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By Selwyn R. Cudjoe, Ph.D.
August 7, 2024
In his address to the nation on African Liberation Day, our grieving leader called on grieving citizens to focus on the outstanding contributions of African Trinidadians and Tobagoers at home and abroad.
He urged universities in the West Indies, Trinidad and Tobago and the Southern Caribbean to “further research and then highlight and promote African cultural heritage in the country’s art, literature, music, religion, theatre, fashion, cuisine, technology and experiential skills”. (The Express, 1 August 2024.)
Now, I’m not quite sure how universities do this. I used to think it was people/researchers who did this, but I could be wrong.
More importantly, it takes a huge amount of money to research the people and relationships listed in the Leader. I did extensive research on Eric Williams, CLR James, and George Padmore. It cost money to do so.
With the exception of Sylvester Williams, all the people the Leader asks us to study lived in the twentieth century. In his view, intellectual events before the twentieth century are unimportant.
He does not seem to realize that many of the ideas of these twentieth-century scholars were derived from nineteenth-century scholars and thinkers.
The nineteenth century produced many outstanding figures who are worth studying and learning from. I think of Jean-Baptiste Philippe, author of The Free Mulatto, Michel Maxwell Philippe, author of Emmanuel Apadoka, LB Trontchin, the great nineteenth century scholar, JJ Thomas, author of The Theory and Practice of Creole Grammar, Philip Henry Douglin, author of one of the most outstanding Emancipation Day speeches ever, Emmanuel Mzombo Lazar, and Charles Petioni.
The works of these patriots emerged from the depths of slavery and the social and political conditions that followed. As Venezuelan linguist Ludovico Silva said of Karl Marx: “Material slavery did not prevent the birth of imaginative beauty in his heart.” (Marx’s Literary Style)
In his introduction to Thomas’s Pride, James says: “I am continually struck by the fact that so many of us have won the attention of the outside world with attitudes that are precisely the attitudes that characterize the work of Jacob Thomas… From Toussaint Louverture to Fidel Castro, our people have written a rich chapter in the book of history.
“Whoever they are, whatever they have been, they are West Indians, a peculiar social product.” This is the core of the idea that we must strive to separate out.
Our grieving leaders infer, without any evidence, that “only by accepting these tasks can the people of this country fully appreciate our challenges, our failures, and our many successes.”
He did not say who would write these biographies or who would undertake this difficult task, but he was certain that reading them would restore our glory.
Sir Hilary Beckles seems to have a richer basis for thought when he talks about the “younger generation of men struggling to fit in”.
He said: “Young people do not believe that they can be treated equally and become equal citizens. We have to find a way to transform these young people… to look at this issue with new eyes.” (The Express, August 2)
In other words, blaming Europe once again, as leaders do, is not enough to lead us out of our current social predicament. Black boys and girls will continue to be devoured by this system.
The leader must demonstrate how these people’s track records will help us get out of the disastrous situation we are in. His government has been in power for nine years. What has he done to implement the tasks he has set out?
The leader’s speech can only be described as the spin of an ideologue bent on throwing any crude and backward clichés at a jaded populace in the hope of gaining something.
This is a classic case of confusing society’s legal and political facades, “like an intellectual ostrich, forgetting or denying the real economic foundations that support the entire facade.”
He works hard, with his eyes only on “the structure that supports the foundation, and not the other way around – he judges society by what it thinks of itself, by the intellectual clothes it wears, rather than by the real relations maintained by the individuals who compose it.” (Marx’s Literary Style)
One day, leaders will realize that solving the problems facing black people requires serious thinking, not improvisation, and that people and problems must be viewed in a new and different light.
Dear Mr. Leader: Wake up and feel the pulse of society.
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