– a bright star within the constellation of Guyana’s brightest passes on
“….only if we weld ourselves into One People, One Nation, with One Destiny” – Education Minister Brindley Horation Benn in 1958
It is ironic that it was social inequity in the church in the colonial era that drove Brindley Horatio Benn (BH), CCH, into the ranks of the PPP, because he perceived Christ as the ultimate ‘socialist’ and found no sense of real belonging in a church system which he claims was ‘unchristian’ so, according to his son Robeson, “It was easy in BH’s view to move from the church to the PPP, which he felt was the only vehicle for the poor and the oppressed to achieve a socially just society.”

SAYING farewell to BH in the ST. Grorge’s. Cathredral Son Robeson is at extreme right

It was his conviction that the people’s movement that had fructified into the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) was the only vehicle that could drive the liberation momentum of this nation that is comprised of a rainbow of races and cultures, one that is made up of the spectrum of Guyanese in its colourful diversity.

And his son, Minister of Public Works Robeson Benn, spoke movingly about the lifetime of restrictions, imprisonment, harassment, physical and emotional attacks and humiliations endured by his father and others to free this nation from first the colonial and then the undemocratic yokes of oppression and tyranny.

In 1952, BH helped to organise the Party’s youth arm – the Progressive Youth League, which subsequently evolved into the Progressive Youth Organisation.

His leadership and organisational skills resulted in his being given mandate for Party work in the county of Berbice.

However, because of the suspension of the Constitution after a mere 133 days in office of what Robeson terms “…the first freely-elected government under adult suffrage in British Guiana”, his movements were restricted to within a mile radius in New Amsterdam, thereby severely curtailing his activism and hampering his Party work.

Having returned to Demerara in 1955, he was appointed Party chairman after Burnham elected to split the people’s movement to form an adjunctive political party, which subsequently became the People’s National Congress (PNC).

FEMALE members of the Benn family escort BH’s casket out of the cathredral

The PPP’s success at the General Elections in 1957 resulted in BH being assigned the portfolio of Minister of Community Development and Education, and the current educational system in Guyana owes much to the groundwork done by former PPP Minister Brindley Benn.

His input on behalf of the PPP Government was critical to the successful establishment of the University of the West Indies; but the greatest mark he impacted on the Guyanese national dynamic was when he coined our country’s motto – “One People, One Nation, with One Destiny” during remarks he made in October of 1958 at the opening of History and Culture week.

He is quoted as having said: “British Guiana can make a unique contribution to history only if we weld ourselves into one people, one nation, with one destiny.

“That is our slogan for this week, and the point is that this country is a home for people who have come from many other lands and it must be our deliberate and conscious effort to weave these radical and racial strands together and marry the individual aspects of our various heritages so that we are one people and not keep ourselves in little groups either to perish silently, or be violently destroyed.”

His unrelenting thrust to attain and retain this equation in the national psyche and framework ran an adjunctive course to the aspirations and the struggles of his party under the leadership of the late Dr. Cheddi Jagan and it came as no surprise when he became Deputy Premier to Premier Cheddi Jagan and Minister of Agriculture and Natural Resources after the General Elections of 1961.

COMRADES bear BH’s casket out of Freedom House

In the subsequent four-year period he was pivotal to the establishment of the land development schemes of Boeraserie, Tapakuma, the Mahaica-Mahaicony-Abary project and the Black Bush Polder, as well as the development of many non-traditional agricultural programmes, such as fish-farming, bee-keeping, the 4-H in village clubs; and in general to boost value-added initiatives in the national agricultural drive.

He sought a new dynamic in the energy and mining sectors and sought to establish a hydropower scheme.

His leader’s vision correlated with his vision and it was under his watch that the Guyana School of Agriculture was born; and his was the presence that graced the opening of Guyana’s premier institution of tertiary education, the University of Guyana, Dr. Jagan’s vision for an institution of higher learning for Guyanese, which was derogatorily dubbed by the political opposition as “Jagan’s Night School”, and I will address what “namak haram” means, and the way it aptly describes some notorious Guyanese in a subsequent article.

The country and Government were plunged into a maelstrom of violence engineered by the British and Americans, working in collaboration with local opposition forces, to destabilise and derail the constitutionally-elected PPP Government, and they succeeded immeasurably, plunging this nation in a downspiral of destruction that was only halted in 1992, when the PPP, with a civic component, once more attained the premier office of the land.

However, the seeds of discord and hatred had already been sown by opportunistic elements, and the reversal of development pattern is perennially impeded by the negative and destructive forces; but this time around history is repeating itself (somewhat) with BH’s son Robeson in the hot seat this time around; but like father, like son, and nothing and no-one fazes the stoic Robeson.

Like his father before him, he does what he considers is in the national interest without counting the cost or consequences.

The murderous and destructive X-13 Plan of the conjoined oppressors, imprisonment at Sibley Hall with other members of the PPP, including the Jagans, and various forms of victimisation did not daunt the members of the PPP, whose indomitable will had been forged in the fires of struggles against oppressive forces for decades. Thus the continuum of struggle of the PPP members continued, with BH in the forefront.

Thus it was that in subsequent years he participated in the activities of the International Solidarity Movement for People’s Liberation, and trained cadres in the other “Jagan Night School”, the PPP’s educational arm, Accabre College, which served as the primary learning institution before cadres were sent abroad for further study.

He was an ardent emissary searching for justice and the restoration of democracy for his homeland, travelling indefatigably to lobby for solidarity from Jamal Nasser of Egypt, Jawaharlal Nehru of India, Ben Bella and Ben Barka of Algeria, and Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana.

Ever the militant and active socialist, BH established the Afro-Asian-American Association to strengthen ties with liberation movements in Africa, Asia, Brazil, and Cuba, among other countries fighting for freedom in their respective lands.

Although he aligned himself with other forces for a short while, BH returned to the folds of the Party of his heart post-1992 and was appointed as High Commissioner to Canada, where his son Robeson said he served with “grace and distinction.”

Like Dr. Cheddi Jagan, BH was a dedicated family man and was married for 58 years to Patricia Benn, nee Prince.

Acting President Sam Hinds described BH as a “….Guyanese son who did not hesitate to play his principled part in the social and political development of our country, a son whose contribution shall benefit many generations to come.“

Through the debilitating devastation of Alzheimer’s, BH probably had a premonition that he was approaching his final days and, according to his son Robeson in his Eulogy, “Three Saturdays ago, on November 28, 2009 BH Benn, in a moment of stunningly sublime clarity, requested to see his President, his General-Secretary, and his priest.”

Robeson reflects the thoughts of the nation when he said: “I kno that his legacy will flicker every time we speak and act in realisation of our national motto: “One People, One Nation, with One Destiny.”