Three men who likely killed history on Burnham's birthday
Freddie Kissoon Column
Kaieteur News
February 21, 2007
One of my heroes, Walter Rodney, (before he was murdered by the Forbes Burnham regime in June 1980) once told a public meeting that he wondered if the abusers of power (he was referring to Forbes Burnham) did not fear that when they open their mouths to speak about freedom, they would choke on their own words.
I always thought that God should choke devilish people who brutalise, torture and kill their fellow human beings, then, in the same breath, utter words about justice and rights.
Last year, on Burnham's birthday, a strange illness struck me down and I had to receive emergency treatment and be hospitalised at St. Joseph 's Mercy. This year, I refuse to keep my fingers crossed. I am not a believer in the supernatural.
The Kaieteur staff had the time of their lives poking fun on my ill-luck last year. On my hospital bed, I read a column suggesting that Burnham took vengeance on me.
This year, Burnham will have to come and strike me again, because I will continue to analyse the nature of his 21-year rule and the nature of the man who could have become one of the giants of Third World politics and development. He threw it all away in a fit of power display.
I composed these thoughts of Burnham on February 20 (yesterday), the day he was born. Brigadier David Granger, Messrs. Aubrey Norton and Vincent Alexander were, in separate areas of Guyana , scheduled to deliver assessments of Burnham.
I was not there, so I cannot evaluate their speeches, but I could have anticipated their thoughts, because Burnham died 21 years ago and throughout those two decades, Granger, Norton and Alexander have echoed their feelings and beliefs about the greatness of Burnham.
I have not the slightest illusion that all three speakers would have told their audience about the superb accomplishments of Forbes Burnham when he ruled Guyana . These men would not only have denied Guyanese history but would have attempted to do away with the truths of this country's history.
The listeners ought to have known something about Granger's, Norton's and Alexander's relationships with Forbes Burnham, but this would not have been told by the three chairmen who officiated at each talk.
These three men owe the substance of who they are to Burnham. Their very existence emerged from the mind of Burnham. They see themselves as having a permanent gratitude to Burnham. Here are three persons, then, who at the psychological level accept the fiction that their mentor was a fantastic person and a great leader.
Their willingness to kill history will not succeed.
There are literally hundreds of thousands of Guyanese in the country and the Diaspora who have vivid (and livid, I suppose) memories of the dictatorship of Forbes Burnham. One day, I will compile the dozens and dozens of articles that I have written on Forbes Burnham and put them in book form so the children of this country will know about his destructive reign in their country.
We come back to Walter Rodney's observation. One wonders if Granger, Norton and Alexander are not afraid that, as they utter the word “great” to their listeners, God would not choke them. But, then again, God is a mysterious person. I don't even know if He exists. Of course when Granger, Norton and Alexander are finished with their panegyric, it will be business as usual – back to telling us how bad the present government is.
It has to be one of the most exasperating moments in the life of anyone who has lived under the rule of Forbes Burnham to hear how wonderful, inspiring and visionary a leader he was, when the memories of his diabolical grip on power are still fresh, yet be told by the admirers of Burnham of how bad the present government is.
Where did Burnham go wrong? This is a tall intellectual order.
The late Tyrone Ferguson, the only pro-PNC academic (Norton would say he is an academic, too) to have acknowledged Burnham's descent into authoritarianism (See his book, “To survive sensibly or to court heroic death: Management of Guyana's Political economy, 1965-1985.” Chapters 9-10) did not even attempt an explanation.
In putting together a total picture of Burnham's dictatorial 21-year rule, a large number of causes have to be enumerated. In a forthcoming column, on August 6, his death anniversary (assuming that his ghost doesn't get me first, according to my Kaieteur News colleagues), I will attempt such an analysis; suffice it to say that his ideas were tremendously visionary. His political character did not synchronise with his learning.
One of the factors that led to his undoing, and over which he had no control, was the 1973 Arab oil embargo. It destroyed the sources of his funds, because the embargo destroyed the world economy at the time.
But had their been no Arab oil sanctions, and had there continued a steady flow of foreign exchange for him to access, as he did in 1976 when the price for sugar soared to the skies, his phenomenal infrastructure programme would still have collapsed.
This was because Burnham was essentially a dictator operating in a country where the opposition was a formidable foe ensconced in constituencies that Burnham needed to compromise with. Secondly, in the latter half of his rule, hubris and hauteur took over, and he became psychologically blinded by his invincibility.
Our present rulers should avoid the path that led to the downfall of Forbes Burnham. It's strange how humans do not learn the lessons of history.
Like Burnham, they can become enamoured with the developments they see around their country. But half of the Guyanese population is alienated. The fears in their minds are genuine, just as the Indians had their fears from 1968 to 1985. Burnham couldn't see it then. Can our present leaders see it now?
It is simply amazing the plans Burnham had for Guyana , and how he could have seen into the future. Four years after Independence , he saw the need for hydro-power.
It is such a pity that such a learned politician perished in the bowels of absolute power.
My next article on Burnham will be on August 6, this year. I always write about him on his death anniversary. However Granger, Norton and Alexander may interpret Burnham's rule, they cannot erase the facts of Guyanese history.