In Suriname, the spectre of Dutch slave trade lingers

As Suriname celebrates 50 years of independence, the spectre of Dutch colonial rule and its role in the slave trade still lingers.

The king and queen of the Netherlands touched down in the small South American country last week: the first visit by the Dutch royal family in 47 years. King Willem-Alexander had vowed before the trip that the topic of slavery, which was formally abolished in Suriname and other Dutch-held territories in 1863, would not be off-limits. “We will not shy away from history, nor from its painful elements, such as slavery,” he said. Building a common future “is only meaningful if we take into account the foundation on which we stand”, he added. “That foundation is our shared past.”

But the shared past remained a source of tension in the present, as the king and queen prepared to meet representatives of slaves’ descendants.

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Spoils of slavery

“The Dutch funded their ‘golden age’ of empire and culture in the 16th and 17th centuries by shipping about 600,000 Africans as part of the slave trade,” said The Guardian, “mostly to South America and the Caribbean.”

A study in 2023 found that the Dutch royal family had earned the current equivalent of £475 million between 1675 and 1770 from the colonies, “where slavery was widespread”. The ancestors of the current king were “among the biggest earners” from what the report described as the state’s “deliberate, structural and long-term involvement” in slavery.

Slavery was formally abolished in Suriname and other Dutch-held lands in 1863, and actually ended 10 years later after a “transition” period.

In 2022, then prime minister of the Netherlands Mark Rutte officially apologised for the Netherlands’ role in the transatlantic slave trade. The king followed with a royal apology the following year, echoing a similar address in 2003 when he acknowledged the devastation caused by slavery, and how his own family had benefited from what he called humanity’s greatest genocide.

Repercussions and reparations

During the visit, Willem-Alexander said the Netherlands was keen to deepen ties with its former colony “based on equality and mutual respect”.

Representatives of the descendants of African slaves and Indigenous people formally accepted the king’s apology. But “the legacy of slavery lingers”, said the president of Suriname, Jennifer Geerling-Simons.

Willem-Alexander had previously offered $200 million (£149 million) to raise awareness about that legacy. Now, the king and his delegation are “being reminded” that the grant should not be considered part of a reparations package, said Caribbean Life.

“The losses they have suffered are significant,” said Geerling-Simons, referring to the descendants of slaves. “We’re not going to argue about that now, but this issue of reparations will have to be discussed someday.”

A reparations commission appointed by Caribbean governments deemed the Dutch “the most brutal and calculating of the European nations”, said the news site. The commission said the country had “invented the blueprint for the slave trade”.