Guyana’s October 1953 in perspective

guyana chronicle editorial November 5, 2015

ON October 8, 1953 the British Government landed troops in then British Guiana and the next day the Governor on the orders of the Crown suspended the constitution which among other thigs gave limited Self-Government to the colony. Several leaders of the governing People’s Progressive Party (PPP) were arrested and would spend months in prison. It would take another four years before some degree of political democracy would return.This extreme move by the British resulted from what they saw as the communist policies of the colony’s first elected government under universal adult suffrage. The PPP, whose leadership included Cheddi Jagan, Forbes Burnham, JP Latchmansingh, Jai Narine Singh, Eusi Kwayana (Sydney King), Janet Jagan, Rory Westmaas, Ashton Chase, Martin Carter among others, had won the election held in April 1953.

Once in office the PPP began to make some modest, but important changes to the political landscape. These included lifting the ban on so-called subversive literature and on socialist leaders from entering the colony; amending the 1945 Rice Farmers Security Tenure Ordinance to make the landlords rather than the tenant farmer ultimately responsible for the upkeep of the land, and to protect the tenant farmers by enacting a standard rental for land; and passage of a Labor Relations Bill in the Lower House to make it legal for employers to negotiate with workers through their trade unions.

While those government actions were aimed at democratising the political economy, in the context of the Cold War they were considered by the Western powers to be subversive. British Guiana was, therefore deemed a “communist threat.” So upon the urging of the then USA government, the British invaded the colony and removed the elected government. The USA took similar action in Guatemala and Iran, where elected governments were overthrown.

While the British may have satisfied their national interests, their action set in train a series of developments that would change the course of history in the soon to be independent Guyana. By 1955, the PPP had split into two ethno-ideological factions that would soon consolidate an ethnically polarised society. After two ethnic election results in 1957 and 1961, the country was plunged into three years of ethnic disturbances that pitted the two major ethnic groups against each other. The legacy of those years still haunts our country.

More than six decades after October 1953, many still yearn for the ethnically united example of that period. Over the years, several questions have been asked. What if the British had not invaded? Would the united movement have withstood the pressures of ethnic hegemony that had begun to stir before the British intervened? Were the leaders of the movement too politically naïve and inexperienced? Did they underestimate the imperialist forces? Some of our scholars have delved into these questions, but more work needs to be done in this regard. Maybe our younger historians and political scientists should be encouraged to go back to a larger investigation of this period. At least three of the active leaders of the then PPP are still alive—Ashton Chase, Eusi Kwayana and Rory Westmaas; their perspectives would be invaluable in this regard. It is time that our country begins to invest in our own history, however uncomfortable aspects of that history may be.

Next year we will mark 50 years of independence. There can be no serious discussion of independence in 1966 outside of a thorough examination of the 1953 period. That years was indeed a watershed. We hope the government and the University of Guyana consider a major conference and a series of public lectures in the communities on that period. We would also recommend the showing of Dr. Rupert Roopnarine’s film “The Terror and the Time,” which is still the most comprehensive documentary of that period. This public education would go a long way towards contextualising our current politics and our post-independence politics in general. Not only would the public at large benefit, but our politicians on both sides of the aisle should find such education very useful.