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WEEK ENDING May 29, 2014 | www.caribbeantimesinternational.com
Brindley Benn
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UYANA: The struggle for independence was never easy, but those who struggled relentlessly made it appear that way. To many, the fighters for Guyana's independence were the late Dr Cheddi Jagan and Forbes Burnham, but there were many others who ensured similar fates. Brindley Benn, CCH, who died in December 2009, is one of those who struggled alongside the two late presidents and others; he was downtrodden, imprisoned and restricted in different quarters in the fight for Guyana's independence from colonial rule. Benn was born in the village of Kitty, Georgetown, and attended the St. Jamesthe-Less Primary School (now F. E. Pollard) also in Kitty. After leaving school, Benn worked with the bauxite company in Kwakwani. His parents were living there at the time. He returned to Georgetown in the early 1940s when the bauxite company started to scale down the workforce. He taught at a high school in Georgetown before owning his own school, Georgetown Secondary School, which he ran for a few years. He also led a strong religious life and was in fact a Chorister at St. James the Less Anglican Church and later became Choir Master at the St. Sidwell’s Anglican Church around 1945. He served in that capacity until the choir was disbanded. Subsequently, Benn started teaching at the Indian Education Trust, now Richard Ishmael
The late Brindley Benn
Secondary School. At the time the Indian Education Trust was situated at the corners of Church and Carmichael Streets, where the Ptolemy Reid Rehab Centre is now located. One evening, Benn attended a public meeting at Norton and John Streets, and listened to Dr Cheddi Jagan, who was criticising what was happening in the bauxite industry and in the colony generally. He was impressed by Dr Jagan’s speech and joined the PPP the same night. He immediately became very involved in politics. When Guyana Times Sunday Magazine visited him at his Ogle East Coast Demerara home in early 2009, Benn could still remember what he endured during colonial rule for Guyana’s Independence. He said it was not easy as on several occasions while carrying out his work among the working class and party members he was harassed and his work hindered. During this time there was much strife, and people need to be re-
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assured and comforted. “You had to be consistent and let the people know that you are taking care of their needs,” Benn said, adding “... so you did everything to make it come proper.” When the constitution was suspended in 1953, Benn was detained and put under restriction orders in New Amsterdam, where he had to conduct party activities. He was ordered to report to the police daily between 8am and 10am except Sundays. Initially his wife and children visited him, then after several raids by the army and the police on his brother’s home where he lived during his restriction period, it was decided that his wife and family would move to New Amsterdam. Mrs Benn and her children relocated to New Amsterdam, where they lived for about two years. She recalled, in the 2009 interview how the family struggled to maintain their support to him in the fight for independence. “It was rough. After the split in the PPP, the struggle had to continue to press for independence, especially, [since] the British government wanted to give us piecemeal.” Nonetheless they continued supporting Benn and the efforts Guyana for independence. “At times when he could not make it to his meetings, I had to continue his work – going to meet with people, have continuous talks with them to raise their morale, selling the Party’s papers and so on to keep the PPP machinery operating,” Mrs Benn recalled.
Benn (left) with Dr Jagan circa 1960s
When the family returned to Georgetown in 1956, Benn was elected Chairman of the People’s Progressive Party and Member of the Executive Committee. The Party contested the 1957 elections with Brindley as the representative of the Essequibo Islands and the Interior, and won the elections in that constituency. He was appointed Minister of Community Development and Education in 1957, and during this time he organised the National History and Culture Week under the theme, ‘One People, One Nation, One Destiny’. Benn said he wanted to emphasise the need for development, patriotism and unity hence he coined the phrase. After the change of government in 1964, the theme was carried forward and at Independence it was made the National Motto of Guyana. He said he always felt that “as long as people know what is best for us we should work towards achieving that best”; part of that is having one
nation of one people with a common destiny. Mrs Benn said she and her family are proud that her husband could make such a significant contribution to the country as then “he felt it was very right that in a land with such a diverse people there was a need to forge the nation as one and this is still applicable even today”. Benn also served as Minister of Agriculture after the 1961 elections which the PPP also won, and formed the Guyana School of Agriculture during his tenure as he felt “it was necessary for people (farmers) to be given scientific information among other things to develop the agriculture sector”. During the disturbances in the early 1960s, when the British managed to successfully split the PPP along racial lines, he was imprisoned by the British. He became the most prominent Afro-Guyanese to remain with the PPP, making a statement against the divide-and-rule tactics of colonialism. He and several ministers and other important persons were
detained at Sibley Hall, Mazaruni Prison for several months. After his release in 1965, Benn moved away from the PPP and established the Working People’s Vanguard Party. In the 1970s he joined with Walter Rodney, Eusi Kwayana, Andaiye, Moses Baghwan and Rupert Roopnaraine, to form the Working People's Alliance. After the 28 years of PNC rule when the PPP won the 1992 elections, Dr Jagan offered Benn to be on the PPP’s List of Candidates and he won a seat in Parliament. He was later appointed Guyana’s High Commissioner to Canada, a position he held with distinction from 1993 to 1998, and for which he was awarded the Cacique Crown of Honour. After his return to Guyana, he served as Chairman of the Public Service Commission for three years. He was also a member of the Teaching Service, Police Service and Guyana Lotteries Commission. (Guyana Times Sunday Magazine)
Shark sanctuary set up in British Virgin Islands
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ORTOLA, BRITISH VIRGIN ISLANDS: Global shark numbers have been dwindling rapidly in recent decades, largely due to overfishing driven by the rising demand for such exotic delicacies as shark fin soup. With experts estimating that about 100 million sharks are killed each year in commercial fisheries around the world, the shark population is further eroded by low fertility rates. Against this backdrop, the British Virgin Islands (BVI) has declared its territorial waters a sanctuary for all shark species to help protect the large marine predators and maintain the balance of the ocean environment. The BVI Cabinet has con-
Reef shark (CMC file photo)
sequently banned commercial fishing of all shark species in the 30,933 square miles (80,117 square kilometres) of its exclusive economic zone. It’s not clear how the archipelago of about 60 small islands will police its waters, which are home to reefs where divers can view such shark species as oceanic whitetips
and scalloped hammerheads, as well as reef sharks. Explaining the decision, Kedrick Pickering, deputy premier and minister for natural resources, said the loss of sharks disrupts the predatorprey balance, compromising the health of oceans and reefs and the survival of other marine creatures.
“The best way to manage their populations is to let them fulfil their ecological role as apex predators,” Pickering said at a conference in Belgium. The British territory said it is also protecting rays, whose numbers have sharply declined over the years. Researchers with the International Union for the Conservation of Nature have said that about one-quarter of the world’s sharks and rays are threatened with extinction. British tycoon Richard Branson of the Virgin Group of companies has long been urging Caribbean governments to better protect marine environments, making special mention of sharks and rays.
At a conference he hosted on Necker Island, his private island in BVI last year, several regional governments committed to establishing shark protections by May 2015. “The British Virgin Islands has shown leadership here and I urge other countries and territories in the region to follow suit to create a Caribbeanwide sanctuary to protect these magnificent animals,” Branson said in applauding the sanctuary announcement. According to Pew Charitable Trusts, which has pushed shark conservation efforts around the world, BVI joins the Bahamas and Honduras as the first governments in the Americas to declare shark sanctuaries. (Caribbean News)