Jamaica to Commemorate National Chief Takyi Day on April 8

A civic ceremony to commemorate National Chief Takyi Day, will be held in the Port Maria town square in St Mary on Saturday, April 8, beginning at 10:00 a.m.

The event is being staged to celebrate the heroics of Chief Takyi (also Tacky), who was the leader of the 1760 slave rebellion in Jamaica.

This will be the Day’s second commemoration, which is hosted by the St Mary Municipal Council in collaboration with the Ministry of Culture, Gender, Entertainment and Sport.

It was first observed in 2022, when a proclamation was issued by the Governor-General, His Excellency the Most Hon. Sir Patrick Allen, declaring April 8 as National Chief Takyi Day.

Minister of Culture, Gender, Entertainment and Sport, Hon. Olivia Grange, will bring greetings as well as read the Governor-General’s proclamation at the event.

Port Maria’s Mayor, Councillor Richard Creary, and Members of Parliament for St Mary South Eastern and Minister of State in the Ministry of Industry, Investment and Commerce, Dr. the Hon. Norman Dunn; St. Mary Central, Dr. Morais Guy, and St. Mary Western, Robert Montague, are also expected to participate in the ceremony.

Guest speaker will be Harvard University Professor, Vincent Brown, who is the author of the award-winning book, ‘Tacky’s Revolt : The Story of an Atlantic Slave War’.

This year’s ceremony will also include a walk from the Port Maria Police Station to the town square, and a presentation of the proclamation to Mayor Creary.

Cultural Liaison at the Culture Ministry, Barbara Blake Hannah, told JIS News that it was important to commemorate the Day because “Takyi is one of our unsung heroes:.

She said the 1760 Easter Rebellion, led by Takyi, was one of the most important events of this nature in the Caribbean’s history.

“What Tacky did was to gather a band of enslaved Africans to try and overthrow their plantation owners in St Mary Parish and declare Jamaica a free country,” Ms. Blake Hannah pointed out.

She said that it was an uprising among the enslaved people against the British, and one of the most far-reaching rebellions in Jamaica’s colonial history.

“Despite its failure… it inspired the Haitian revolution three decades later, becoming a major factor in the battles for freedom that continued in Jamaica until slavery was officially ended by the British government in 1834,” Ms. Blake Hannah further stated.