Special Report on the Rodney Commission of Inquiry by Shaun Michael Samaroo

Rodney Commission ends session on upbeat note

WRAPPING up the sixth session of the historic Rodney Commission yesterday at the High Court, Minister of Labour Dr Nanda Kishore Gopaul and Counsel for the People’s National Congress (PNC) Mr Basil Williams brought the Court alive with energetic engages and mutual respect.

This session’s hearings ended on a positive, upbeat note, with Williams eschewing his usual aggressive tone, for a relaxed demeanour, punctuated with laughter and easy pleasantries.
Ending on this positive note injects a welcoming breath of fresh air into the usually somber, acrimonious exchanges between witnesses and Counsels aligned to PNC sympathies.
Dr Gopaul, who serves as Minister of Labour in President Ramotar’s administration, introduced a tone of tolerance and mutual understanding to the proceedings, noting with intense gesticulation and a firm voice that his participation at the Commission is purely of his own conscience, and because he wants to see “closure” and justice in the demise of his friend and associate in the fight for democracy, Dr Walter Rodney.

The Walter Rodney Commission of Inquiry yesterday ended the sixth session of public hearings, with a slew of witnesses appearing to testify into the circumstances and conditions that existed in Guyana in the 1978 to 1980 period, which saw the bomb blast assassination of Dr Rodney, on Friday, June 13, 1980.
Much of the evidence accumulated so far at the Commission substantiates worldwide suspicions and allegations over the past three and a half decades that the PNC Government plotted, conspired and executed a deadly PNC State-sanctioned plan to execute Dr Rodney.

Dr Gopaul and Williams went head-to-head over two days of cross-examination this week, and at the end both came out smiling and in good spirits, and everyone in the Courtroom felt the light atmosphere that open, authentic dialogue between the two political leaders engineered, with the distinguished Commissioners guiding the process.

Dr Rodney was leader of the Working People’s Alliance (WPA), and was engaged in a civic rebellion against the dictatorship PNC Government, which rigged local and national elections, and collapsed the national economy,

causing untold suffering on Guyanese workers.
Dr Gopaul, a long-standing Trade Union leader and closely aligned with Dr Rodney and other great Guyanese freedom fighters for over two decades, provided damning testimony and evidence to the Commission to support his contention that the PNC State machinery assassinated Dr Rodney.

But Dr Goapul said he holds no malice towards the PNC, and welcomed the PNC to join with other political parties in Guyana to develop the country, and cooperate to build a good future for the nation.
He sounded a note for forgiveness and cooperation, and Williams responded with a softer tone to his cross examination.
This resulted in the Commission adjourning with everyone in a light mood.
President Donald Ramotar has directed that the Commission accumulate the evidence it unearths, and issue an official report, bringing closure and justice to the brutal demise of Dr Rodney. The cold case of the political leader’s death languished for 34 years before President Ramotar convened the Commission early this year.
But the PNC adopted a hostile stance towards the Commission, with only Williams opting to appear on behalf of the disgraced party, as its Counsel.
Yesterday’s shift in tone could see Williams cooperate with the Commission in the future, thus ensuring Dr Gopaul’s olive branch to welcome the PNC’s role in Guyana’s development bear fruit.
The Commission could provide the platform the nation needs to see healing of the political divides that strangle development and hamper the Government of President Ramotar in its initiatives to carry out major development projects.

Williams’ perspective, based on his participation in the Commission, could play a major role in inculcating that atmosphere of workability and mutual cooperation.

Although the Commission sees vociferous criticism to its work from a minority of vocal PNC-sympathisers, yesterday’s session – and the public engagement between Dr Gopaul, a sitting Minister of Government, and Williams, a senior executive member of the PNC and a Member of Parliament for the political coalition A Partnership for National Unity (APNU), comprising the PNC and its arch-foe, the WPA – showcased what’s possible out of the work of the Commission.
Dr Gopaul and Williams went head-to-head over two days of cross-examination this week, and at the end both came out smiling and in good spirits, and everyone in the Courtroom felt the light atmosphere that open, authentic dialogue between the two political leaders engineered, with the distinguished Commissioners guiding the process.
The Commission resumes public hearings next year, but the Commissioners – Chairman Sir Richard Cheltenham of Barbados, Jacqueline Samuels-Brown of Jamaica and Seenath Jairam of Trinidad and Tobago, along with the Commission Secretariat based at the High Court, would monitor the political situation in Guyana before fixing firm dates to resume.
The Commission adjourns as Guyana’s Parliament faces acrimony, strife and division, with the Opposition, comprising the PNC and WPA in coalition, along with the Alliance For Change (AFC) seeking to topple President Ramotar’s Government in a questionable no-confidence motion.

Yesterday’s Commission sitting was groundbreaking, however, as Dr Gopaul and Williams showed what’s possible with open dialogue and authentic expression of feelings and perspectives.
The Commission may have elevated its impact on this nation, in providing the platform and forum for Williams and Dr Gopaul to thus engage on sensitive national and historical issues.
Should the tone set yesterday become a regular feature at the Commission, out of its convening could emerge a new way of being for this nation, with a meeting of the sides over the watchful eyes of legal luminaries of the Caribbean.
The energetic exchanges, mutual respect and genuine engagement between Williams and Dr Gopaul saw the Commission take on a new dimension in its last hours of this session, one of, in reality, providing the forum for healing, understanding, forgiveness and ventilation of the nation’s dark history.