大象传媒

I first arrived on the shores of the UK in 1962 as a young student awarded Nigerian military scholarship to study at an army college for a period of 3 years.

My discovery then was that the British indigenous population appeared to be living in fear of and hostile to the presence of people of dark skin colour whose countries their ancestors had ruthlessly invaded, initially for slave trade, and subsequently for mineral wealth exploitation through colonisation, both of which according to DFID (2006) had "made a huge contribution to the British economy and its rise as an industrial nation."

The reason for that fear was based on the hidden agenda of certain politicians who had used the race card to raise unfounded fears in the minds of the electorate who simply accepted what they were told, read or heard through the news media.

Unfortunately, there was hardly any black elected Member of Parliament who could counteract the fears raised. This was left to the white philanthropist MPs who had to rebuff the charges against black immigrants and calm the fears of the electorate.

Nevertheless a social divide was created as a result of those pronouncements, which had spread through most cities of the UK.

I returned to Britain in 1971 after the end of the Nigeria/Biafra civil war, and have lived in Derby since 1974 where I worked for a firm at East Midlands Airport as an Aircraft Engineer. In those days, Derby had little or no facilities for the black community.

I became involved in community development matters from 1979 when Margaret Thatcher's听reign began. It was then reported that the Black community were swamping Britain.

To overturn some of bye products of slavery; such as negative听 stereo types and caricatures of retardation a church group called the Derby Catholic Racial Justice Group was formed.

Elected as chair I joined forces with the leaders of the Derby West Indian Association and other community activists听 and together we challenged some of the misguided campaign directed against the black immigrant community.

Unfortunately, my discovery was that the legacy of racial pronouncements made by politicians had institutionalised racism in a covert fashion.

Consequently nearly 50 years after my first arrival to Britain, racism is still alive and well in the UK despite the race relations laws passed by the parliament.

Research statistics show that according to DCLG (2005),听in five key areas such as education, labour market, housing, health and criminal justice system, the black ethnic population have not fared well.

In听 education, black pupils were underachieving, in the labour market, "people from ethnic minorities are almost twice as likely to be unemployed as the national average" and only very few Blacks are in managerial posts.

In housing, "11% of Black and minority ethnic households are overcrowded听 whilst White households听 are 2% overcrowded."

In health, "Black people are three times more likely than others to be admitted to a psychiatric hospital and once in hospital, they are more likely to be subject to seclusion and restraint."

Finally in the criminal justice system "in 2004/5 Black people were six times more likely to be stopped and searched than White people. Asians were 1.8 times more than the White people."

Therefore whilst some strides have been made to address some of the legacies of the slave trade, the time has not arrived for celebrations.

Our youngsters are knifing and gunning themselves down due to frustration and lack of hope.

We have a paramount duty to continue the fight against the covert modern day slavery of racism that is responsible for these tragic circumstances.

Only when that battle is won would the celebrations of freedom from slavery be truly meaningful.听

C.Ejiofor: BA Hons, MBA, MCMI Chair. Amara-Chi Group and founder of Mirindu Development Group