
As the Spiritual Baptist Fraternity prepares to observe its first officially designated National Holiday in St. Vincent and the Grenadines on May 21st, a call has been reiterated for the British Government to pay reparations to the religious entity.
This latest appeal has come from retired Senior lecturer of History at the University of the West Indies, St Augustine and Chair of the Trinidad And Tobago National Committee for Reparations, Dr. Claudius Fergus.
Fergus, who recently published a book on the Spiritual Baptists Faith in St. Vincent and the Grenadines titled “Against Toleration: Britain’s Persecution of the Spiritual Baptists” said the way the Spiritual Baptists were treated by representatives of the British Government in the past, constituted a crime against Humanity.
Dr. Fergus said the Spiritual Baptists were barred from many of the rights which were enjoyed by other ethnicities and religions by the British Government and this in itself, was unconstitutional.