HONOUR & DISHONOUR (taken from a Facebook post)

WE LEARN ABOUT THE ATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE AT SCHOOLS AND UNIVERSITIES, BUT HOW MANY PEOPLE KNOW ABOUT THE ARAB SLAVE TRADE?

AND WHERE DOES THE 'K-WORD' BANNED IN SOUTH AFRICA COME FROM?

WHICH SLAVE TRADE LASTED THE LONGEST, THE ARAB SLAVE TRADE OR THE EUROPEAN/ AMERICAN SLAVE TRADE?

  1. Muslim Arabs: approximately 1400 years (STILL ONGOING IN SOME COUNTRIES IN AFRICA AND THE MIDDLE EAST).
  2. ATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE (EUROPEANS): approximately 350 years

CHRISTIANS WERE THE FIRST TO ABOLISH SLAVERY IN THE YEAR 1807. ONLY 105 YEARS AFTER THE FIRST CHRISTIAN ABOLISHED SLAVERY DID THE MUSLIM WORLD START TO ABOLISH SLAVERY.

CHRONOLOGY: WHO BANNED SLAVERY WHEN?

THE WEST
1792 - Denmark bans import of slaves to its West Indies colonies.
1807 - Britain passes Abolition of the Slave Trade Act, outlawing British Atlantic slave trade.
1804-1808 - United States passes legislation banning the slave trade.
1811 - Spain abolishes slavery, including in its colonies.
1813 - Sweden bans slave trading
1814 - Netherlands bans slave-trading
1817 - France bans slave trading, but ban not effective until 1826
1833 - Britain passes Abolition of Slavery Act
1819 - Portugal abolishes slave trade north of the equator.
1833-1838 - South Africa abolishes slavery after the Slavery Abolition Bill of 1833 was passed by the British House of Commons and by the House of Lords.
1846 - Danish governor proclaims emancipation of slaves in Danish West Indies.
1848 - France abolishes slavery
1858 - Portugal abolishes slavery in its colonies,
1861 - Netherlands abolishes slavery in Dutch Caribbean colonies.

MUSLIM COUNTRIES ONLY STARTED ABOLISHING SLAVERY 105 YEARS
AFTER THE FIRST CHRISTIAN COUNTRY (Denmark) ABOLISHED IT.

1897 - Zanzibar
1924 - Turkey
1962 - Saudi Arabia
1962 - Yemen
1961, 1980, 2007 Mauritania

STILL CONDONED & ONGOING IN MANY MUSLIM COUNTRIES.

  • The Byzantine-Ottoman wars and the Ottoman wars in Europe resulted in the taking of large numbers of Christian slaves. Denmark-Norway was the first European country to ban the slave trade.
  • During the Second Sudanese Civil War many people were taken into slavery. In Mauritania it is estimated that up to 600,000 men, women and children, or 20% of the population, are currently enslaved, many of them used as bonded labor.