David Cameron is due to arrive in Jamaica today for a three-day visit amid pressure from JA's politicians and academics to address the issue of reparations for enslavement.
As The Guardian reports today, Sir Hilary Beckles, chair of the CARICOM reparations commission, has pointed out that the British prime minister is himself a beneficiary of the brutality of the plantations that enriched the enslavers.
With Cameron due to address Kingston's House of Representatives and Senate one MP, Mike Henry, is calling for Jamaica's politicians to turn their backs on him if he fails to move on the issue.
Meanwhile reports suggest that Britain is so far unwilling to move on reparations. Potentially it could be an explosive visit.
Gone are the days when representatives of the Mother Country were afforded deference. After a year of CARICOM discussions about launching a legal action against Britain and European countries, JA is in no mood to brush history under the carpet.
The last year, which culminated in the temporary abandonment of legal action in favour of a reparations commission to more accurately quantify the damage caused by chattel slavery, colonialism, failure to leave a social infrastructure upon independence and the consequences of economic debt enslavement, Jamaica has engaged in an unprecedented level of public debate around these issues.
This heightened degree of public reflection and awareness of the various impacts of British involvement with Jamaica means that Cameron is in no position to write enslavement off as past history.
The choices before him are to either directly address the demands for repair or say nothing at all. And saying nothing will leave a bitter taste in the mouth of the whole Caribbean and plunging diplomatic relations with the whole CARICOM region into deep freeze.
I was tweeting a week ago that if Cameron was planning to fudge or avoid entirely the reparations debate he shouldn't be going to Jamaica at all.
The BBC documentary series 'Britain's Forgotten Slave Owners' , screened last month, illustrated the extent to which Britain grew rich off the backs of the blood, sweat, tears and forced labour of the descendants of Africans kidnapped from their homes.
We are entering an era in which demands for compensation are being underpinned by new research into the extent of that enrichment and new efforts to quantify what this means in terms of repair, whether that be financial compensation, creating fairer terms of world trade, and/or other measures to level the playing field.
The longer Britain and other former slave trading nations delay, the more detailed the analysis will be, and the higher the notional value of compensation will be. Factors such as the compensation slave owners got on emancipation, inflation and interest, the 'cost' of emotional and generational damage, and the economic impact of racism, can all be added to the equation that at present is based on simpler calculus.
Far from fading into history, the more work that is done on the issue the bigger the demands will grow, not just in financial terms but also in the demands of the ancestors of stolen Africans.
When Mike Henry launched his Private Members Bill last April, he told the Jamaican parliament:
"The claims against the slave traders are far more heinous, as any act against humanity carried out by anyone else and the horror and the atrocities are known.
"I am not asking for the death penalty. I am asking for reparation to the country in cold, hard cash and debt relief.
"Our ancestors cry from their graves for justice, and we could readily deny that our own recent upsurge in blood-letting may not be the cry from the grave."
From the historical disadvantage and ingrained societal racism against those of African ancestry to the generational ill-health and disfunctionality we see manifested today from the disproportionate criminalisation of black people and the underachievement and youths killing their brethren, the modern day consequences of enslavement are undeniable. Just as the comparative advantage of the nations that perpetrated the horrors are clear for all to see.
There is only one conclusion they can come to: that the legacy of enslavement is clearly evident in white advantage and black disadvantage today, and that addressing this requires more than words. It requires action, whether affirmative, trade-based or cash compensation-based - or a combination of all three.
Today Cameron should do the right thing and commit the British government and parliament to fully consider the recommendations of the reparations commission alongside a full and unreserved apology for the horrors committed by Britain which the country, its' financial institutions and families such as his own, continue to benefit from.
By Lester Holloway
