Saint Kitts and Nevis Celebrates Emancipation Day
St. Kitts and Nevis, like all the former British colonies, continue to celebrate the abolition of slavery in the British Caribbean islands on August 1.
The federation celebrates the day on the first Monday of August, with a public holiday, even though the actual date of emancipation was the first day of August.
This year because of the restrictions in place due to the covid19 pandemic, very few events in the way of celebratory activities will be hosted.
There has always been a stark difference in the celebration of Emancipation on both islands.
In St. Kitts, it is usually a quiet holiday. One of the mainstays for the recognition and celebration of Emancipation was the Emancipation concert hosted by the Brimstone Hill Fortress National Park.
The UNESCO World Heritage Site has been the ideal place, filled with history, to host a concert of this type, paying tribute to those who built the edifice and the struggles they faced.
This concert allowed for a celebration through song, dance, and folklore in honour of those who fought for their freedom.
In Nevis, Emancipation Day is marked with revelry. The Culturama Festival is at its peak during that holiday. A weekend of activities usually leads up to the Monday holiday.
While the first Monday in August is constitutionally a holiday in the twin-island federation, every year, the Governor-General issued a proclamation informing that the first Tuesday would also be recognized as a holiday, affording a ‘Last Lap’ celebration for the Culturama Festival.
The festival, in its unique way, pays tribute to the emancipated, as slaves were known to host their forms of celebrations that would involve dancing and singing. Enter the folklore-- masquerades, clowns, moko-jumbies, all paying tribute to those who came before.
Many Kittitians usually use the long holiday weekend to travel to Nevis to join in the festivities.
In an announcement that surprised many, this year, Culturama activities will be held during the Independence holiday in September. The pandemic, as it has been doing, threw a wrench in the plans to host Culturama, and so with lockdowns and curfews implemented in June, the festival that should have begun in July has been scaled back and moved to a later date.
Emancipation Day is also a time of solemn remembrance for 233 persons who lost their lives when a ferry, MV Christena, sank between both islands on August 1st, 1970.
Since the tragedy, it has been recognized that Nevisians, more than Kittitians, have acknowledged and celebrated the Christena Disaster every August 1st.
In 2011, 41 years after the ferry sank, the Christena Memorial was erected at the waterfront of Charlestown, with the engraved names of those who perished in what has been described as a national tragedy.
For the 50th Anniversary of the Christena Disaster in 2020, a special sitting of the National Assembly was held where respect was paid to those who experienced the events of that day.
Since then, efforts have been made in St. Kitts to erect a monument in honour of this tragic moment in the federation’s history. Work is still ongoing, and the monument will not be completed in time for the 51st Anniversary.
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