Columbus was a mighty sailor/He sailed the open seas/He went on to the Caribbean/And he called it the West Indies/He said he found a new world/And he expect me to believe/But how could this world be new/When it's much older than Adam and Eve?/Columbus lied/Columbus lied/Columbus lied/He said he discovered the whole of America/He never tell nobody/how he had to run from Apache.—The Mighty Shadow.
If we defined a country as land and surrounding oceans, its beautiful landscape, fertile soil and mineral resources, then there’s much for its people to treasure and protect. It’s more than that though—deeper core, historical and abstract values, which are dynamic and powerful because they harmonise a nation. It is why we respect history, flag and anthem, and value our heroes, cuisine, arts, culture, traditions and other symbols of nationhood.
History informs about our foundations and too, defines civilisations, gives meaning to the present and direction for the future. Of course, that’s if it’s the unvarnished truth. When it was twisted to glorify conquerors, demean, dehumanise and divide those who had been conquered then; evidently, the present was bound to be filled with strife, tribalism, bigotry and discord, and so too the future will be, unless there’s justice. To many, the monuments of colonial-day heroes are symbols of racism and genocide—testaments to brutality. The campaign for the removal of these offensive monuments to museums of horrors, or, to where the Santa Maria had sunk, is not about erasing history but asserting their rights to the truth and justice.
Generations of people of every hue were brainwashed to believe that pre-colonial societies were savages and cannibals and that civilisation meant Europeanism. What passes for history is all too often an imperialistic and vainglory misrepresentation of facts.
Some may ask, then why not remove all symbols of colonialism? Well, not all represent offensive lies. And there are good reasons why there should be change. Like Wrightson Road which was named after the colonial director of works, Walsh Wrightson, but it was a visionary engineer and son of indentured labourers named Ranjit Kumar who’d developed that dual highway from the earlier single-lane road. Brunswick Square was changed to Woodford Square, and the Trinity Cross changed to the Order of Trinidad and Tobago. Discovery Day became Emancipation Day. Queen Street was changed to Janelle 'Penny' Commissiong and George V Park to Nelson Mandela Park. History was created, not changed.
For those, like the T&T Ambassador of Spain, His Excellency Javier Carbajosa who said there are more important things than statues in the wake of economic problems and the COVID-19 pandemic, think again. COVID heightened awareness of how fragile life is and what’s essential for peace and harmony—social justice—not symbols of racism, discord and genocide. The very fragility of life puts the onus on us to honour the truth.
People fighting for human rights and justice aren’t obliterators of history. That distinction belongs to those who’d attempted to eradicate every vestige of indigenous civilisations, who’d savaged millions and called those they'd enslaved, sub-human. They’d disrupted the natural development of people. They’d divided countries, plundered economies, and had perpetrated the notion that had it not been for colonisation, the people would still be living in mud huts.
The ambassador called our indigenous people campaigning for the removal of Columbus statue, hypocrites. He reportedly said, “the image of the Admiral’s defaced statue is particularly unsettling...history cannot be rewritten...It is what it is, with its lights and shadows, and it is part of our legacy...it is a futile and hypocritical and dangerous endeavour.” Yet, his government had removed all symbols of Spain’s dictator General Francisco Franco. For nearly 800 years the Muslim Moors had ruled Spain, building some of its most famous places like the La Alhambra. Yet, there’s brief mention of the Moors achievements and heroes in schools’ history books as though they were Spain’s shame. Saying history can’t be rewritten is a disingenuous defence of deliberate omission of facts. History books can and are being revised, to tell the truth.
The man with his Santa Maria.../said he discovered new lands/And he thought that I wouldn't know/...He took all the glory/From any discovery/The truth of the story/Those lands were discovered already...Columbus lie, lie, lied—Winston McGarland Bailey, HBM, DLitt. aka the Mighty Shadow.