Accra, July 24, GNA - Activities for the Fifth Emancipation Day celebration in Africa took off in Accra on Wednesday with a public lecture that scores of people including students, Pan-Africanists and Africans in the Diaspora attended.

The lecture under the theme: "Emancipation, What it means to us," was marked with cultural performance, inspirational speeches and poetry. The celebration, which marks the abolition of slavery in British colonies in 1838 was characterised by emotional scenes as some of the Africans in the Diaspora recounted the horrifying experience their ancestors went through.

Speaking on: "Healing the wounds of the past," the Reverend Fred Deegbe, Senior Evangelist of Calvary Baptist Church, called for mental emancipation of Africans from the shackles of slavery and the evils of colonialism.

''Africans must liberate their minds by thinking for themselves and refusing to accept the dictates of or imitate the cultures of people, who think they are superior to Africans."

He appealed to Africans both on the continent and in the Diaspora to ''rethink, reinvent and reconstruct the history of slavery through a providential perspective for the realization of the goals of globalisation and economic emancipation of the continent".

Dr Akosua Perbi of the Department of History, University of Ghana, who spoke on: "Aftermath of Abolition and Emancipation," said "the slave trade was the greatest mass migration the world has ever known as the African continent suffered desolation, depopulation, insecurity and ravages of war but today we celebrate its survival.

"We celebrate the fact that although the continent sent its able-bodied men and women outside to work for others the continent did not die out...we celebrate the ability of the African to bear pain and to produce children to keep the continent alive."

Dr Perbi said the emancipation story showed the importance of freedom and liberty.

"It does not matter how long it takes, how costly it takes and how dreadful it must be, Africans both on the motherland and in the Diaspora fought to be free from the shackles of slavery.

"We celebrate this triumph and need to tell this story over and over again because no one else can tell this story for us. It is the oppressed, suppressed and enslaved who can best tell their story."

Alhaji Boniface Abubakar Saddique, a Deputy Minister of Tourism and Modernization of the Capital City, said the government would soon establish a Commission to be in charge of Africans in the Diaspora. Other activities lined up for the programme include the official opening, an international conference on emancipation, a slave route march, re-interment and funeral rites for enslaved ancestors.