Anti-racism campaigner Dr. Eva Hodgson has criticised five black members of the United Bermuda Party who condemned the statement by PLP St. David's candidate Lovitta Foggo that a UBP vote would be a vote for slavery.

At an East End PLP rally last week, Ms. Foggo declared: "A UBP vote is a vote back to the plantation... it is a vote that will keep us as slaves."

The comments have since drawn angry reactions from the UBP camp.

Shortly after, black UBP candidates Wayne Furbert, Austin Warner, Shawn Crockwell, Alvin Wilson and Gina Spence Farmer appeared in a video advertisement with a "hope not hate" counter message.

However, Dr. Hodgson dismissed their responses, saying they were restricted as spokespersons for a white political party.

"The issue of slavery touches the hearts and minds of all black people," she explained. "They lost a great opportunity to explain to their white colleagues why that very significant period of our history continues to play such a vital role in the mind of the black community.

"Those black candidates should have known that the period of slavery is very important to black people.

"Not only because it was such a brutal period but it was during the time of slavery when the foundations were made to divide black and white people.

"Those five black candidates know that and yet because they are representing the white community, they were not able to express that point of view, instead they are expressing the point of view of the white community."

Asked what it will take for the community to get past the issue of race, Dr. Hodgson said it would be dependent on the level of awareness in society.

She gave these examples: "One of the indications would be is whenever a black person is recognised for their skills and contribution by a previously all-white organisation, it would no longer be headline news.

"When Phillip Butterfield became CEO of the Bank of Bermuda it was headline news. Recently when Ralph Richardson became Commodore of the Royal Bermuda Yacht Club, it was too.

"If we were truly an integrated community, these sorts of appointments would have been taken for granted and not become headline news."