Brian Rodway, Sir Lionel Luckhoo and my unchanging country

Jan 28, 2019 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

Brian Rodway died more than twenty-five years ago. I got to know him at the beginning of the seventies. I met him when I became part of the Movement Against Oppression (MAO). It started in Tiger Bay in what was then German’s cook shop. MAO later subsumed itself into the Working People’s Alliance.
Brian had an immense influence on me. And was nice to me too; he paid my fees when I became a freshman at UG. I used to be at MAO everyday because there was nothing to do on D’Urban Street, Wortmanville, except die from boredom. One day, Brian said to me that Sir Lionel Luckhoo was an outrageous man. He told me what Luckhoo said on a morning radio programme named, “Viewpoint.”
Viewpoint was on the radio Monday to Friday after the news during the seventies. It was a five minute opinion piece by very prominent citizens. Actually, I can only remember two presenters – Luckhoo and Shruti Kant, the principal of a very popular private high school on Thomas Street, North Cummingsburg, named Guyana Oriental College.
Shruti Kant (deceased), originally from India, was one of the most pleasant and nicest persons I have ever met.
Brian said that Luckhoo was heartless in his opinion on Viewpoint that the police should arrest cycle riders who do not have lights on their bikes because you cannot see them on dark streets. Brian’s point was that they were larger violators of the law that Luckhoo should pick on. At the time, I agreed with Brian.
Last week, around 8 PM, I was walking my dog in the compound of the Aquatic Centre, when I heard a loud argument on the roadway, that is, the Railway Embankment. It was a confrontation between a taxi driver and a bicycle rider. The rider yelled out, “Yuh effing blind. I deh till in de corna buddy” to which the driver relied, “Put a effing light on de effing bike so people could see yuh sc..nt.”
Why was Luchkoo harsh on bicycle users who do not have lights in the night? I guess Luckhoo probably had a similar experience to the taxi man. In those days (the early seventies), almost ninety percent of the streets in Georgetown didn’t have lamp lights. Forty-seven years after Brian fumed at Luckhoo for his point of view, I understand how Luckhoo felt.
I live on the Railway Embankment next to the CARICOM Secretariat. For two years now, the lamplights from Sheriff Street to UG road on the Railway Embankment stopped working. It is so dark that a cycle rider with dark clothes and no bike light is not easily seen. This has been my experience so far on the lightless Railway Embankment. On two occasions, I barely saw the rider and interestingly enough, one of those situations was outside the Aquatic Centre.
From Independence, onwards I have failed to understand what makes our rulers tick. Here is what you will find on the Railway Embankment if you are travelling east from Sheriff Street. There is the Aquatic Centre, which always has nocturnal activities from Monday to Sunday; Arthur Chung Convention Centre; Giftland Mall where nocturnal visitors are non-stop; the head office of CARICOM and its annex.
You can turn off from the Caricom annex and get to the soon to be opened Movie Towne complex and Hard Rock Café.
If you pass my home and you reach UG road, a right turn takes you to the newly opened Rama Krishna complex, UG and Cyril Potter College. A left turn takes you to University Garden where many diplomats live, the Gafoor hotel complex and the residence of the US Ambassador. The new GRA head office is going up across from where I live.
Surely, that area just described above would carry a huge number of foreign visitors and foreign dignitaries. How can such an area be without streetlights for two consecutive years? We have a Ministry of Tourism. We have a tourism authority. Yet one of the busiest roadways where tourists would visit is without streetlights for two years now.
It makes you wonder what has changed in this county since Luckhoo gave his opinion and Brian was annoyed at him for such a viewpoint.
Finally, I have seen two robberies in the dark on that street from my window. On one occasion, it happened just outside the Caricom Secretariat. The next morning, I went to the security to ask why they didn’t help the couple.
They told me standard operating procedure prevents them from leaving their post. Surely, by now, it is time to do something about the unnerving darkness on the Railway Embankment.

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Brian Rodway, Sir Lionel Luckhoo and my unchanging country

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