A United Front: Adrian Odle's insight on Reparatory Justice
The Repair Campaign spoke with Adrian Odle, Chair of St. Vincent and the Grenadines’ National Reparations Committee, about the significance of reparatory justice in the case of St. Vincent and the Grenadines.
24th October 2025
Could you introduce yourself and your work?
I’m Adrian S. Odle, Barrister & Solicitor-at-Law and Managing Partner of Adrian S. Odle Law Chambers; Chairman of the SVG Reparations Commission, SVG Postal Corporation and The National AntiFascist SVG Chapter; and course director in Family Law and Company Law at the St. Vincent and the Grenadines Community College. I also lead Odle Property Management & Real Estate and Odle & Henry Accounting Consultants. My work blends courtroom precision, nation-building leadership, and practical entrepreneurship. From advancing reparatory justice and regional dialogue, including CELAC engagements, to developing the next generation of Vincentian leaders.
What does reparations mean in the context of the histories and communities of St Vincent and the Grenadines?
Reparations in St Vincent and the Grenadines means a programme of repair for the harms caused by the genocide and dispossession of Indigenous peoples and by the enslavement of Africans and the plantation order that followed. It is not charity. It is restitution, rehabilitation, and guarantees that these harms will not recur. In our context this begins with truth, acknowledgment, and concrete measures that rebuild lives, institutions, and land stewardship.
On Yurumein our original peoples included Arawaks and later the Kalinago. Over time a distinct Garifuna people emerged from African and Indigenous ancestry. Colonisation brought war, disease, and land seizure. The catastrophe of 1795 to 1797 saw the forced removal of thousands of Garifuna to Baliceaux where many perished, and the exile of survivors to Central America. These events are remembered as acts of genocide. Their effects are still felt in communities such as Sandy Bay, Owia, and Fancy through loss of ancestral lands, restricted access to sacred sites, and cultural suppression.
After the expulsion and defeat of the Caribs the plantation economy expanded. Enslaved Africans were used to build wealth they could not partake in. The legacies are visible today for example, in land distribution around the former plantation belts including Marriaqua and districts along the leeward and windward valleys. Many Afro Vincentian families continue to face intergenerational barriers that are a direct inheritance of that history.
The CARICOM Ten Point Plan for Reparatory Justice offers a framework that can be applied in practical ways for Vincentians. A full and formal apology by former colonising states recognises genocide and slavery as crimes against humanity and opens the door to structured remedies. An Indigenous Peoples Development Programme should protect sacred heritage and support community investment, including the permanent protection and dignified co management of Baliceaux with Garifuna and Kalinago representatives at home and in the diaspora. Repatriation and cultural reconnection should establish clear pathways for travel, citizenship, and exchanges linking Yurumein with Garifuna communities in Honduras, Belize, Guatemala, and Nicaragua, alongside language and culture revitalisation.
Cultural institutions must be strengthened through a National Garifuna and Kalinago Centre and upgraded archives and museums so families can trace lineages, names, and estates. Public health repair must address the burden of non communicable diseases in historically disadvantaged districts, matched with food system reforms that undo plantation era nutrition patterns. Education transformation requires adult education, rural school resourcing, scholarships for descendants of the enslaved and Indigenous peoples, and curricula that teach the history of Chatoyer, Baliceaux, and the Garifuna diaspora. Psychological rehabilitation calls for trauma informed services, memorial rituals, and arts funding that restore dignity and identity. Technology transfer and carefully structured debt relief can free fiscal space for these programmes, particularly in climate resilience, housing, and the digitisation of records.
St Vincent and the Grenadines has already begun to move in this direction with steps to secure Baliceaux as a sacred monument. The work ahead is to turn remembrance into repairs that are measurable and sustained. Reparations for us means land returned or protected, culture restored, health and education made equitable, and economic capability built where it was once intentionally denied. It is the organised repair of the communities most harmed so that the future of our country is not shaped by the unfinished business of its past.
What are you looking forward to in the ongoing movement for reparations in the Caribbean?
I’m eager for the Caribbean to move as one, grounded in truth about not only Yurumein’s history but the history of the region, from the genocide of our Indigenous peoples to the afterlives of slavery, and for the CARICOM Reparations Commission to operate as a single, formidable engine of repair.
United, we can turn remembrance into results and ensure the most harmed communities across the region feel repair in their daily lives.