United Progressive Party (UPP) candidate for St John’s City West Alister Thomas has once more renewed his calls for African Heritage to be added to the country’s curriculum.
“We have failed ourselves as a Caribbean people, primarily in our education system. We have failed in our education of consciousness. We do not carry an appreciation of ourselves……..Many people have gone through school and never been taught about African history and Africa being the cradle of civilization,” Thomas said in a recent interview.
Referring to the passing of Rastafarian icon King “Frank-I”, Thomas highlighted the importance of celebrating national icons before they die.
The UPP candidate suggested that the history curriculum must be revisited to uphold African history and literature while moving away from Eurocentric ideologies.
“In my view, one of the things that would contribute to the celebration of our lives is celebrating ourselves in our curriculum but we do not do that. We need to revisit our curriculum so something like Black and African history should be a compulsory subject,” he said.
Thomas is adamant that this inclusion to the curriculum will help Black Caribbean people have a better knowledge of themselves as descendants of African nations.
