Dear Editor,
The 2011 general and regional elections must rank as a watershed for Afrikans as further social and economic marginalization can push us over the brink. The AFC’s presidential candidate Khemraj Ramjattan’s statement of solidarity and understanding with “our brothers‘ struggles” a few days ago, welcome as it is, is insufficient to address the Afrikan dilemma. The Afrikan dilemma by its very magnitude and the length of time that it has been in the making, needs to be a platform issue in Guyanese politics and social activism, in order to be effectively dealt with. It warrants a place on the national development agenda as its issues affect in excess of 33 per cent of the nation’s population directly. Elections are about selecting the managers of the states resources, and the managers of the Guyanese state’s resources have been a major culprit in the creation of the Afrikan dilemma. Our struggles evolved from the unequal opportunities and uneven development to which we have been subjected. It was the European state which undermined our development by part funding and receiving the benefits of our enslavement, the most inequitable socio-economic system we have endured. This state sponsored unequal development continued post emancipation and under colonialism. In 1839 the Court of Policy passed a bill to raise £400,000 to support immigration. The Colonial Office eventually supported the bill “to relieve the hard pressed landed interest.” However when in 1882 two Afrikan sugar planters and millers John Griffith of Plaisance and Europe of Buxton applied to the Court of Policy for a loan of $1,000 to improve their sugar mills, both had their petitions rejected with one member of the court arguing that it was wrong in principle to lend money to improve estates. The state through a cocktail of measures including fiscal and monetary policies and actions, immigration, slander, terror, education, legislative and social actions directed an attack on the Afrikan entrepreneurial movement. Afrikans found themselves embedded in the public service, the disciplined forces, and small mining and timber operations. Afrikans were also to be found in the mining industry as workers not as owners. When responsibilities for the state’s management devolved to ‘Guyanese,’ fuelled by economic interests which were ethnocentric, the role of preserving the Afrikans position in the non-productive sectors of the economy had already been institutionalized. The recent unfolding in the bauxite belt and the revelations in the Jagdeo v Kissoon case attest to the current contributions of the managers of the state to the development and continuation of the state’s role in our dilemma. Post the colonial era Forbes Burnham’s welfare state was too short-lived to entrench the opportunities capable of challenging the structures, values, and expectations created by the almost 300 years of colonial rule. At any rate Desmond Hoyte’s ERP based on the free market liberal economy soon caused the opportunities created by the Burnham’s model to disappear. It is in my opinion the stipulations of the free market liberal economic model and the displacement of the Afrikan in the non productive sectors along with the ethnic imperatives of the PPP/C have contributed greatly to the indignities levelled against us by the state.
Certainly, the number of persons affected, the impact on national development, the duration of time for which the problem has existed, its magnitude and the role which the state can play in alleviating the problem do warrant it being given greater attention at this time.
Neither the AFC nor the PPP/C manifestoes mention anything about this issue, whilst they have sections on Amerindian development; this is in the year being designated The International Year for People of African Descent. I can speak for neither the APNU nor TUF as I have not seen their manifestoes. I avail myself to Brother Ramjattan or any organization, to be a part of the re-education process which he spoke of, so that the basis of our struggles may be understood and thus contribute to a more tolerant and better educated society.
Yours faithfully,
Jonathan Adams
