any restitution. It was mere symbolism.
Between 1680 and 1686, the Company transported an average of 5,000 slaves a year. Between 1680 and 1688, it sponsored 249 voyages to Africa. After slavery the British royal family unleashed its next weapon of mass destruction on Africa known as colonialism.
Most explorers and early British settlers were directly funded by the British monarchy. Colonialism robbed Africans across the continent of their land and their wealth in gold and other precious minerals. The British royal family was the main beneficiary of colonialism in Africa. The British royals are said to be the largest landowners in Africa and the world.
The causes of economic hardships in South Africa are attributable to the lack of landownership. South Africa is an agrarian economy and its citizens need access to land for their subsistence. The land issue is a thorny issue which South Africans are unwilling to talk about. They want to keep their status as a rainbow nation and do not want to talk about the issues that are destroying the nation. Issues of income inequality caused by colonialism.
While the Duke and Duchess of Sussex are in town to promote rights we also remember that Cape Town is the bastion of white supremacy. In 2018, Africans were chased away from Clifton beach simply for being black in Cape Town. The thought process was that Africans were not welcome to the beach to keep it white only despite South African beaches being public property.
If Harry and Meghan want to make a difference, they should return the land the Queen owns in Africa to the rightful owners!
