The president of Guyana will take centre stage at the United Nations today – but before doing so he had to take on ITV’s Richard Madeley. President Irfaan Ali, who has said descendants of European slave traders should offer to pay reparations to right historical wrongs, came to blows with the Good Morning Britain host during a debate on slavery.
Ali said that Britain needed to realise it ‘still benefits from the greatest indignity to the human being’. But his comments went down badly with Madeley, who questioned why ‘someone who maybe had an ancestor seven or eight generations ago should have to pay for what an ancient ancestor did’.
Ali hit back, saying:
‘Not only did you benefit during the slave trade, and your country develop, but look at what it cost the developing world. During slavery, resources were used to build your country, build up your capacity. You were able to then become competitive, able to invest in mechanisation and developing countries like ours were left behind.
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