Walter Rodney Commission of Inquiry…Donald Ronald concludes testimony

Mar 24, 2015 News

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…reveals plan to appeal 1983 conviction
Donald Rodney, the lone eyewitness and brother of Walter Rodney, the slain Working People’s Alliance (WPA) leader, yesterday told the Commission of Inquiry that while having a walkie-talkie in those days was a risk, interacting with it with a former army member was an activity “that could attract death from the dictatorship.”

More than 34 years later, Dr. Walter Rodney’s brother ended his testimony before a Commission of Inquiry, that on the fateful night they were uplifting a walkie-talkie from alleged assassin Gregory Smith and not explosives.
Donald, the politician’s younger brother, testified that he had not parked his car in front of Smith’s house as they did the “pickup” because of the situations which prevailed in the country at the time.
The witness had been with Dr. Rodney when a walkie-talkie exploded in the latter’s lap in the vicinity of the Camp Street Prison killing him. Donald Rodney was charged and sentenced to serve 18 months for the explosive.
Yesterday, he told Commissioners that his conviction in 1983 for the said explosive was unlawful and he intends to appeal it. While on bail pending the appeal, he left the country.
Part of the Commission’s task is to ascertain the situation in the country during the period under review (1978 – 1980)
Attorney-at-Law Basil Williams who, is representing the interest of the People’s National Congress (PNC), questioned Rodney about earlier statements that the then Prime Minister, Linden Forbes Burnham at the party’s Third Biennial Congress in 1979 had said that “the WPA must make their wills.”
This Rodney had earlier testified that he heard this during a radio broadcast. Questioned by Williams that the statement said “they” and not the WPA, he maintained that he and virtually everyone in Guyana had indeed heard that being said by the Leader since it was broadcast by two radio stations.
Williams argued that the record is not showing that the PM at any point said the WPA. “He cannot sully the record of the PNC.”
Also, the lawyer directed him to his earlier testimony in January where he had said that Walter asked him to use his passport in 1980 and he gave it to him. The witness recalled saying that his brother had subsequently returned the passport.
Williams asked whether it was lawful to hand his passport for another man to travel and the witness said, “It is illegal but legitimate.”
Asked whether he was agreeing to participate in something that was illegal, the surviving Rodney said, “I was taking part in an enterprise that was legitimate against the dictatorship.”
“Didn’t you think it was immoral? That it was immorally wrong?” the lawyer probed but Rodney held that it was legitimate.
Williams asked if that was his approach to life at that point, to which the witness said it was his response to the circumstances to the country at the time where they were facing “a bigger illegality.”
“Since you believe that you could, with impunity, breach the law of the land and decide it’s legitimate, you agree that we really can’t believe anything that you say?” the lawyer asked. But Rodney said he spoke the truth, yet it was “up to you to decide whether you believe or not.”
The lawyer probed too whether the witness believed it was possible that his brother and the former Sergeant had talks unbeknownst to him about the said walkie-talkie. “It is very much possible,” Donald Rodney said.
Williams asked if it was that Walter Rodney and Gregory Smith had their own agreements on the device, that the former Sergeant was surprised when the younger Rodney had shown up at Smith’s house on June 13, 1980 to uplift the device that night.
“I’m putting it to you, because you turned up and he (Walter Rodney) remained in the car, he (Gregory Smith) accompanied you back to the car so that he could explain instructions to Walter himself.”
But Donald Rodney said that Smith had not accompanied him to the car.
Continuing, Williams asked him if he left Guyana through illegal channels but he said no. “I was not making myself unavailable to the judicial process to the country…I am here now.”
Williams asked whether he had any qualms about being a fugitive from justice but the witness said he believed he was a “fugitive from injustice.” Under question about the morality of his choice, Donald Rodney said that he saw nothing wrong with “leaving injustice.”
“If you felt that you were innocent, why would you think that was injustice?” Williams asked. He said “Well I am innocent and I am not a convict.”
“You operated like a guilty man by fleeing…just like how you fled the scene that night,” Williams said. The witness debunked that claim. The lawyer suggested to the surviving Rodney that he knew that the device he collected from Smith was an explosive device and not a walkie-talkie.
Williams suggested to Donald Rodney that he fled the scene of the explosion because he knew that he was involved in an “unlawful enterprise with the so-called walkie-talkie” to which the witness said “I didn’t flee the scene. I went to get help for Walter, medical attention.”
This, the witness clarified, meant he went to get medical attention for his brother and to get the “precious walkie-talkie” out of the car.
The PNC lawyer suggested that it was untrue that the Magistrate did not write statements during the trial to which the witness said that the Magistrate had stopped writing at a certain stage.
The witness claimed that he pointed this out to her during the trial. Questioned whether he is aware that the record did not reflect that this was pointed out to the Magistrate, Donald Rodney too, claimed that many things had been neglected during the trial.
Under cross examination by Lead Counsel to the Commission, Glen Hanoman, Rodney said that he interacted with the Former Sergeant in 1979 – 1980; during which time he had been to Smith’s house three times; the day his brother died being the last.
The Commission lawyer asked the witness, too, whether he had any reason to believe that delay by Smith in handing over the device was ever thought to be because he was working with another party. He said he never gave any reason.
The Commission heard that he was under the impression that Smith was designing and building “this unit” and it never occurred to him that he was working with another person.
Asked whether he had any conversation with Smith about detonators, he said no.
“After the explosion, did you consider that your brother was still alive?” Hanoman asked. He said that the impact silenced Walter in midsentence and this was enough for him to realise that he needed assistance.
He said he had not rendered assistance because he couldn’t see well and his hands had lost sensation and he realised that he could not help.
He was questioned whether he was reluctant to tell the police what happened since he had not reported what happened that Friday, until Sunday. He said it took him some time to work out the “puzzle in his mind” as to what happened. He said before that it would have been “self defeating to give a statement to the police.”
Rodney told Commissioners that he didn’t perceive the police as a unit that acted fairly.
Asked whether he wanted to take steps to find the man who gave the device, he said yes but the police wouldn’t have wanted to assist. “My faith in the Guyana Police Force was shaken since the day of Father Darke’s killing,” he said.
During reexamination by his lawyer, Scotland brought Donald Rodney to the words he had spoken to WPA members when he arrived at the Croal Street house. He had said that something terrible had happened and in the witness stand he clarified that he meant something terrible had happened to his brother and they needed to go help him.
It was then too, that a document detailing the younger Rodney’s trial prepared by Amnesty International was presented to the Commission and tendered as evidence. Part of the report was read which spoke about the trial, stating that the younger Rodney had stated that he had no knowledge that the device had explosives in it.
The Commission heard that his lawyer has since drafted a constitutional motion for appeal. It has not yet been filed.
The witness clarified too that he had not parked in front of Smith’s house that night because dealing with the walkie-talkie was banned and also interacting with it with a former army member, “that could attract death from the dictatorship.”
Today, sister of former Guyana Defence Force (GDF) Sergeant Gregory Smith, Ann Wagner will take the stand. The former Sergeant and Wagner and published under the title “Assassination Cry of a Failed Revolution: The Truth about Dr. Walter Rodney’s Death”.
The book presents a version of events from Smith’s point of view. Yesterday was the COI’s sixty-second session. The Commission will sit for this week and will go into recess until some time after Regional and General Elections.

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