St. Catharines keeping Harriet Tubman’s message alive (Niagara This Week)

https://www.stcatharinesstandard.ca/local-st-catharines/life/2023/03/10/st-catharines-keeping-harriet-tubman-s-message-alive.html 

St. Catharines keeping Harriet Tubman’s message alive

A small ceremony inside council chambers was held in honour of Harriet Tubman Day

Set St. Catharines as My Local news

By Abby Green

Fri., March 10, 2023timer2 min. read

Saleh Waziruddin from the Niagara Region Anti-Racism Association speaks at a ceremony at St. Catharines City Hall in honour of Harriet Tubman Day.

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Tapo Chimbganda said it’s important not to historicize what Harriet Tubman’s fought for.

“Her values are something that we need to hold onto as current, as pertinent, as requiring all of us to take responsibility for each other’s freedoms, for each other’s education, and for everything else that Harriet Tubman and her colleagues worked hard for,” she said.

Chimbganda spoke as part of a small gathering at St. Catharines City Hall to honour Harriet Tubman Day, on March 10, the anniversary of her death.

The Future Black Female founder was one of several speakers, including St. Catharines Mayor Mat Siscoe, MPP Jennie Stevens, and historian Rochelle Bush, who also owns Tubman Tours Canada.

Bush joined virtually, summarizing Tubman’s life story, and her journey to St. Catharines with the Underground Railroad, which Tubman used to smuggle enslaved peoples to Canada, and to freedom.

“That was the catalyst that started the movement towards the abolition of African enslavement in the United States … it was hatched here in St. Catharines,” she said. “For me, that's a proud moment for my ancestral history because I know it was started here in St. Catharines, the idea to overthrow institutionalized slavery in the United States.”

Leo Barone-Edwards and Hala Yahya, students from Harriet Tubman Public School, read a poem about Tubman’s life.

“She was a conductor on the railroad. Her passengers were the payload. She never got caught, she couldn't be bought,” they read. “She was on the run, threatening with an unloaded gun. This African-American ex-slave was the most brave.”

Bringing it back to the present day, Chimbganda encouraged keeping Tubman’s spirit alive.

“The values are important and there's something that should unite us as a city, as a community, across whatever divide we might experience, we might imagine we all need that freedom,” she said.

Referencing the treatment of people seeking refuge in Niagara Falls, Chimbganda said the sentiments don’t reflect the value of freedom.

“We need to be aware as we celebrate Harriet Tubman, what message we're now bringing across as a community,” she said. “Are we still concerned about people's freedoms or have we become so self-focused that we've forgotten that this was one place where people in the U.S. would dream of coming to live their lives? This was a dream destination.”

The event closed with messages from Saleh Waziruddin, an executive for the Niagara Region Anti-Racism Association, who emphasized a need to come together as a community, following the vandalism of the Harriet Tubman statue, school, and at a local Caribbean eatery last year.

He said stronger consequences are needed.

“It's difficult for any reasonable person, I think, to understand why when the N-word and racial hate was brazenly displayed, there aren't hate crime charges,” he said. “The students, faculty and staff of Harriet Tubman Public School have been resilient. But to give them to justice, we should show we take hate crimes and anti-Black racism seriously in St. Catharines by using the laws we already have against hate crimes … We need to put our actions, our money, where our mouth is, and it's not enough just to make declarations.”