THE EDITOR, Sir:
YOUR HEADLINE of January 18, 2003 which read, 'The Queen says 'No' to Rastas' is not accurate.
Rastafarians wrote to the Queen on behalf of Africans and African descendants at home and abroad. It was not a request to benefit Rastafarians per se, but the entire black community. Therefore, your headlines should have been entitled:- "The Queen says 'No' to black people"
The Queen's reply was most disrespectful to all black people to say the least. She writes, "The UK Government is looking for ways to commemorate all victims of the slave trade. A body of independent experts (presumably she means the house slaves) is advising the Home Secretary on the most appropriate form of UK Slavery Commemoration".
Imagine, here we are seeking our just and adequate compensation, for the criminal acts committed against our ancestors, and she is thinking of building monuments to commemorate her people's atrocities. If monuments are to be built to our great African ancestors, then let I-N-I the Africans choose that path, not the perpetrators.
In this letter she describes slavery as "the worst example of man's inhumanity to man".
In her letter dated August 26, 1999 to Mr. Saphier Husain, attorney-at-law in Georgetown, Guyana, she states "...Slavery was a deplorable chapter in world history, and a major human tragedy".
These identical words were stated in an earlier letter dated August 4, 1998 to the Ethiopia Africa Black International Congress in Jamaica.
She has consistently condemned slavery and the slave trade, but adamantly refuses to show respect to Africans and African descendants.
When an independent country stoops so low as to have the British finance the refurbishing of our police stations, then no wonder the Queen has little or no regard for us.
The only sign of relent coming from this letter, is that in most of her earlier letters she blamed slavery on the "indigenous rulers and traders in Africa". In this letter she blames her ancestors.
I am, etc.,
MICHAEL A. LORNE
Provisional president
Marcus Garvey Peoples
Political Party
69-1/2 Church Street
Kingston
