Someone made note of a snippet I penned two columns ago when I enquired about the veracity of allegations with respect to corruption in investment in this land.
I had written, quite simply, but with intent, that “…I welcome investment but not one set of Guyanese owning our patrimony”.
This also recalled my one-time pre-occupation with the state of Black Business and African attitudes to land. All that now located amidst the discussion on how national assets are leased or granted to “successful” investors.
Well alright, it’s enough for me to venture more personal views and suggest questions surrounding the issue of “ownership of the land” and who has how much and why. Under my strange caption at the top.
History and Heritage
Our First People, perhaps from Mongolia, trekked and boated here. And lived in the foothills and forests leaving the Coasts alone, by and large. To this day, rationalizations and methodologies are employed to apportion land by title to their descendants. Funny how there has never been a true, real national debate on the issue of our indigenous Amerindians being entitled to own the lands their (nomadic) ancestors settled and “occupied” for many, many decades. I suppose that, in those areas of Guyana, there is still enough land to go around. Even if other groups dare become interested (?)
The British Europeans then prevailed over their continental counterparts and ruled for one hundred and thirty-five years as British Guiana. The land came into legal possession by the monarchs, hence Crown Lands. African slaves, Indian immigrants, indentured and bound-to-work toiled on the plantations to produce sugar. Most for Britain. Some for BG. Guyanese took political and constitutional control of their national destiny in 1966 and 1970. That “destiny” is still uncertain. One element of periodic discontent by a few, from time to time, is ownership of the Land.
Now, legally titled or not, Amerindian Guyanese occupy and or own lots of land, with some groups owning expanses larger than Tobago or Barbados. After slavery, African freedmen were happy to remove themselves from the jurisdiction of the slave-masters and the plantations. But they bought up land and established the coastal villages, the basis of a significant village movement. They had saved surprisingly enormous sums whilst in apprenticeship, some even earlier and wanted to establish a vibrant peasantry.
Grudgingly, but sensibly, the whites sold the freedmen their old cotton plantations and other land. Victoria on the East Cost of Demerara was first purchased. West Coast, Berbice lands soon because thriving villages too. The old, jealous, devious plantation owners were astounded at the Africans’ saving power, ability to purchase and determination to become an independent pleasantry bent on agriculture as a future.
Result? Land prices shot up. Or sales were stopped. Communal villages, never-the-less, continued to be established. Then proprietary villages emerged, firstly after Planter Carberry on the Essequibo Coast divided up his front lands and sold them to the freed slaves in 1840. He wanted them near to his plantation – as workers. Proprietary villages soon blossomed in many locations where remnants of Plantations were.]
Those Africans of the latter villages owned the land, owned their homes and had mortgages and legal documents to prove it. I won’t dwell on the sabotage and destabilization unleashed against African villages and lands here – the legal ruses, the floodings, the increased taxation, the restraints on living on freehold land.
The point I want to emphasise is that today’s African Guyanese must understand that their fore-fathers did respect Land and Agriculture even after the horrors of slavery. But they must also find out just why those Africans eventually turned away from their portion of the patrimony! Compared to the Indian Indentured they did leave the land for the professions. Now, some of their land heritage attracts dispute. Not so with my “Indians!”
Tom’s house? New Owners!
Ras Tom Dalgetty, the part–Scottish Pan-Africanist, used to argue that African blood bought this land for Afro-Guyanese; that the African-Guyanese House was his. His people’s labour, sweat and tears made him sole proprietor.
But the Indian Immigrants were given land to prevent most of them from returning to Mother India after their contracts ended. They were also sold land for “next-to-nothing”. Numerous villages were established. Then the Indians turned to rice-farming with a vengeance. They loved rice and they worshipped the land. They even remained on the sugar plantation.
I ask assistance from my more learned social historians here. Did the African education pull him from the land to the professions? While the Indians respected both the land and later the professions, trades and arts? Godfrey Kwame Assanna, after history and twenty-eight (28) years of PNC “favours”, seems to own less land than Ganesh Badri Natoo, if you know (and accept) what I mean…
Add to that reality the allegations of rather “liberal” leasing of our forests to Ganesh and the current doubt about how recent negotiations resulted in more assets being allocated to Ganesh’s descendants.
I except to earn some flak for these thoughts, but what think you? Consider circumstance well before laying any blame…
Consider…
● Next week: ACDA’s latest position on “African” Land Rights.
● How much do you really know about the five Martyrs of Enmore 1948? Who pulled the triggers and why?
● How many sugar workers were shot dead before ’48?
● “Waiting to commit a felony…to commit a crime” What an interesting charge in law. The police can hold you based on their reasonable suspicions. Okay? Pity it can be open to abuse! By the cops.
● Fine work so far Joint Services. But don’t reveal too much prematurely! About the cell phones, diary, other equipment. Investigate first! Leave some crime scenes alone for them to return.
● Fellow accused me of “cavalier Journalism” in SN last Saturday. Oh my. Me? Just using words because they are there?
● Will that spanking new, New Thriving Chinese Restaurant on Main Street in the Capital be completed in time for CARIFESTA X? Less than ten (10) fellows work on it? From where?
‘Til Next Week!
Comments?
allanfenty@yahoo.com
