Author Response To Johnson

Editor:

Greetings! I would be grateful if you permit me to reply to an article you published describing me as “wrong-headed” recently.

Jamaica’s National Movement which is the subject of my upcoming book We Come From Jamaica, was a quarter century of great change involving thousands of Jamaicans many of who threw in their lot with what was a voluntary movement that started outside of partisan politics. It was also a time of some powerful contending forces and therefore contending stories and spin.

So when one goes about writing on a subject like this, given the personalities and the propaganda, one has to be sure of one’s ground. The book is the result of ten years of work; reading, researching, consultation, interviewing, digesting, writing and editing. Nor does it claim to be all things to all people.

It is amazing that your correspondent R.B. Johnson has joined so many people who have rushed to denounce the author of this new book based only on a report in a newspaper – and not on the book itself which was not yet published and which they had, therefore, not read. Their focus has been on comments in that newspaper report regarding Sir Alexander Bustamante and their drawn inaccurate inference regarding what the author reports about Jamaicans calling for “a government of national unity.” Nowhere in the book does the expression “one-party state” appear. But somehow that does not stop people from doing their thing. Indeed, a sign of a government of national unity briefly glimmered three weekends ago when the Opposition Leader joined the Prime Minister and the Governor-General and united their voices in a declaration against crime… There is nothing in the history of Jamaicans that would suggest they cannot forge a government of national unity and make it work. On the contrary, everything that we know of the capabilities of the people of that country says they can. What is more, I think they should!

Yes, the times of which R. B. Johnson writes were joyous times when Jamaica’s political meetings were an entertainment for all. But contrary to his protestations, Bustamante’s violent tendencies are fairly well recorded (including a charge of manslaughter for shooting a man during a march that he led) and available to all who care to do the research.

Below are some other quotes from the book regarding Bustamante:

Bustamante fanned the forging fire that helped create modern Jamaica.

Bustamante was able through workers’ strikes to deliver increased wages to the masses

Bustamante’s value is reflected in the lasting union movement he pulled together into his own Bustamante Industrial Trade Union (BITU) and keeping it strong.

The union had no democratic structure. It held no annual conference, issued no financial statements, and all its officers were appointed and dismissed by Bustamante who made himself president for life.

Bustamante’s 1944 administration granted monopoly concessions to various franchise-holders including operators of public transportation for Kingston and manufacturers of cement.

Bustamante set out to make Kingston into an integrated city.

Bustamante made sure to give out work only to his own BITU members, much to the distress of the TUC.

Bustamante’s working class union members adored him.

Bustamante wrote, “It has been stated that I want to be a dictator. Yes, I do want to dictate the policy of the Unions, in the interest of the people I represent and the only ones who are giving results today are the dictators. The other elements, the minority, have had their dictators too long. Then why should labour not now have a voice?” 

When they declared that he could not fire them as “more than one coffin will come out of here today,” Bustamante rose to his full height, grabbed a chair and began swinging it at them. The chair broke on one of their backs and they all fled the room, never to return to 61½ Duke Street… In fact, he was made to pay a fine of ten pounds in court when some of those who had been driven from the office reported him for assault and battery.

A strike called by the TUC at the lunatic asylum in the city imperilled Bustamante’s plan to be sole labour leader and he led a huge mob of longshoremen and BITU adherents to the scene, resulting in a number of deaths as well as a manslaughter charge against Bustamante himself… Somehow, the criminal case against Bustamante was transferred to a Court in Saint Mary and he was freed.

Despite his autocratic tendencies, or because of them, Bustamante always looked out for the oppressed and tried to fix problems when he saw them. Strange then that it was the aloof Norman Manley who organised a political party along democratic lines while the likeable Bustamante was an autocrat who formed his Jamaica Labour Party to fight the first general election in 1944

Bustamante’s ground-breaking and heroic efforts on behalf of the labourers of Jamaica through the consolidation of labour unions into the BITU were fundamental in breaking down the power of the plantocracy, and his unique personal characteristics were central to his success. On the other hand, it was those same characteristics that created the dissention which put a chill on the national movement and still haunt the island today.

Bustamante… declared himself to be “the most staunch, the most vigorous, the most consistent and determined opponent to self-government now.”

The Bustamante government banned the flow of government advertising to Public Opinion.

Bustamante famously replied, “Saltfish is better than education,” having already declared that self-government was “worse than slavery.”

“Federation? Federation?” Bustamante replied scornfully. “You expect me to federate with a bunch of paupers?”

Bustamante said, “We move forward with the firm resolution of making Jamaica the greatest little nation on earth. With the help of God, we intend to achieve this.”

Premier Manley and Opposition Leader Bustamante then signed the Independence agreement.

And so a call by civil society for “a government of national unity” that was sounded around 2010 was really an attempt to shed partisan politics and re-unite the people – even if it would mean playing down the political parties – and complete the task of nation building.

Ewart Walters, CD, MJ
Ottawa, Ontario