Jamaican delegation to travel to UK in September to file historic slavery reparations petition with King Charles

Jamaica's culture minister, Olivia Grange, told parliament on Tuesday that a delegation will travel to the UK on September 6 to present a petition first announced in June last year. The petition asks King Charles, in his capacity as head of state of Jamaica, to request legal guidance from the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council—the UK's highest court for overseas territories and certain Commonwealth countries—on three questions: whether the forced transportation of Africans to Jamaica was lawful, whether it constituted a crime against humanity, and whether Britain is obligated to provide restitution for slavery and its enduring effects.

Grange said the plan has full backing from the Caribbean Community (Caricom). She highlighted the significance of the date: on September 6, 1781, the slave ship Zong departed West Africa for Jamaica with 442 enslaved Africans. During the voyage, the captain ordered enslaved people thrown overboard to claim insurance; 140 were killed. The ship reached Black River on December 21.

The minister noted that at emancipation in 1834, planters were compensated for their “property” with £20 million from England—a loan only finally repaid in 2015—and that newly freed Africans were forced to provide additional unpaid labor. Jamaica has already taken internal reparative steps, including an apology and land transfer to the Rastafarian community.

Laleta Davis Mattis, chair of Jamaica's National Council on Reparations (NCR), called the petition a “significant milestone.” She credited legal sub-committee chair Bert Samuels and a team of UK lawyers for devising the strategy. Samuels, deputy chair of the NCR, noted that the case now rests on a landmark UN resolution from March 25 declaring the trafficking of enslaved Africans as the gravest crime against humanity.

Samuels will join a legal team led by Attorney General Dr. Derrick McKoy to argue before the Privy Council. He said Britain's refusal to pay reparations and its abstention from the UN vote are shameful, but Jamaica remains resolute. If the Privy Council rejects the claim, he predicted international outrage and street protests.