It was a memorable moment for Dr Julius Garvey as he placed a wreath at the foot of a statute of his late father, Pan African activist Marcus Garvey, on Harris Promenade, San Fernando, yesterday.
Garvey, who is in Trinidad as a guest of the Emancipation Support Committee, said he was pleasantly surprised to learn how much his father’s legacy is celebrated and revered in this country, saying it was a deserving tribute as his father laid the foundation for African civilisation.
“It is a very memorable moment. I was not aware my father was in this location in 1937, so it is historically revealing to me.
“It is nice to see a group of people who have honoured him by putting his statute here and keeping it,” Garvey said.
“I notice he is near to (the statute of) Mahatma Gandhi and Simon Bolivar, so he is in good company and I am very pleased.”
Garvey said he was glad to see African people honouring their own heroes, “because if we do not honour our own heroes it means that we do not have an identity, we do not believe in ourselves, our history and our culture.
“So this is a confirmation of our African consciousness and I am very pleased with that.”
Garvey said more and more, what his father had done has to be understood, “because he laid the groundwork for African redemption, African renaissance.”
Recalling the words of his late father, made popular by the late Bob Marley, that we must liberate our minds from mental slavery as none but ourselves can free our mind, Garvey said, “we have to reclaim our education.
“We have to learn our history and teach our history because a lot of the content of the system of education which is designed for us, is designed to marginalise us and to elevate the British to a higher level than us in terms of humanity.
“So it dehumanises us and does not put us on an equal footing.”
He said it was unfortunate so many black people were killing one another because they did not have a true understanding of their own lives, as the system was not designed to protect, support and encourage the humanity of the human being, and so it was easy to take another life.
He encouraged people of African descent, as they celebrate 177 years of Emancipation, to continue the fight for freedom of the mind, economics and freedom to create a system which is beneficial to them.