Come home Eusi, please!

Aug 23, 2013 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

I was a guest, along with Tacuma Ogunseye, last Sunday on the channel 9 programme, “Walter Rodney Groundings,” hosted by David Hinds. Part of our function was to assess the role of Eusi Kwayana in the modern history of Guyana. Quite an impossible task – for someone who has contributed seventy years of social, cultural and political life to his country.
On Wednesday evening, I attended a tribute to him at the Friendship Primary School, that is, the village next to Buxton. Speakers were from the now defunct African Society for Cultural Relations with Independent Africa or ASCRIA (Tacuma Ogunseye), PNC (David Granger), Red Thread (Andaiye), ACDA (Eric Phillips), PPP (Eddie Rodney). I had to leave after the Red Thread presentation, so I don’t know if the AFC’s invitee spoke.
It was amazing to hear about the fantastic history of this simple Guyanese. There were facts that were outlined there that few people in today’s Guyana know. Kwayana wrote the battle song for the PPP, PNC, ASCRIA and ACDA. I had no idea the amount of poetry and plays he wrote.
I met Eusi Kwayana in 1976 when the Working People’s Alliance was born as a pressure group in the bottom level of the office of the trade union NAACIE. My relation with him I would say is paradoxical. I am forever grateful I got to relate to him, but there are times I wished I never met him. I will start with the latter.
I learnt from Eusi Kwayana that no matter how important an organization is to you, no matter how sensitive the stage of the struggle is, you must speak out for principles and moral values, even if it means upsetting the mango cart. I did just that and it has been a disaster for me. Not that Eusi was wrong. He was absolutely right. But in Guyana, you could not do those things and believe that there would not be severe consequences that will hurt you.
Only Eusi Kwayana could have done that; absolutely no one else. Eusi would speak his mind on the most sensitive topic, make some of his colleagues uncomfortable, but in the end there would be no retaliation, because there was only one like him and everyone deferred to him. My emulation of Kwayana’s outspokenness ended in disaster for me. And if I had to live my life over again, I would do the same things, but differently.
People like Eusi had a profound effect on me and I was too eager to be like Eusi Kwayana, too willing to call a spade a spade, too quick to speak out, too energetic to want to confront all those who were doing wrong things. In the process, people fought back even though they knew they were in the wrong, they were vicious in the process. Looking back at my struggle from the seventies, I think there is a place for just leaving a few things alone. If I could turn back the clock, I would willingly do so.
I turned out to be a passionate person for human rights because people like Eusi Kwayana influenced me in that direction. He influenced a whole generation from the seventies onwards. I honestly believe he is one of the world’s most misunderstood humans. If an East Indian hears that this man changed his name to an African one, he is bound to think that such a person is either racist or is driven by an African psyche.
This is where Kwayana becomes a complex person. Eusi Kwayana wanted liberation for the African people of this world. He came from that race and he knew the historical wrongs they suffered, but Kwayana was quintessentially a man driven by justice for all people and I say from the bosom of my heart, Eusi had no racist bone in him. He would devote the same passion to the cause of Indians as he would for Africans. This is where I think many Guyanese Indians misunderstood the politics of Eusi Kwayana.
It is unproductive to try to convert Guyanese to the theory that Forbes Burnham and Cheddi Jagan were not the heroes an entire generation accepts them as. There can be no doubt they were historical figures that countless Guyanese love and admire. But for me, I think the figure – from the forties right up to the time of Cheddi Jagan’s death – that came closer to embodying the aspirations of the masses that fought against colonialism, is Eusi Kwayana. I believe he should now come home to Guyana and let us enjoy more of his wisdom.
My condolences to the families of Doodnauth Singh and Harold Davis. Thanks for serving Guyana

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Come home Eusi, please!

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