Abdo Fayed
A NEW national team playing in the World Cup represents a country whose area is roughly smaller than many small districts around the world… just 450 square kilometers. But despite its tiny size, you will see Curaçao at the heart of every team from Latin America. Or, more precisely… you will see the crime of the Netherlands. Let me tell you the story.
The Netherlands is a small country, very peaceful and kind, and you might not hear its name in news bulletins except once every 10 years… But the situation was very different 400 years ago, specifically in the 17th century. At that time, the Dutch discovered a new, profitable trade… slaves. There was a new, virgin world… North and South America… vast lands and immense wealth, but the problem was that the indigenous people had small bodies and few weapons… and the European plan required high population density and strong labor. The problem would increase a bit more because those weak indigenous people were also wiped off the face of the earth… So the need for new labor doubled. From where to bring people? There were only the strong, dark-skinned people from the continent of Africa…
The Netherlands said, “Okay… we will establish two companies… a company for Asia and name it the East India Company, and a company for the Americas and name it the West India Company.” The latter is the hero of the story… It built giant ships, sailed towards Africa, specifically the coast of the Gulf of Guinea, and there they went to steal Africans from their families… by force, command, and direct action… with weapons and sometimes bribes to tribal chiefs… They loaded the ships with African slaves and crossed with them tens of thousands of kilometers across the Atlantic Ocean until they reached the Americas. A story that might pass easily like this, but it hides behind it a horrific Dutch criminal story. The Dutch traders wanted to save space in transport… So they would tie four Africans with ropes in an area of 18 inches, to fill the maximum space on the ship, and of course to compensate for the 300 guilders paid to the church. The church itself would bless the trade, by the way, and receive the price of the Africans in cash. Is this the crime? No… this is its first chapter.
I want to tell you a very shocking number. Imagine that for every African slave brought to America, 5 Africans met their death either inside the continent or in the Atlantic Ocean. In other words… The Netherlands and its partners, like Spain, Portugal, France, and England, transported during 200 years nearly 15-35 million Africans as slaves from Africa to America. Even if we take the minimum, which is 15 million slaves, then there are 60 million correspondingly who met their deaths… either as slaves transported inside ships who got sick and whose bodies were thrown to the sharks… or as a result of the invasion operations carried out by European companies to seize slaves inside the continent. Africa lost at least 60 million souls of its human workforce, simply so that the Dutch West India Company and the other European companies could profit. Correct, but how did they profit? Let me finish the story… The Netherlands, for example, laid its hands on some Caribbean islands… Curaçao, Sint Maarten, Bonaire, Saba, and Sint Eustatius. They used to call them the Dutch Antilles… and Curaçao was the most important of all. From there, the selling process begins… “Buy, madam… Come closer, sir… The African for only 75 dollars!” And buyers were plentiful. Where would the slave go? He would go to work in the “Heroin” of that old world… Real Heroin? No… Sugar.
Europe discovered sugar cane, a profitable trade requiring hard labor. They started from Bahia in Brazil… The Netherlands would supply African slaves, they would work, extract sugar, and it would be sold back in Europe… Fantastic profits… and the Netherlands profits. 500,000 African slaves were sold by the Dutch West India Company from Curaçao, which was the largest human trafficking market known to history up to that time. Guess how many workers met their death, for example, on sugar plantations? Nearly 3 million people. The Netherlands was the first to invent horrific methods of torturing slaves… They would finish their work, then be tied with an iron halter like beasts. Anyone who tried to escape would be offered as a feast to the predatory dogs. The slaves were terrified and began to rebel. In Dutch Guiana, 17,000 gathered and escaped. The Dutch besieged them because they knew that if a rebellion started, everyone would imitate them. Nevertheless, the slaves succeeded in hiding in the forests, and they became known in history as the “Djukas.” Their fate? The Netherlands crushed them completely. But everyone started imitating them. The African Muslims in Brazil staged a rebellion, and they were called the “Muhammedan Negroes,” in reference to our Master, the Prophet. And the story is not over yet.
You may know the Brazilian club Palmeiras. Palmeiras was the site of the largest rebellion. 50,000 Africans escaped slavery and founded a republic, led by the brave Janja Zomba. The result was that the Netherlands and Portugal cooperated in a very vile way and besieged them, until the escaped slaves were forced to kill themselves for fear of falling into slavery again. Imagine that there is a human being for whom suicide is better than living with Portugal and the Netherlands? But the great uprising would occur.
All of the above were just precursors. And its hero is the country of Haiti. The national team that also participates in the World Cup with Curaçao, and will play against the Moroccan national team. There was a man named Jean-Jacques Dessalines who swore not to be a slave. He gathered 100,000 Africans and they led a revolution against France, and for the first time, they succeeded in inflicting a devastating defeat on the French Empire led by Bonaparte. 50,000 French soldiers were killed. For the first time in history, a complete slave revolution succeeded. But don’t forget, my dear, that France would later impose reparations on Haiti worth 21 billion gold francs in today’s currency value, which Haiti paid until 1947. The price of freedom from slavery. In 2011, a terrifying earthquake struck Haiti, and a quarter of a million people died. At that time, The Guardian published a petition demanding that France provide significant aid in return for its enormous looting of Haiti. France responded and paid $8 million. By God, $8 million.
When you watch the World Cup… and you see Brazil and Ecuador, and you see Haiti and Curaçao… you see a high density of black players, and next to them also white-skinned players… remember then that this composition is Europe’s making… when it stole millions of Africans and employed them as slaves in Latin America. When you see Curaçao… remember that it was the heart of Dutch trade that pumped half a million slaves into the sugar cane plantations of Brazil, Guatemala, Jamaica, and others… And remember that behind these countries are horrifying stories caused by humans who decided, overnight, to create a terrifying trade called the Triangular Trade. Ships would set out from European ports, steal Africans from the Gulf of Guinea, go sell them in the New World, and return with tons of gold back to the ports of Rotterdam and Liverpool. And remember that the ball is not just a ball. It may be a round game, but it always tells a story… a story of peoples… that not many hear about… but it was and will remain a witness to the most heinous crime committed by man against man.
And if you ask me what the Netherlands did to compensate for its dark history? I will tell you that it apologized in 2022 to the whole world. Just the word “sorry” for the souls of millions squandered, and billions in revenues reaped on their bodies. And the ball remains… just a ball telling a story… the story of Curaçao and the Netherlands… the story of a world that destroys you, steals from you, plunders you, annihilates you… and then tells you “sorry”… and when you participate in the World Cup… [they tell you] “Don’t you dare… you’ll dirty our clean ball.”
