Dr DAVID Hinds is committed to find resolution by race alone, considering his claims that “in our multi-ethnic society with its inevitable competition for resources and the insecurities that flow from that competition. It is a mistake to ignore inter-ethnic
dynamics” as advocated in a letter to SN of 3-18-14. “Our national quest for social, economic and political justice is situated in this basic challenge,” he says. How accurately does this reflect the teachings of Dr Hind’s village sage mentor Mr. Eusi Kwayana, in vivid contrast with the life of Dr Walter Rodney who subsumed race to class? Did Dr Rodney die so all would become fully emancipated to now find Guyanese in even greater tragedy with his WPA legacy now completely hijacked and crushed within PNCR/APNU?
Dr Hinds explains that “in the process of “competition” (my highlight), narratives of defence and offence are constructed by groups and form the basis for the power relationships….. What often emerges is the myth of innate ethnic inferiority or superiority, which depending on the balance of power, becomes social truisms that directs action by and towards ethnic groups.” Is he referring to UWI’s Dr Kean Gibson’s scurrilous attack targeting Indians by proxy of Hindus, or former Chief Magistrate Juliet Allen-Holder’s advocacy that all Indo-Guyanese be deported from Guyana, both remarkably, without “equality “of pushback response? There is absolutely no similar evidence which can match the truisms of May 26, 1964 Wismar massacre or the Rondell “Fineman” Rawlins atrocities at Lusignan, Bartica and Lindo Creek. The PNC selected May 26 as Guyana’s independence in 1966, for what purpose?
It would be most refreshing to witness considerably more which debunks “One such myth in Guyana (as) the inferior instincts for commerce and less than sterling contributions of African Guyanese to the evolution of the Guyanese economy” considering Black Guyanese have contributed significantly to Guyana’s progress. If they are myths shouldn’t there
be enough intelligent resolve to completely dump them and move on? Who keeps Black Guyanese stuck in the past can only be their outdated leadership but its repercussions affect all Guyanese.
Nearly two centuries after Emancipation, what makes black Americans so better off than in the Caribbean or in Guyana? The PNC inherited an excellent economy from the PPP in 1964. Why and who was responsible for Guyana’s decline for 28 years has always been obvious as they resurface again in today’s APNU. If “it is a mistake to ignore inter-ethnic dynamics” black magnificence cannot anytime become nullified by any vagaries of balance of power relationships; the colonial British, American foreign policy and PNC governments policies never historically favoured the allegedly “pagan” Indo- Guyanese. When all others failed, they were the last chosen to do Guyana good and only became targeted for their success. Which ethnic group can ever claim ownership
of success?
For anyone to claim much less believe that African Guyanese
contributions are less than magnificent is most deplorable. Under duress, they laboured to build our country’s basic foundations. Their descendants still actively guard our porous borders from tomorrow’s invaders and much more. The overzealous biased GHRA has even credited slaves for carving Guyana out of the Atlantic Ocean which would have made the Amerindian presence an after event. As an Afrocentric advocate
only preoccupied with his race segmentation mission, Dr Hinds questions
“If we accept that all is not well economically with African Guyanese, what should or can be done to repair the situation?” Persistence in power sharing demands based on race rather than Federalism requires urgent clarification concomitant with the exclusive ownership, advocacy and defence of “kith and kin: are certain to exacerbate more crushing cabinet
gridlock.
In the meantime, it would indeed be refreshingly educational to know what are the underlying basis and remedies, considering Dr Hinds himself now acknowledges that Guyanese have “heard that African Guyanese cannot do business or that the emancipated Africans abandoned the sugar industry in the wake of Emancipation or that widespread poverty in the African Guyanese community is a result of laziness and preference for shallow materialism.” Dismissal alone is not invalidation to let the light shine all around. Who can easily forget, noting that Dr Hinds can still remember to point out that, “One prominent political leader (it was Dr Cheddi Jagan who) asserted some
two decades ago that African Guyanese were at the bottom of the economic ladder”. Not easily forgotten are the accompanying bigoted attacks on Dr Jagan because he bewailed the plight of Afro-Guyanese; he was denounced as a racist and condemned. Absolutely no Afro-Guyanese organisation stepped up to validate his sincere concerns but now, maybe, it catalyses Dr Hinds’ inspiration in following Cuffy the monumental rebel.
Can no other Guyanese give inspiration so that “In this regard
economic equality and justice must become more than mere rhetoric”? They must be a living reality for black Guyanese we are told by Dr Hinds.
By SULTAN MOHAMED