ON August 1, Emancipation Day is celebrated by all Guyanese, both at home and abroad, as being one of the country’s most important anniversaries, since it commemorates the legal ending of plantation slavery. The story of plantation slavery is well known, but it needs to be retold so that coming generations could have a deeper understanding of the dangers of racism, and of Man’s inhumanity to Man.

With the Europeans “discovery” of the Americas in the 15th Century, colonisers began settling in the New World, intent on exploiting its wealth.  One form of exploitation was the occupation of the lands of the native Amerindian Peoples and establishing plantations to grow produce that Europe needed, which could be sold at enormous profits.

In Guyana, the first colonisers were Dutch planters who laid out plantations along the river banks, and later along the coast.  These plantations were mainly for producing sugar, which was sold at very high prices in Europe.  Sugar plantations required a great deal of labour, and since the local Amerindian population would rather die than work as plantation slaves or labourers, the planters were desperate to find labour from any source.  Slave traders then entered the picture, and began buying or capturing slaves, mostly from West Africa, to supply the plantation labour market.

From the 15th to the 19th Centuries, tens of millions of Africans were forcibly brought to the then British Guiana and other parts of the Caribbean.  The voyage across the Atlantic Ocean, better known as “The Middle Passage”, was one of unspeakable horror, and a high proportion of the slaves died at sea.  Once on land, they were sold to planters who put them to work on the plantations in a labour regime that was cruel, inhumane and humiliating, and, even to this day, reading of the horrifying cruelties of slavery is disturbing, both mentally and emotionally.

Eventually, slavery was abolished in the British Empire, including British Guiana and the Caribbean, on August 1, 1833.  But in most territories, full freedom was delayed by the Apprenticeship System, where the former slaves had to work for their masters for a number of years at a very minimal wage.  By 1838, all Guyanese slaves were freed with the ending of the Apprenticeship System.

EXTRAORDINARY RESILIENCE
The freed slaves, or “freedmen”, showed extraordinary resilience, maturity and creativity.  In the 1840s, they bought several abandoned sugar estates and transformed them into villages, with thousands of houses and farms, and a village government. These villages had certain characteristics which Guyanese of today could well emulate. They saved whatever small income they had from working as Apprentices, and from Sunday markets, and were able to buy the abandoned sugar estates.  Saving was an important part of the ethics of these villagers. Other important characteristics were their commitment to education, their strong belief in God, and their desire to farm and be self-sufficient in food.  They also had the entrepreneurial spirit of taking risks, and a remarkable work ethic.  During slavery, they were the tradesmen, and from the 1840s, they provided the carpenters, plumbers, tin smiths and the other trades required in the colony.

This spirit of risk and adventure made them and their children go out into the Interior and found the gold industry.  It is from these same goldfields, which the pork-knockers of yore had worked, that the foreign mining companies, with their modern equipment, are now extracting hundreds of tons of gold.

Then the community fell into social and economic doldrums from the end of the 1920s.  This was caused by the Great Depression, which brought with it widespread unemployment and poverty, and before any recovery could come, World War II brought more hardship, scarcity and unemployment.  The optimism caused by the end of the war did not last for very long, and before any recovery could occur, Britain decided to withdraw from the colony, and hand over its government to local politicians. These politicians caused racial discord and poor economic and social management of the country, and life, as Guyanese, in particular Afro-Guyanese knew it, collapsed, and over half the population emigrated.  Dr. Accabre Nkofi, in his booklet “Renaissance of the Blackman” captures the scenario.

In 2022, with the discovery of oil, the dawn of a new era has come, and all Guyanese are on the threshold of a prosperous and creative life. The ethos of the 1840s needs to be recaptured and internalised.  Oil revenues are now being gradually channelled into the various capital-starved industries, so that Guyana’s agricultural and industrial sectors could become an employment-providing and wealth-generating way into the future after the oil reserves would have been exhausted. Oil revenues are also being channelled into social sectors such as health, education, old age pensions and cash grants.  Afro-Guyanese and all other groups should take advantage of these offerings.  For example, the valuable scholarship offerings in various skills and professions, or the grants and guidance given to young people venturing into startups.

All Guyanese social and political leaders, and in particular Afro-Guyanese, should pledge themselves to make Emancipation Day 2022 the beginning of an Afro-Guyanese Renaissance, since the prosperity and well-being of any one segment of society redounds to the benefit of all.