Cassandra's Candid Corner
Stabroek News
June 10, 2001

In another two days time, Guyana will be observing the 21st death anniversary of historian and political activist Dr Walter Rodney. While it was not in the nature of the man to take credit for his contribution to the anti?dictatorial struggle, it would be an injustice not to recognize the role he and several other Guyanese including Andaiye, Bonita Harris, Vanda Radzik, Clive Thomas, Josh Ramsammy, Rupert Roopnaraine, Nigel Westmaas, David Hinds, Catholic priests Malcolm Rodrigues, Bernard Darke and Andrew Morrison played in that difficult, dangerous era.

Some of these warriors like Dr Rodney died in battle or more accurately were assassinated by the dictatorship while others remain active in public life today. David Hinds in particular continues to agonise on the state of affairs in our country and to make a valuable contribution to the national debate in the letter columns of Guyana's most widely read newspapers, or so they say.

The exchange of letters between David and Freddie Kissoon who has his political roots in the WPA, has been one of the few positive features in Guyana recently, although one has to wonder whether anything makes any difference in the corridors of political power in Guyana.

David's letter which started the exchange was an open appeal to African Guyanese that was as courageous as it was 'shocking.' As one writer in the Catholic Standard said, "no other black person in Guyana since Walter Rodney, not even Black Sage has been able to tell people of our own race (Afro Guyanese) when they are wrong."

Freddie Kissoon in one of his more generous letters acknowledged the contribution both to the discussion and David's role in the anti?dictatorial struggle, including an extended jail term at Sibley Hall. Freddie, however, took issue with David for providing no theoretical argument for power sharing. Almost irrelevantly, and in a total non?contribution to the discussion, a PNC apologist wrote a long piece seeking to defend the PNC/R. David's response was brilliant. He spent less than two sentences responding to the apologist, if only to let him know that he did read his letter.

Freddie has an understandable obsession with theory, but it would be useful for him to have heard Lord George Robertson, who in discussing the European Union's approach to the problems in Macedonia, boasted that its success in bringing about a ceasefire was a triumph of practice preceding theory. Eric Phillips, a relative newcomer to Guyana politics who knows about success said about the same in his own contribution to the Stabroek News. The Guyana situation requires practical solutions with the kind of courage and commitment to action that David suggests. Now that David has spoken, who is going to be the Indian David Hinds telling their political, religious and civil society leaders how much they have failed the Indians since the 1950s. Instead, the Indians operate on the basis that criticizing the tribe is tantamount to selling out; that Buxton justifies Albion; that Channel 69 should be the answer to Channel 9; and that corruption by Indians is justified because of past corruption by Africans.

Twenty-one years after, we are as a nation worse off than we were then and it is a sign of how bad things are that many of the names listed in this letter now say they have no appetite for continuing the struggle, that indeed there is no hope. Not only has Berbice lost its innocence, but the events of Albion have raised significant doubts about whether our country now has more

than one president. Hoyte for Georgetown and the East Coast and Jadgeo and Ravi Dev for Berbice, for it is these alternative presidents who dictate the agenda for these areas.

Responding to Ravi Dev's appeal to Berbicians, Jagdeo used the opportunity to pour scorn on power sharing which he sees as bringing dissension in cabinet. Can he be that ill?informed? We criticized Hoyte for adopting Blackie, but are silent when a police station in Berbice is attacked. The events in Berbice, or to be fair, Albion, over the past week will forever be used as justification for the events in Georgetown and the East Coast.

The fiasco over the consultation clause now going through Parliament because of a perplexing proposal by the Government will be used to justify the charade that passed for consultation when the PNC was in power.

Where are we going? Did Walter really die in vain and are the committed Guyanese like David Hinds and Freddie Kissoon wasting their time? Is Freddie being over optimistic in hoping that Jagdeo will be the PPP's Gorbachev? Can either the PPP or the PNC truly reform themselves, or are they more like the leopard, unable to change their spots. Will this Government pursue the killers of Rodney, not out of a sense of revenge, but of justice, not to dwell on the past, but to warn those tempted to repeat such acts that justice has a long arm and an even longer memory? The answers to these questions will tell us, and, most especially our youths, whether Guyana is worth fighting for or investing in.