The WPA was composed of independent cells

Jul 04, 2014 Letters

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Dear Editor,
The WPA was composed of independent cells and all other cells were not privy to the others’ existence neither were they aware by isolation
what the others were doing according to  Mr. Tacuma Ogunseye’s candid testimony to the Rodney Commission of Inquiry (RCOI) on Wednesday 2nd July 2014.  Mr. Ogunseye was not asked by the RCOI why this was necessary and by whose directive it was done. The WPA executive member, however, publicly confirmed the WPA was stockpiling weapons. Assuredly, their successful clandestine accumulation and uses in any military venture was hazardous, full of personal risks and sacrifices altogether requiring much secrecy and subterfuge.  Since free and fair elections were not possible by democracy under the PNC government before the 1980s, the WPA’s secret weapon stockpiling was preparatory for other necessities.
Repeatedly Mr. Ogunseye asked the PNC’s cross examining lawyer Mr. Basil Williams to clarify his questions turned commentary before he
understood it to give a reply. Even though Mr. Ogunseye was not directly asked by anyone at the RCOI his explanations served to
indirectly corroborate Dr Rupert Roopnarine’ stunning disclosure just before they merged into APNU that the WPA was stockpiling weapons.
Whether the WPA’s Dr Nigel Westmaas who also testified the previous day before Mr. Ogunseye was aware of the WPA weaponry stockpiling, even though he was not  personally involved as he denied, is still unclear.
Without a shadow of doubt it finally confirms that Dr Walter Rodney did not trust everyone within the WPA.  Buxton’s notable Mr. Eusi Kwayana, was definitely out like south from their WPA leader’s circle of trust.
For Dr Rodney to discuss with the entire WPA executive whom he should trust, or not, was neither realistic nor astute.  Obviously the “trust” issue was solely made only by Dr Rodney’s solitary personal analysis, evaluation and implementation. Why he specifically chooses his beloved brother Donald to accompany him to the fatal rendezvous and no one else, must be crystal clear.
Either Dr Rodney trusted Mr. Kwayana’s vast political experience without reservation or he was privately wary of him. Since Dr Rodney was best equipped to handle the truth, he only humored him in toleration. Mr. Kwayana completely ducked the entire issue during his garrulous testimony with rambling crafty diversionary information outside the scope of the RCOI’s inquiry. No one at the RCOI directly inquired from him about his role and awareness of the WPA’s weaponry accumulation neither did he voluntarily refer to those facts.  Without doubt the clandestine WPA arms stockpile deployed in any violent overthrow of the PNC government would have escalated out of control into race acrimony among Guyanese. Defenseless Indians inevitably would have been paying the usual price of black retaliation.  Dr Rodney’s wisdom not to trust everyone is understandable considering Dr Roopnarine’s naïveté in hiring his policeman jailor, Mr. Robert Allan Gates as his personal bodyguard.  Mr. Gates told the RCOI that he was also a double agent working undercover for the state.

Even Mr. Ogunseye  was out the loop on issues of WPA operations.  In a letter to the press he sought clarification about Dr Rodney’s secret agreement with Dr Cheddi Jagan’s PPP of later national reunification of the PPP with the WPA within.  During Dr Jagan’s meeting with Dr Rodney  the former  reportedly confessed to Dr Rodney that he was facing difficulties in attracting black Guyanese and he was most anxious to restore the multi racial composition of the PPP 1950s origins. By mutual resolution for the WPA to concentrate principally in Afro Guyanese communities and with the PPP to instead concentrate among Indo Guyanese the anticipated unification of the WPA in the PPP was to be made easier.  Was Dr Rodney very cognizant of possible repercussions coming from predominantly black WPA activists when the unity merger was to become reality?  He chose to keep the merger plans with the PPP confidential. Many outside his “circle of trust” did not need to know.
Certainly Dr David Hinds had no need to know and did not know about the merger by his own written words of obfuscation.  In a letter to SN of 11-11-11 titled “the PPP marginalized Rodney” Dr Hinds sought to big up himself when he wrote “When Walter Rodney returned to Guyana in 1974 he joined the WPA. He was an ardent advocate of a broad alliance similar to what we have now (sic) in the form of the APNU. He wanted a close relationship with the PPP”.
Those who failed to counsel Dr Rodney to refrain from confronting the PNC by violence were most intent on preventing him from his final goals of unity within the PPP.
Dr Hinds prominently typifies those who distort Dr Rodney’s legacy to validate  the fallacy of preference  that he also “was an ardent advocate of a broad alliance similar to what we have now (sic) in the form of the APNU”.
Why any  likely WPA merger within the PPP was even pursued and led by Dr Rodney but  was constantly rejected as the worse possible alternative and horror imaginable compared to the current barren APNU crown jewel status?
Sultan Mohamed

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