Dear Editor,
How do we confront and dismantle oppression when it comes dressed in the colours of our own ethnic loyalties? When a nation chooses its government not by principles, accountability, or courage, but by inherited fears and tribal insecurities, the outcome is always the same: oppression is recycled, the powerful remain unchallenged, and the people continue to suffer. This is the painful lesson the Guyanese nation has lived under both the People’s National Congress of yesterday and the People’s Progressive Party of today.
May I once again invoke the memory of the late Dr. Walter Rodney — scholar, activist, and patriot — whose life and work demonstrated the rare courage needed to confront evil in its institutional form. On Friday June 13th, 1980, he was assassinated by the PNC-R under the dictatorship of Forbes Burnham, for daring to empower a nation that was long silenced, abused, and coerced into submission.
During those dark years, many of us — including the late Dr. Rodney — made the conscious decision that fear could not be our master. Out of this conviction, a small band of brothers and sisters from the Working People’s Alliance chose to resist. I recall vividly one operation in my hometown of New Amsterdam, just one week before Rodney’s assassination. Under the cloak of night, hiding from the police and paramilitary units loyal to the dictator, we painted our streets and buildings with the simple but powerful words: “People’s Power,” “No Dictator,” and other declarations of our collective refusal to surrender.
One of those acts — painting “BANAM PALACE” in bold four-foot letters across the wall of a brand-new public restroom in front of the New Amsterdam Market — was done by my own hand. Walter Rodney, whom I never met, later referenced this moment as an example of the courage ordinary citizens found in themselves. By the next morning, hundreds had seen it, laughed, discussed, and felt a spark of hope. And by mid-day, in a show of panic and embarrassment, the PNC-R scrambled to cover it up. But the memory could not be painted over.
That night, many of our brothers were arrested, beaten, interrogated, and humiliated in the New Amsterdam Central Police Station. Today, I honour and salute the courage of these men: Mr. John Pinkerton, Mr. Arnold Teekasingh, the late Mr. Jeelall, the late Mr. Ndugu La Rose, Mr. Ashley Ramcharran, the late Mr. Saffee, Mr. Desmond Patterson, Mr. Mohan Bassit, Mr. James Herod, and many others. Their bravery is etched permanently into the conscience of any Guyanese committed to democracy.
I will never forget the scream of a sister — now deceased — who collapsed in horror as she witnessed the brutality meted out to her husband, Mr. Arnold Teekasingh. I stood barely fifty feet away. That moment defined for me the true cost of dictatorship: the breaking of families, the humiliation of citizens, and the crushing of human dignity.
Yet neither the PNC-R, responsible for Rodney’s assassination, nor the PPP/C, who succeeded them, ever held anyone accountable. The cycle of fear and silence endured, and today the nation is once again trapped under a government whose corruption and cowardice betray the sacrifices of those who fought for a free Guyana.
It is a bitter tragedy that many who once risked their lives for democracy now watch as the PPP/C under Bharrat Jagdeo has transformed into a machinery of arrogance, oppression, and self-interest. A government that refuses accountability, governs by intimidation, and cowers behind state institutions cannot claim legitimacy, patriotism, or righteousness. Courage requires distinction. Cowardice requires company.
The struggle for a free, democratic, and just Guyana is not over. And it demands the same courage today that it demanded decades ago.