GAWU 2007 Emancipation Day Message

One hundred and seventy-three years ago the African slaves in the colonies that were to become Guyana won their formal, legal freedom from the inhuman system of slavery.

Like the abolition of the Atlantic Slave Trade in Captive Africans twenty-seven years earlier (in 1807), the end of slavery ushered in a revolution of the social history of Guyana. Emancipation occasioned the arrival of hundreds of thousands of immigrant-labourers from India. The social, cultural and economic character of the country was then fashioned to become the legacy we have inherited today.

As we stated last year, we accept the position that had there been no Emancipation, there probably would have been no arrival of other groups who were eventually imported by a ruthless, worried Plantocracy. That is one powerful reason for the Guyana Agricultural and General Workers Union (GAWU) to congratulate the Afro-Guyanese descendants of the slaves on the occasion of another Emancipation Anniversary.

But GAWU again uses this national celebratory event to encourage the Afro-Guyanese community to REFLECT on such issues as the examples given here: firstly, what were the consequences psychological, cultural and economic of Africans’ then welcome escape from and abandonment of the plantations and agriculture? Secondly, what effects did Planter-sabotage have on the gallant attempts to establish and sustain a Village Movement, replete with smaller-scale agricultural pursuits? How did a preference for the professions and trades, as against large-scale agriculture and manufacturing, result in the African condition today? And fourthly, how were the African segment of Guyana’s population served by those Afro-Guyanese Leaders who wielded political power for three decades?

GAWU recommends that these and similar issues be the topics for serious discussions, debate and introspection even as celebrants enjoy the cultural presentations of dance, dress, drumming and SOIREES. GAWU also contends that beyond the physical celebrations, African minds must confront the challenges and dilemmas of ethnic quarrels, real or perceived. The genuine leaders of the Afro-Guyanese community must fashion programmes of survival and progress for presentations in the corridors of power where national leaders will be forced to respect and act upon these approaches. But pride, reason and common-sense must attend requests for resources.

Emancipation time must signal the rejection of mental dependence and slavery. Only then will the message of Bob Marley, the hopes and aspirations of Afro-Guyanese – and the destiny of Guyana be meaningful.

GAWU wishes Afro-Guyanese a Happy Reflective Emancipation