Dear Editor,
The WPA response on November 8, 2019 to the November 1, 2019 Stabroek News article `Pat Rodney calls again on government to make COI report on Walter Rodney public’ is a sad indication of the depths to which that party has sunk.
In fact this release is a classic example of Shakespeare’s Hamlet “the lady doth protest too much, methinks.” The WPA’s protestations of its loyalty to Dr. Walter Rodney at this stage on the eve of elections mask the truth. And what is the truth? This party, which emerged as a result of and in response to the dark days of rigged elections and the PNC’s authoritative and repressive government, led by one of Guyana’s most brilliant minds, Dr. Walter Rodney, has stooped shamelessly to apologize and cover up for the PNC-dominated APNU+AFC Coalition it is in bed with.
The depths to which the WPA has sunk are so deep that its release never mentioned that the February 2016 Commission of Inquiry Report into the Death of Dr. Walter Rodney (appointed by President Ramotar on June 13, 2012) was debated in the National Assembly on August 5, 2016 only after I, on behalf of the PPP/C Parliamentarians brought two motions, one to force the government to table the report and another to call for the report to be adopted and its recommendations implemented. The latter was defeated by all of the 33 APNU+AFC Coalition Members of Parliament inclusive of the WPA Minister Dr. Rupert Roopnaraine.
The WPA’s attempt to cast aspersions on the PPP leaders and PPP/C’s successive administrations is but a cheap shot. Firstly, l can personally vouch for Dr. Cheddi Jagan and the PPP leaders who had the greatest respect for Dr. Walter Rodney, both at the many meetings between the two parties and the two leaders as well as on public platforms where both Dr. Jagan and Dr. Rodney spoke. The image of Dr. Cheddi Jagan and Dr. Walter Rodney leading thousands of Guyanese, Indian and Black and other races, from Buxton to Kitty, to the beat of the sounds of the tassa and African drums, demanding free and fair elections and return to democracy, drove terror into the heart of the Burnham regime. This was the first mass popular demonstration of ethnic and political unity since the early 1950s.
The release omitted the findings of the report that it was Burnham and the PNC government who were responsible for the death of Dr. Walter Rodney. Paragraph # 7. 37 stated “He {WR} could only have been killed in what we find to be a state organized assassination with the knowledge of Prime Minister Burnham..” and paragraph # 7.39 “ we conclude that Prime Minister Burnham knew of the plan and was part of the conspiracy to assassinate Dr. Walter Rodney.”
Long before 2012, the PPP had attempted to have a Commission of Inquiry. I tabled a motion in the 9th Parliament in 2005 calling for A Commission of Inquiry into the assassination of Dr. Walter Rodney. It must be recalled that the WPA’s MP Sheila Holder heavily amended the motion and objected to the word “assassination” as it was prejudicial and with the support of the PNCR succeeded in negativing the motion. Dr. Roopnaraine was present that day.
It was the WPA that was responsible in the first place for there not being an inquiry. However, it was not the defeat of the motion that halted the promised inquiry. It was the failure of the WPA to develop the terms of reference for the inquiry that eventually brought an end to a process that was initiated during the 25th anniversary of the historian’s assassination. Dr. Roopnaraine was the interlocutor between President Jagdeo and the Rodney family. Later it was learnt that he had misrepresented the wishes of the family in this appointed role.
In 2013, Mrs. Rodney approached President Ramotar without any interlocutor and the commitment was made to establish an International Commission of Inquiry. The Terms of Reference were agreed to by the family and the Commission was appointed on June 13, 2013, 33 years after Dr. Rodney’s assassination. Mr. Granger was opposed to the Commission and on assumption of office abruptly brought it to a premature end in December 2015.
Lawrence Rodney in a letter to the Editor of Stabroek News wrote on September 30, 2016, following the defeat of the 2016 motion in the National Assembly, that “…during the decade after the historic 25th anniversary programme in June-July 2005 in Guyana, the Working People’s Alliance leadership, whilst affirming its ‘Rodneyite’ credentials had cultivated a back-to-back relationship of collaborating with the PNC bureaucracy.”
The WPA believed that had it proceeded with the TORs with President Jagdeo it would have jeopardized its chances of being part of the Big Tent that was emerging in talks with the PNC and the newly formed AFC.
By the 2011 elections, the APNU was formed including the WPA; this time it was forced to make a confession that the party had been stockpiling arms just prior to Rodney’s death. This was a most shameless betrayal, and all for one seat within the APNU.
The April 15, 2016 WPA statement in response to the submission of the COI’s report to President Granger in February 2016 is a pathetic whimper. The WPA was reduced to dissecting the procedures of the Commission and delivering the views of the Head of State. “The Head of State, Hon David Granger who had the benefit of possession of the report has registered the Presidential disaffirmation of the report, it appears without prior consultation with his coalition partners. It remains to be seen whether on further consideration he will modify his severely critical position or even it remains immutable, he may help to create an environment accommodating differences so that we can rescue something positive out of it.”
Of course Granger and the APNU+AFC did not change their position and the evidence lies in the Parliament’s Hansard, and, the fact that the report is still not publicly posted on any government website nor on the Parliament’s website, nor have any of the recommendations been considered (hence Mrs. Rodney’s public statement).
Now three years after defeat of the motion “the WPA intends to engage with the President on this issue. For the WPA the matter of Rodney’s assassination is unfinished business.”
Ironically the WPA release refers to Rodney’s 1979 proposals for a “Government of National Unity and Reconstruction” and links this concept to justify their presence with the PNC- dominated APNU+AFC Coalition, “We see the APNU and the APNU+AFC as avenues to a genuine Government of National Unity and Reconstruction… the WPA has recommitted to the Coalition as a matter of national duty.”
Isn’t it ironic that the attempt of the six-party Patriotic Coalition for Democracy (PCD) between 1990-1991 to move from a broad-based political alliance for free and fair elections to an electoral alliance was defeated by the WPA’s reluctance to support Dr. Cheddi Jagan and the PPP as the Presidential candidate because of his ideology and race? At least the six parties in the PCD could verily claim to have sizeable constituencies unlike the APNU+AFC Coalition, leaving out the PNC, which is comprised of four shell parties and one dying party.
The objective of this release is to win back many supporters of Dr. Walter Rodney, in particular those overseas where there is great love and respect for this outstanding scholar and fighter, to recoup disgruntled supporters of the WPA and the Coalition, and, to thusly enhance the WPA’s bargaining power within the PNC-dominated Coalition. This, too, will fail.
The WPA behaviour is like that of Lady Macbeth in Shakespeare’s Macbeth, who believed that “a little water” would cleanse her conscience. The betrayal of Walter Rodney falls at the feet of “his trusted comrades” and that stain cannot be wiped out no matter how much WPA leaders protest otherwise.
Yours faithfully,
Gail Teixeira
