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African Slavery was Not Better than American Slavery. It was Differently Abominable.
“African chiefs were the ones waging war on each other and capturing their own people and selling them. If anyone should apologise it should be the African chiefs.” — Yoweri Museveni, President of Uganda, 1998
“We cannot continue to blame the white men, as Africans, particularly the traditional rulers, are not blameless. … In view of the fact that the Americans and Europe have accepted the cruelty of their roles and have forcefully apologised, it would be logical, reasonable and humbling if African traditional rulers … [can] accept blame and formally apologise to the descendants of the victims of their collaborative and exploitative slave trade.” — The Civil Rights Congress of Nigeria, 2009
On Twitter, a privileged black woman (her bio says she lives in London and Chicago) who claimed to be an “Igbo person” was praising the ways of the Igbo tribe and saying they showed better alternatives to capitalism. That sparked a vague memory, so I googled “Igbo slavery” and found two useful introductions to the subject.
From Igbo Worlds An Anthology of Oral Histories and Historical Descriptions by Elizabeth Isichei:
“Our people traded extensively in slaves. It was a dangerous trade, but very profitable. It was dangerous, because you must…
