Benin grants citizenship to slave descendants as it faces its own role in the trade

Associated Press

DAKAR, Senegal (AP) — Some African Americans are among those are taking advantage of a new law in Benin that grants citizenship to those who can trace their lineage to the slave trade. It’s part of efforts by the West African nation to face up to the role it played. The coastal town of Ouidah was one of Africa’s most active slave-trading ports, and at the “Tree of Forgetfulness,” enslaved people were said to be symbolically forced to forget their past lives. One French Caribbean woman now seeking citizenship in Benin says that “I am doing this for my ancestors.”