I am responding to recent comments in the media relating to the late great historian, Dr Walter Rodney. I am a great admirer of Rodney and no one can dispute the fact that he was a hero to many not only in Guyana but around the globe as well, and to many academics. He was much talked about at college campuses in America and almost every Caribbean Social Science student read his seminal work on How Europe Underdeveloped Africa.
I first met Rodney during the students and teachers’ strike on the Corentyne in February 1977. He came with elder statesman Eusi Kwayana and other WPA stalwarts to give us support in our battle against the dictatorship which had victimized our teachers at the Corentyne (Chandisingh) High School. Rodney addressed a huge gathering at Port Mourant where Father Malcolm Rodrigues (CLAC) and a PPP representative (Feroze Mohammed), Dr Chaitram Singh, and Dr AK Jagnandan, victims of the dictatorship, also spoke. People overcame fear and attended the meeting cheering Rodney and the other speakers who lambasted the dictatorship. A menacing helicopter hovering above the train line in Miss Phoebe did not intimidate the large crowd which held steady prompting Rodney to say that Burnham was afraid any time people got together, so he monitored them; and that even if a group of donkeys were to get together, he would be afraid.
Rodney was a great speaker filled with oratory. His speech was laced with humour and biting wit, jeering the dictator evoking much laughter from the crowd. There was unbridled adulation for him everywhere, although people were fearful to be seen with him in public because of victimization. His courage and charismatic personality led to a large following, and he was building support for his call to remove the dictatorship. He had become a threat to the regime and his activities were monitored by the secret police. A friend who was in the know about intelligence activities, informed me that Rodney and his WPA colleagues were warned to stay off the streets or suffer the consequences. They were harassed and intimidated. Sand and sugar were often placed in the gas tanks of their vehicles. I recall Burnham saying his steel was sharper than theirs.
Rodney’s life was in danger. I was told that thugs were out to harm Rodney. Once he had to run for his life jumping fences and taking shelter at someone’s home to survive a knife-wielding thug from the House of Israel. Burnham used to mock him. I was told that Burnham viewed Rodney as a great threat because Rodney was prepared to use any means to get rid of the dictatorship. I recall Rodney using language to that effect in his Port Mourant speech.
There were also commentaries in Caribbean Contact (published out of Barbados by editor Rickey Singh) during the late 1970s and 1980s. After Rodney was murdered in June 1980, CLR James in Caribbean Contact blamed Burnham for Rodney’s murder but also chided the WPA for not taking greater measures to protect Rodney, given the threat he posed to Burnham. I recall reading where CLR James referred to Rodney as a naïve revolutionary. So Annan Boodram is right about James on Rodney. The late Fred Wills (once Burnham’s Foreign Minister), in discussions with me at CCNY where Wills delivered several guest lectures during the late 1980s when I was an executive in student government, told me “Rodney’s naïvety led to his death at the hands of Burnham’s assassins.” Wills said Rodney underestimated Burnham’s intelligence tentacles in seeking to remove him by any means and Burnham could not afford to have him around – Rodney was making inroads with officers in the armed forces and police.
Unlike others who responded to Mr Boodram’s first piece captioned ‘We must eschew the “us” versus “them” mentality in the New Year’ (SN, January 31), I do not believe that Boodram has denigrated Rodney’s outstanding contribution to our politics. Mr Boodram has attempted to place Rodney’s historic role in perspective. As Prof David Hinds noted, Mr Boodram did not introduce race into the topic and I do not see any “racial bent” in it. Like me, Boodram admired Rodney.
Mr Boodram is right in noting that while Rodney had a huge following, there is no way of knowing whether it would have transferred into votes in a democratic election. Ethnic loyalty is inherent in political support for the PNC and the PPP. Crowd attendance does not automatically mean political support. One should not dismiss the fact that with all the election riggings, murders of prominent Guyanese, sufferings of 28 years, banning of basic items, shortages of basic foods, mass unemployment, high crime, kick down door banditry, etc, the PNC still obtained 42% of the vote and WPA a mere 2% in 1992. That says a lot about the ingrained nature of ethnic behaviour in elections.
People go back to their ethnic prison even when they sought an escape route after abuse by their own leaders. While Rodney was reaching out to Indians, I am not certain they would have voted for him. In fact, the late Gora Singh told me that some of Rodney’s comrades expressed concern about the meagre political support from Indians for the WPA.
Gora claimed he, the late Mahadai Das, and other Indians held discussions with WPA officials, some of whom described Indians who supported the PPP in terms suggesting the WPA was not making inroads as expected.
Whether Rodney would have won an election is immaterial to the central point made by Mr Boodram. Like everyone else, Boodram would agree with the claim that those who lived and suffered under the dictatorship are indebted to the contributions of Rodney and other heroes like Dr Cheddi Jagan, Janet Jagan, Eusi Kwayana, Rupert Roopnaraine, etc, who marshalled the forces to restore democracy to our homeland.
Yours faithfully,
Vishnu Bisram
