REVELATIONS of horrific events that transpired during Rodney’s political activism in Guyana and leadership of the Working People’s Alliance (WPA) are emerging, primarily because the PPP/C administration has promised that no prosecution for complicity and/or involvement in any way by any person will ensue from information proffered to the Rodney Commission of Inquiry. So renowned researcher and historian, charismatic leader, passionate advocate for human dignity and equality, patriotic son of Guyana’s soil, and humanist extraordinaire Walter Rodney, may finally get justice – of a sort; and his supporters and loved ones may finally get closure, 33 years after the fact of his assassination.
Generations to come will marvel that a descendant of slaves could inflict such wanton destruction on a nation peopled with fellow descendants of slaves and indentured labourers, that one wonders at and compares the two oppressive regimes of the colonisers and the dictatorship, through juxtaposition in analyses and critiques of both regimes of oppressive terror in this beautiful country, so richly blessed with natural resources, and a rich blend of cultures in a family of humanity that interweaves into a spectacular tapestry of a unique nation.
In essence, while the repression and terror existed during colonial times, there was concurrent progress in various spheres, as well as promotion and sustaining of high standards  – especially in infrastructure and education, as well as the service sectors; whereas, during the Burnham years, the destruction of every aspect of life and every sector was absolute.
But it is important that the ethos of the terror of those times be understood in context for proper assessment and impartial judgement on the Walter Rodney saga.
Burnham and his bourgeoisie regime were correct in being fearful of Rodney, because his empathy for the oppressed and poor in Jamaica had generated a similar movement off-campus, and propelled a dynamic in the socio-political landscape whereby the downtrodden people discovered their value as human beings and Rodney’s struggle to restore their human dignity and self-respect had succeeded in no small measure; but he earned the enmity of that island’s socio-political elite in the process.
Burnham was of the newly-emerged black bourgeoisie Caribbean leadership grouping, and he empathised with the Jamaican Government rather than empathise with the plight of the people he ruled.
The Jamaican government banned Rodney from re-entering that country during his attendance at a Black Writers’ Conference in Canada.
But Rodney’s struggles in Jamaica had generated a liberation movement that blazed across the Caribbean, and the old Colonial imperialist order and post-colonial oppressive governmental structures were slowly but surely being changed through challenges by the working-class movements in Caribbean nations, and one of the most historic and eventful fruits of Rodney’s initial work in Jamaica was the February Revolt of the working force in Trinidad & Tobago.
Guyanese and the world at large are being informed as the saga of deceit and a most heinous betrayal unfold, as witnesses testify to first-hand experiences during one of the most dreaded and dreadful periods in the corridors of Guyana’s history.