Let’s all celebrate… our thing

Last week, because of US informational dominance, your Eyewitness’ internet feeds bombarded him about “Juneteenth”. Did you, like yours truly, ask “what’s that?”. Well, one post informed: “Black people freed on Juneteenth in Galveston Bay, Texas, on June 19, 1865, were illegally kept in bondage. The White people in Galveston were cruelly determined to maintain slavery. Even after President Abraham Lincoln signed The Emancipation Proclamation in January of 1863, and their Confederate soldiers lost the Civil War in April of 1865, White Galvestonians had to be forced by military proclamation to respect Black Americans’ freedom. Union General Gordan Granger, along with 2,000 of his troops, travelled to Galveston and issued General Order №3: “This involves an absolute equality of personal rights and rights of property.”
“Juneteenth”, of course, is a combination of June and nineteenth – and Emancipation was commemorated by the African Americans of Galveston – still called “Blacks” of course – under that name the following year in 1866. But it was only in 1980 – more than a century later – that Texas commemorated the occasion as a holiday!! Other States gradually followed suit and finally on June 16, 2021 – just FOUR years ago – then President Biden declared the day a Federal Holiday. We can look at the grudging acceptance of Juneteenth by the rest of America as a metaphor for the acceptance of the freed African Americans as full citizens.
So while we imitate America in so many ways, they can learn a thing or two about Emancipation Day from us!! Here, while there was a 4-year Apprenticeship scheme for our freed African Slaves after Emancipation Day, August 1st, 1834, that date was celebrated even during the colonial era. After the end of Apprenticeship, the freed Africans started buying plantations with the money their earned in the then three counties of Berbice, Demerara and Essequibo – and converted them into villages. Even when they didn’t buy entire plantations, they purchased plots in the front lands of plantations, adjoining the Public Road – and these soon coalesced into villages.
This pioneering move gave them an independence to run their affairs that was – and is – still unknown to American Blacks!! They formed Village Councils that were democratically formed and run. As such they were ahead of the colonials who only instituted universal franchise more than a hundred years later in 1953!! They had their own churches and schools that prepared their children for national life – creating its own dynamic for change.
Unfortunately, Burnham – who benefited and was a product of that democratic system – betrayed it by creating the dictatorship that destroyed the hard won accomplishments since Emancipation.
Your Eyewitness does believe that after the upcoming LGE, we’re gonna to the old, village vibrancy of Augusteenth!!

…Augusteenth food
Most holidays are associated with particular foods and customs – so we know what to expect culinary wise in our commemorations or celebrations. Like Christmas with Black Cake or Garlic Pork! So what about Augusteenth?? Well, we can do worse that imitate the dishes our freed ancestors enjoyed when they were free to eat whatever they wanted!! In a word “freedom food” – and not the scraps they were thrown from Massa’s table.
But this is where it gets kinda tricky!! There’s the old standby “Foo Foo” – made by boiling plantains – or any other starchy root vegetable like yam or cassava – and pounding and shaping it into balls. These are then either eaten with some fried saltfish – or as an ingredient in a soup or metemgee! And the irony is the salt fish and the pig tail or pig feet or pig face in the soup were the same as what they’d gotten as scraps from Massa’s table!!
But its still our heritage, innit??

…a death?
Former Chair of the US Fed Allan Greenspan just passed at 100. He’s the fella who institutionalized “free market” principles in the US and the world via the IMF and World Bank – creating our disastrous financial system!