Dear Editor,
JULY 17, 2026, marks the 62nd anniversary of the assassination of Michael Forde, a prominent 22-year-old Progressive Youth Organisation (PYO) activist and a key leader of the historic February 1964 Freedom Marches.
Forde was killed in a targeted bombing at Freedom House—the headquarters of the People’s Progressive Party (PPP)—marking a tragedy that compounded an already devastating week for his family following the death of his father just days prior.
The bombing occurred during one of the most volatile eras in Guyana’s pre-independence history. In 1964, the colony (then British Guiana) was paralysed by intense political rivalry between Premier Dr. Cheddi Jagan’s ruling PPP and the opposition People’s National Congress (PNC), led by Forbes Burnham. These domestic political fault lines took on deep ethnic dimensions and were heavily exacerbated by external Cold War pressures.
It was against this backdrop of national crisis that a young man entered the Progressive Bookshop, located on the ground floor of Freedom House, carrying a small cardboard carton. After placing the box on a bookshelf, the suspect purchased a book and hurriedly fled the premises, leaving behind both the package and his monetary change.
Forde, an employee at the bookstore, immediately alerted the manager, Euna Mulzack, an American citizen residing in Guyana. Forde noted the customer’s suspicious behaviour and the abandoned item.
Sensing immediate danger, Mulzack instructed Forde to remove the package from the building. Fearing for the lives of roughly 60 party executives meeting on the upper floor, Forde grabbed the device and rushed toward the eastern side exit to discard it. Before he could reach safety, the bomb detonated in his hands.
The force of the explosion killed Forde instantly, shattering the storefront and hurling a portion of his left hand roughly 50 yards away near the Metropole Cinema. His ultimate sacrifice prevented the bomb from decimating the entire building, likely saving the lives of the party leadership.
Approximately 40 individuals inside Freedom House survived with various injuries, including several prominent political figures:
Just minutes after the Freedom House blast, a second bomb detonated 400 metres away at GIMPEX, the trading arm of the PPP, underscoring the coordinated nature of the day’s terror.
Later that year, constitutional changes imposed by Great Britain introduced a system of proportional representation, which unseated the PPP and permanently altered Guyana’s path to its 1966 independence. The tragic death of Michael Forde remains an enduring symbol of the severe human cost of that political transition.