What follows is a substantial extract from `When is the next Rodney inquiry? (SN 07/05/2014) with some additional comments, which I hope indicate how easily we can usually be seduced by the mere existence of opportunity!
“A few weeks ago, after reading the press release GHRA [Guyana Human Rights Association] not convinced about purpose or process of Commission of Inquiry into death of Dr. Walter Rodney” (March 2014), I asked myself ‘When is the next Rodney inquiry?’ Nothing has happened since then to make that question redundant. Indeed, matters have become progressively worse and it would take something of a miracle for the current commission process to bring closure to the Rodney issue as so many had hoped.
“In their press release, the GHRA claimed that it was unacceptable for the government to construct the inquiry process without at least consulting the Working People’s Alliance, the party of which Walter Rodney was the acknowledged leader. It also pointed to what it deemed ‘provocative’ terms of reference, which firmly inserted the PPP into an inquiry in which it should have been marginal. The release also suggested that the act of establishing the inquiry at a time when elections are in the air appears the worst form of electioneering. It will not be party to the inquiry because “Reluctantly the GHRA feels compelled to conclude that the proposed initiative has more to do with prolonging the ethnic dimension of Guyanese politics than laying to rest controversy over who was responsible for Walter Rodney’s death”.
“The GHRA is one of the better known and more credible civil society organisations in Guyana. It has also been one of the organisations that have consistently been demanding an independent inquiry into the death of Dr. Rodney. If in spite of this lineage it took a negative position on the current inquiry, it appeared to me that the PNC and WPA must have similar concerns.
“Since then, the matter has become even more complicated. The WPA and the PNC have objected to the appointment of one of the commissioners on the ground that he has taken legal briefs from the PPP/C government and may well be biased in favour of that party. And more recently, the PNC has been making much of the fact that the chairperson of the commission is in a conflict of interest position as he failed to disclose that he both knew Dr. Rodney and spoke at a memorial service held for him in Barbados in 1980.
“I believe that too many foreigners, even from the Caribbean, misconstrue Guyana’s unique political situation. Unlike other Caribbean countries, first autocratic rule and now ethnic voting mean that regime change has been extremely infrequent, and before the 2011 elections, governments hardly paid attention to the opposition. As a result, all our governments since independence have had very limited legitimacy, which has now been exacerbated by the minority status of the present regime. Therefore, in our political situation, consensus must be arrived at about both the process and personnel if the outcome of this kind of inquiry is to have the necessary level of acceptability.
“The reader may sensibly ask whether it is not extremely foolish and a waste of public resources for anyone genuinely wanting closure on the Rodney issue to present major stakeholders – even before the commission begins its work – with sufficient reason not to accept the outcome.
The PPP/C has been in government for over two decades in an environment clamoring for an independent inquiry into Dr. Rodney’s death. Why was an inquiry not established before and now being done in a manner that very likely will not resolve the issue?
“But I believe that this does not bother the PPP/C and is possibly precisely what it wants. The party has for decades blamed the PNC for Rodney’s death and this is now very much part of the psyche of its supporters, particularly those of the middling generation who are now becoming more and more disillusioned with it. For the PPP/C, the best result from this controversy would be for it to gain the propaganda value without the issue of Rodney’s death being resolved so that it can remain in the party’s armory.”
Comments
I was very much around the state at the time that Dr. Rodney met his death and I too believe that the state was involved. But it should have been obvious that the Rodney inquiry was established by the PPP/C in a manner that could not bring closure to the question of how and by whose design Dr. Rodney met his death.
When one adds the above-mentioned concerns to the dubious manner in which the commission proceeded with its business, the title of my article remains as relevant today. For many, the hallmark of its incompetence has been its having at its disposal and not doing all it possibly could to put on the stand an individual who it claims had played a ‘significant role in the conspiracy to kill Dr. Walter Rodney and subsequent attempts to conceal the circumstances surrounding his death’, and in this cauldron of controversy that is Guyana, the amount of credence it gave to the evidence of the convict, Robert Allan Gates.
But what struck me most is how quickly all the concerns about the process of establishing the commission gave way to the fact of its establishment by persons who initially questioned its terms of reference, the manner in which it was established and the credentials of the commissioners.
Once the process began these very persons enthusiastically became involved in giving evidence before this flawed process. When upon coming to government, the coalition attempted to halt the inquiry, rather than demanding some kind of rectification and continuation of the process, pleadings were made for the unsound process to continue, notwithstanding the recognition that ‘Guyana needs and deserves a proper inquiry in which all key witnesses give evidence under oath. Only then can our country begin the journey of healing and reconciliation (Justice for Walter Rodney group petitions gov’t for extension of inquiry. SN 28/11/2015).
It was inevitable and now it is a fact that the unsound process would not provide the healing and reconciliation that it was hoped a properly established inquiry would have facilitated. So we must wait until the next Walter Rodney inquiry.
henryjeffrey@yahoo.com
