Republic Day not Mash Day

Feb 19, 2011 Features / Columnists, Ravi Dev

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As I’ve done since they started school, around this time of the year I ask my kids what they were taught about Republic Day. And the answer remains the same: “Mash, Dad. It’s all about Mash.” So they learn that this is the day children play steel pans in the streets, dress up in scanty costumes and parade, and dance on stage and in the streets. Not a single activity to let them know what it means for their country to be a ‘Republic”. All they’ve learnt about this day is that it’s a day of revelry. Now contrary to what some (most?) may think I like my revelry as much as anyone else but there is a time and place, a rhyme and reason for everything. We have to ask ourselves as a nation – what is February 23rd all about?
February 23rd is Republic Day – period. While Independence was given to us by Britain, Republic Day was chosen by us as the day to sever all formal ties with the British Crown. We were on our own – captains of our fate and masters of our destiny and all that.
“Republic” comes directly from the Latin “Res Publica” – the public thing. We the public, the people, were now responsible for governing ourselves and conducting our affairs in such a manner, to achieve the goals that we ourselves would set for our country. The day itself – February 23rd – was selected to remind us as to what republican values were all about. This was the beginning of Cuffy’s great effort to overthrow Dutch rule over Berbice and remove the shackles of slavery back in 1763. It was a landmark event in the entire Western hemisphere. It should remind us that colonialism of one form or another always threatens and must be resisted
Mashramani, on the other hand, began as an event in Linden to commemorate Republic Day. This is perfectly in order and commendable – any group of citizens have the right to commemorate Republic Day based on how they feel it’s appropriate. However, several problems arose when the Government promptly decided to adopt Mashramani and make it the official way to celebrate Republic Day.
Firstly, by also mandating that all Government entities (at a time when the Government controlled eighty percent of the economy) including schools and Ministries had to get involved in the Mash, the Government sent the message that Mash was the Guyanese way to commemorate Republic Day. To commemorate Republic any other way was in some way to be outside the pale…literally marching to a different drummer.
There are two problems with this. Firstly, by making Mashramani the official celebration of Republic Day, the Government is telling the population that the values demanded by Republican status are going to be reinforced or inculcated by the Mashramani activities. And this is where I part company with the promoters of Mashramani as the Republic Day commemoration activities. I would like anyone to tell me how backballing in the streets of Georgetown will help us to be self-sufficient or protective of our country or securing good governance or any other Republican goal. Again I restate my point – private individuals can backball to their waist’s content, but a Government has to promote activities consonant with what they seek to promote –in this instance Republicanism.
Secondly, Guyana is a land of several cultures and each may have different perspectives on how to commemorate or celebrate events. When the Government selects a particular cultural expression or a component thereof as the official expression, it explicitly privileges that expression to the exclusion of others. This is an unacceptable policy in a multicultural state. In its excursions in the cultural realm, the Government has to be balanced in its promotion of values and activities. Mashramani (notwithstanding its Amerindian name) imitates the Caribbean Carnival arising out of the cultural encounter between Europe and Africa, during and after slavery. Its particular expressions of unrestrained exuberance, ebullience, gaiety and exhibitionism, comes out of a specific historical experience – most literally brought out by the Barbadian label for its version – “Crop Over”.
The African labourers were allowed to let off steam after the furious intensity and rigour of the grinding season on the plantations to forget for awhile their degradation that they would be forced to return to with the start of a new crop. This was the old “bread and circus” routine perfected by the Romans so many centuries ago – but here there wasn’t even any bread.
In this “International Year for  People of African Descent”, I hoped that those purporting to represent African-Guyanese descendants would have taken the opportunity to proclaim that their contribution to Creole culture is more than just song and dance. Focusing on the aspirations and achievements of Cuffy on February 23rd , in my estimation, would be much more in consonance with the theme of activities proposed by the UN’s Working Group Of Experts On People Of African Descent: “Recognition, Justice, and Development”.
Leave Mash for another day. Other groups also have historical instances of anti-colonial struggle that resonate with Cuffy’s inaugural moment and Republic Day, would be the perfect occasion to stress these commonalities in a public way. Our Res Publica.

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