ADDIS ABBA, Ethiopia (CMC) — Jamaica’s Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller was due to return to her homeland yesterday after participating in the 50th anniversary events of the African Union.

A government statement said that Simpson Miller, accompanied by Foreign Affairs Minister A J Nicholson, held bilateral talks with the presidents of Ghana, Nigeria, Tanzania and South Africa on a range of strategic cooperation issues including airlift, trade and investment.

“Jamaica and indeed the entire Caribbean community are proud of our African heritage and the strong links that we have forged with many African countries,” she earlier told the 50th anniversary Summit of the Organisation of African Unity.

She also took the opportunity to renew Jamaica’s commitment to the nations of Africa, recalling the role Kingston played in the non-aligned movement and the anti-apartheid struggle.

The Jamaican prime minister told the summit that although separated by distance and water, the countries and people remain connected by the blood bonds of ancestry.

She said Jamaica was firmly committed to ensuring that the relations with the African Union become a stronger priority on the Caricom (Caribbean Community) agenda and that “the commonality of our shared African history and legacy must now be channelled into tangible projects that will harness the energies of our peoples to build our societies and economies”.

She said that the tune Redemption Song by the late Jamaican reggae superstar, Bob Marley “is for us in the African Diaspora a reminder of the dehumanising experiences our ancestors suffered and evokes the spirit of Pan Africanism and the African Renaissance.

“When people of African origin were seen as less than human and deemed only fit for domination, Marcus Garvey saw (them as) people with a rich history and culture, and a people with a bright future,” she added.

Prime Minister Simpson Miller, who has been in Africa since last Friday, met with members of the Jamaica Diaspora, many of whom journeyed over 150 miles away from the town of Shashamane, where members of the Rastafari movement and other persons from Jamaica and the Caribbean have settled.

In 1948, Emperor Haile Selassie I, donated 500 acres of his private land for the purpose of creating the town of Shashamane in central Ethiopia.