Walter Rodney: Genuine Afro Caribbean Hero
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| Dr. Walter Rodney |
In recent weeks, we have learnt
that there will be an International Enquiry into the death of brilliant Guyanese historian, Dr. Walter
Rodney. We believe that what has been called a murder was actually a political on,assassination during the reign of Forbes Burnham. We welcome such a development although it
comes thirty three years after the treacherous deed.
Dr. Rodney was one the most
brilliant thinkers and visionaries to have ever emerged from the Caribbean region
and he left a legacy of unmatched progressive scholarship that is now being revisited
by those who are desperately trying, to forge a new Caribbean Nation. Assassinated
at the age of 38 he had already established himself as our foremost
progressive academic throughout the world. His classic book: How Europe
Underdeveloped Africa, is widely accepted as one of the most profound works by
any Afro Caribbean writer.
Already there are concerns
that the Enquiry will be considerably weakened because many of those involved or believed to be involved,
in the dastardly act are now dead. However, we cannot downplay the importance
of at least attempting to bring some closure to one of the most brutal chapters of our post
colonial period. Political assassinations and murders are not features of our
political culture and all those who participated in the assassination of Dr.
Rodney should be seen as anti-Caribbean
terrorists. We view his assassination as
an act of war against the Caribbean Nation. They robbed this region of a
remarkable citizen and threw his young family into great agony. They must never
be forgiven. Dr. Walter Rodney must never be forgiven.
WALTER RODNEY: A BIOGRAPHY
Walter Rodney was born in Georgetown, Guyana on March 23, 1942.
His was a working class family-his father was a tailor and his mother a
seamstress. After attending primary school, he won an open exhibition
scholarship to attend Queens College as one of the early working-class
beneficiaries of concessions made in the filed of education by the ruling class
in Guyana to the new nationalism that gripped the country in the early 1950s.
While at Queens College young Rodney excelled academically, as
well as in the fields of athletics and debating. In 1960, he won an open
scholarship to further his studies at the University of the West Indies in
Jamaica. He graduated with a first-class honors degree in history in 1963 and.
he won an open scholarship to the School of Oriental and African Studies in
London. In 1966, at the age of 24 he was awarded a Ph.D. with honors in African
History.
His doctoral research on slavery on the Upper Guinea Coast was the
result of long meticulous work on the records of Portuguese merchants both in
England and in Portugal. In the process he learned Portuguese and Spanish which
along with the French he had learned at Queens College made him somewhat of a
linguist.
In 1970, his Ph.D dissertation was published by Oxford University
Press under the title, A History of the Upper Guinea Coast, 1545-1800. This
work was to set a trend for Rodney in both challenging the assumptions of
western historians about African history and setting new standards for looking
at the history of oppressed peoples. According to Horace Campbell "This
work was path-breaking in the way in which it analyzed the impact of slavery on
the communities and the interrelationship between societies of the region and
on the ecology of the region."
Walter took up his first teaching appointment in Tanzania before
returning to his alma mater, the University of the West Indies, in 1968. This
was a period of great political activity in the Caribbean as the countries
begun their post colonial journey. But it was the Black Power Movement that
caught Walter's imagination.
Some new voices had begun to question the direction of the
post-independence governments, in particular their attitude to the plight of
the downpressed. The issue of empowerment for the black and brown poor of the
region was being debated among the progressive intellectuals. Rodney, who from
very early on had rejected the authoritarian role of the middle class political
elite in the Caribbean, was central to this debate. He, however, did not
confine his activities to the university campus. He took his message of Black
Liberation to the gullies of Jamaica. In particular he shared his knowledge of
African history with one of the most rejected section of the Jamaican
society-the Rastafarians.
Walter had shown an interest in political activism ever since he
was a student in Jamaica and England. Horace Campbell reports that while at UWI
Walter "was active in student politics and campaigned extensively in 1961
in the Jamaica Referendum on the West Indian Federation." While studying
in London, Walter participated in discussion circles, spoke at the famous Hyde
Park and, participated in a symposium on Guyana in 1965. It was during this
period that Walter came into contact with the legendary CLR James and was one
of his most devoted students.
