Gramps Morgan Performs Reparations at Ghana State Banquet, Praises Mahama's UN Slave Trade Push

When Gramps Morgan took the stage at Jubilee House on April 1, he was performing for an audience that had just changed history. The 3x Grammy-winning founding member of Morgan Heritage performed his 2026 single "Reparations" at the state banquet hosted by President John Dramani Mahama in honor of Zimbabwe's President Emmerson Mnangagwa, just one week after Ghana's UN resolution declaring the transatlantic slave trade "the gravest crime against humanity" passed with 123 votes in favor.

The timing was anything but coincidental. Morgan arrived in Accra on March 31 for the Ghana-Jamaica Homecoming Festival, a collaboration with the Ghana Tourism Authority and the Ghana-Jamaica Chamber of Commerce, and was welcomed with a Ga Traditional Council ceremony that installed him as Nii Oyeeni Mpese I, Development Chief of the state. Within 24 hours he was at Ghana's seat of government performing for two African heads of state.

"Reparations" is a February 2026 single Morgan co-wrote with Antigua and Barbuda Prime Minister Gaston Browne, who appears on the track under his musical alias "Gassy Dread." Morgan built the release explicitly around what he told the Jamaica Observer was a duty to ensure people "never forget the spirit of our ancestors and what they've been through and the fact that they must be justly compensated." He had released the single hoping it would "gather the attention of the United Nations." By the time he performed it at Jubilee House, the UN had already answered.

Mahama spearheaded Resolution A/80/L.48, adopted on March 25, 2026, the International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade, with 123 member states in favor. The United States, Israel, and Argentina were the only three nations to vote against it, with 52 abstentions. The resolution designates the transatlantic trafficking of enslaved Africans as the gravest crime against humanity and urges member states to pursue reparatory justice, including formal apologies, restitution, and the return of cultural artifacts.

The Mnangagwa state visit carried its own historical weight. At the banquet, the Zimbabwean president recalled Ghana's role in sheltering and training liberation fighters during the struggle for independence. "Most of my colleagues received training here in Ghana for the armed liberation of Zimbabwe," Mnangagwa said. "We are forever grateful to Ghana."

Ghana Tourism Authority Deputy CEO Gilbert Abeiku Aggrey was among the officials who welcomed Morgan to Accra, and footage from the banquet circulated widely with strong social media engagement. For a song released two months earlier with the explicit hope of moving the UN, performing "Reparations" at Jubilee House in front of Mahama days after he secured 123 votes is the kind of full-circle moment reggae rarely gets to witness in a head-of-state dining room.