Latest update September 11th, 2026 10:26 AM
Victoria village teaches a lot about determination
Dear Editor,
On May 2, 1845, 79 of the 83 Africans who bought Northbrook made an agreement among themselves “…For the good regulation and general benefit of the said estate”. The property, now called Victoria, was purchased in November 1839 —some 500 acres for $10,000. The code catered for: in Clauses 2 and 5, revenue collection to offset expenses associated with the maintenance of the village and the election of leaders; while clause 4 prohibited “…drunkenness, cursing, swearing, fighting, gambling, dancing…”
Clause 17 strictly forbade strangers from going to the provision grounds. Other clauses provided for the disposal of property, their spirituality and education among others.
In 1862, Francis Hicks illegally levied on the villages of Buxton, Beterverwagting and Friendship, East Coast Demerara.
The levy violated a pact of internal self government which the Africans had made amongst themselves. Friendship protested.
On October 24, 1862, Hicks sent in the military to force the villagers to pay. The ensuing protest ended in some of them being arrested. Hicks sold some of their properties as they insisted on non compliance.
The Africans’ response was to hire a schooner to sail to England and petition Queen Victoria. They abandoned the idea and returned to Guyana after the Governor of Barbados dissuaded them.
Here they continued to the fight to regain their properties.
These actions following so closely on the heels of slavery suggest that our foreparents’ sense of their rights as human beings were unfazed by the horrors they had endured on the plantation.
They had left the plantation in 1838 with a greater sense of dignity and willingness to preserve that dignity as a people. We had a more acute sense of our own humanity then than we have now.
Mr. Kissoon’s “King Kong…” K.N. June 28,2010 is another reminder that serious reflection and action on the African condition, primarily by Africans is an urgent priority for us. We must as a people take time to take stock of our self expression in the Guyanese society.
The collective non response to the state’s attempts to degrade our humanity is symptomatic of a people who have lost touch with reality and a true sense of who we are.
That side of us which we used to build the great civilizations of Africa, the side of us which nurtured other world civilizations, which weathered the storms of slavery, apprenticeship, and colonialism; that side of us which is greater and mightier than the decadence of the minds which seek to take advantage of our disorganization.
But by the precedents set by those gone before us we have already triumphed.
To reactivate that elevated sense of our humanity and dignity we have to develop a code of behaviour which discourages that deviant culture among some of our youth which causes them to see one another as “top dogs” or “ bitches”. Seeing ourselves as being born in sin and shaped in iniquity or sinners saved by grace is another debilitating factor in the resurrection of that sense of human dignity. The origin and purpose of the unwritten religious injunction forbidding Africans from revering things African has to be undertaken. Africans will be more equipped with the willingness to protect their rights if they can appreciate the value of their Africanness means to the world.
We will be more inclined to embrace our African self when we understand the role false religion has played in demonising what genetically and divinely we are, Africans.
The foregoing, I think, are fundamental to the enhancement of our self esteem, the spin-off of which, is the confidence and courage to expect and demand of ourselves and others, better.
Africans, leaders and followers will, when we revise the things we believe about ourselves be once again able to build new, and re-energize the enduring cultural structures left for us by our forebears.
Then we will be able to capitalize on the opportunities present in our environment with our dignity intact.
Jonathan.
Share this:
Discover more from Kaieteur News
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.