Walter Rodney: a mysterious spirit or a mysterious betrayal?
Kaieteur News – The PNC merger and Walter Rodney’s Workers’ Alliance party under the APNU umbrella in 2011 divided Rodney’s admirers. Rodney’s famous brother, Donald, never accepted the merger. One suspects that the likes of Donald Rodney would have preferred some kind of recognition from the PNC of the role of his previous leadership in killing Rodney or a mandatory apology.
Others supported WPA leadership’s arguments at the time that it was time for the healing among African Guyanese that was torn apart by the zero-sum fight between two Guyanese icons – Rodney and Burnham. The 2011 WPA big wigs publicly justified the merger by saying that time had changed the configuration of politics and that the marriage could only lead in positive directions.
After turning itself from a pressure group into a political party in 1976, the WPA finally achieved state power in 2015. The youth in 2011 came between opponents and supporters of the wider merger. The four WPA leaders had considerable state authority – Drs. Rupert Roopnaraine, Clive Thomas and Maurice Odle. One of the WPA’s greats, Joycelyn Dow, became a huge beneficiary of the post-2015 spill.
Eyes around the world became open because the APNU-led government was not only universal, outspoken, racist and neo-liberal but there wasn’t even one item on its agenda that went back to Walter’s dreams Rodney. In fact, Dr. Roopnaraine was a blatant revolutionary fraud of power when he stopped attending WPA statutory meetings under the explanation that as a Minister he could not handle government business at party level. This decline by Dr. Roopnaraine is the basis of a separate column. Thomas chaired GuySuCo when 7,000 sugar workers were dismissed without the financial compensation legally requested.
The WPA quota in the APNU’s administration had become the sycophants of David Granger, the least competent and most flawed of all Guyana presidents. For those who opposed the merger, it was thought that the WPA had openly betrayed Walter Rodney. Only one of the WPA’s nails said publicly even though he didn’t use those words. Andaiye gave me permission to quote her saying that he wanted nothing to do with the kind of politics that WPA portrayed in the Granger government. I quoted her.
The APNU-led government has died. The WPA is dead but the betrayal of those who once loved Rodney and who are still around are still shameless beings. On Monday, a letter appeared in this newspaper in the form of an appeal to Anil Nandlall, the Attorney General in the current PPP government, to bring justice to brother Donald Rodney by hearing his appeal on the Forbes Trumpham trumping charge of Donald’s involvement in the murder of his brother. This appeal is 40 years on the court shelf.
This is where Rodney’s spirit stalks the land. This is where Rodney’s betrayal gets more nauseous as time goes by. The letter was signed by four WPA stalwarts, Aaissinian Carto who is Andaiye’s brother; WPA’s continuing female activist, Karen de Souza and two members of the group called WPA Foreign Friends – Dr. Nigel Westmaas and Moses Bhagwan.
There is a mystery behind announcing this appeal to Mr. Nandlall. The APNU regime was the government of these four signatories. The Attorney General of the APNU administration was a Cabinet colleague of Dr. Roopnaraine and had a close working relationship with Drs. Thomas and Odle in that exact government. Why during the five years of the APNU’s control of the state did these four signatories never demand that AG, Basil Williams, take the direction that they now ask Mr Nandlall to enter?
When Donald Rodney was watched outside the Court of Appeal, then Opposition MP Mr Nandlall found himself chatting with us and he was clearly sympathetic to Donald’s plea. One would like to think that the AG is going to act on Donald’s request. But when he does, Rodney’s betrayal by the WPA’s remains will show itself once again for the world to see.
The question that all four signatories have to answer to Guyanese, wherever Guyanese can be found, is why when the WPA was part of the government between May 2015 and March 2020, they did not demand justice for Donald Rodney or demand that the WPA withdraw from its coalition agreement with the PNC. Even a public suggestion from these four signatories that AG Williams must use his office to end Donald Rodney’s persecution cannot be overstated. How can these people face decent human beings in this world?
(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of this newspaper.)