John Mahama seeks UN slave trade crime status

A groundbreaking UN resolution to label the transatlantic slave trade the worst crime against humanity lands on the General Assembly floor on March 25, 2026.

Ghana is leading the charge at the UN

• President John Dramani Mahama will personally present the resolution.
• Ghana acts as the African Union's point person on reparations.
• CARICOM and diaspora communities are backing the effort.
• Nothing like this has hit the UN in its 80-year existence.

What the resolution actually demands

• Formal recognition of racialized chattel enslavement as historically unmatched.
• Scale, duration, and brutal systemic nature justify that designation.
• Adoption could kickstart real talks on reparatory justice globally.
• Structural inequalities from the slave trade persist worldwide.

Big-name events are lined up in New York

• A wreath-laying ceremony takes place at the African Burial Ground on March 24.
• A high-level reparatory justice event follows the same day.
• Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa will handle media engagement beforehand.
• Ekwow Spio-Garbrah serves as Special Envoy for Reparations.

The African Union is fully on board

• Continental backing already exists through the AU.
• A Decade of Action on Reparations runs from 2026 to 2036.
• Pan African Lawyers Union says adoption reshapes global legal debates.
• Ghana's Foreign Affairs Ministry called the vote a moral test.