By the summer of 1968 Rodney's "groundings with the working
poor of Jamaica had begun to attract the attention of the government. So, when
he attended a Black Writers' Conference in Montreal, Canada, in October 1968,
the Hugh Shearer-led Jamaican Labor Party Government banned him from
re-entering the country. This action sparked widespread riots and revolts in
Kingston in which several people were killed and injured by the police and
security forces, and millions of dollars worth of property destroyed.. Rodney's
encounters with the Rastafarians were published in a pamphlet entitled
"Grounding with My Brothers," that became a bible for the Caribbean
Black Power Movement.
Having been expelled from Jamaica, Walter returned to Tanzania
after a short stay in Cuba.. There he lectured from 1968 to 1974 and continued
his groundings in Tanzania and other parts of Africa. This was the period of
the African liberation struggles and Walter, who fervently believed that the
intellectual should make his or her skills available for the struggles and
emancipation of the people, became deeply involved.. It was from partly from
these activities that his second major work, and his best known --How Europe
Underdeveloped Africa - emerged. It was published by Bogle-L'Ouverture, in
London, in conjunction with Tanzanian Publishing House in 1972.
This Tanzanian period was perhaps the most important in the
formation of Rodney's ideas. According to Horace Campbell "Here he was at
the forefront of establishing an intellectual tradition which still today makes
Dar es Salaam one of the centers of discussion of African politics and history.
Out of he dialogue, discussions and study groups he deepened the Marxist
tradition with respect to African politics, class struggle, the race question,
African history and the role of the exploited in social change. It was within
the context of these discussions that the book, How Europe Underdeveloped
Africa was written."
Campbell also reports that " In he same period, he wrote the
critical articles on Tanzanian Ujamaa, imperialism, on underdevelopment, and
the problems of state and class formation in Africa. Many of his articles which
were written in Tanzania appeared in Maji Maji, the discussion journal of the
TANU Youth League at the University. He worked in the Tanzanian archives on the
question of forced labor, the policing of the countryside and the colonial
economy. This work-- " World War II and the Tanzanian Economy"-- was
later published as a monograph by Cornell University in 1976".
Rodney also developed a reputation as a Pan-Africanist
theoretician and spokes person. Campbell says that "In Tanzania he
developed close political relationships with those who were struggling to
change the external control of Africa He was very close to some of the leaders
of liberation movements in Africa and also to political leaders of popular
organizations of independent territories. Together with other Pan-Africanists
he participated in discussing leading up to the Sixth Pan-African Congress,
held in Tanzania, 1974. Before the Congress he wrote a piece: "Towards the
Sixth Pan-African Congress: Aspects of the International Class Struggle in
Africa, the Caribbean and America."
In 1974, Walter returned to Guyana to take up an appointment as
Professor of History at the University of Guyana, but the government rescinded
the appointment. But Rodney remained in Guyana, joined the newly formed
political group, the Working People's Alliance. Between 1974 and his
assassination in 1980, he emerged as the leading figure in the resistance
movement against the increasingly authoritarian PNC government. He give public
and private talks all over the country that served to engender a new political
consciousness in the country. During this period he developed his ideas on the
self emancipation of the working people, People's Power, and multiracial
democracy.
On July 11, 1979, Walter, together with seven others, was arrested
following the burning down of two government offices. He, along with Drs Rupert
Roopnarine and Omawale, was later charged with arson. From that period up to
the time of his murder, he was constantly persecuted and harassed and at least
on one occasion, an attempt was made to kill him. Finally, on the evening of
June 13, 1980, he was assassinated by a bomb in the middle of Georgetown..
Walter was married to Dr Patricia Rodney and the union bore three
children- Shaka, Kanini and Asha.
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