Haunted by 1980 | How Trevor Munroe got radicalised

Professor Trevor Munroe, a radical of the turbulent 1970s, has now admitted that it was “inappropriate” to weaponise Edward Seaga’s race in a struggle to advance the democratic socialist agenda which opponents said bordered communism.

The Message, a song written by Neville Martin, was a targeted missive used in the general election that plucked hard at the heartstrings of the white Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) leader who had been born to Jamaican parents in the United States.

“’My leader born ya’ ... . Clearly, in a society where you are hoping to live up to the motto of ‘Out of Many, One People’, where it was an attractive, populist way of winning support and denigrating the other side, it [was] just not appropriate, but attractive. In party politics, very often that which is attractive and that which is expedient overcome that which is right and that which is proper,” Munroe, a leading figure in the communist Workers Party of Jamaica (WPJ) in that period, said in an interview with The Gleaner.

The WPJ gave “critical support” to the PNP as it fought the JLP to hold on to state power.

Munroe agreed that Jamaicans, black people in particular, developed a sense of self-esteem during the 1970s Manley administration in a consolidation of race pride that carried over from the 1960s Black Power movement.

Munroe told The Gleaner that he had been radicalised because of how black people were treated at the time, especially those who provided labour in a booming economy but who had reaped very little for themselves.

He said the music at the time also reflected the mood of the country.

“... Marley and the Wailers, Simmer Down, what Marley was saying in that first music was ‘rude bwoy, cool it.’ There was a level of resistance and rebelliousness because of the condition of the underclass,” Munroe contended.

“When we left school, Independence came, promised much, but delivered little for the underclass and, therefore, that sustained our radicalism,” he added.

He said Manley’s democratic socialism was in response to this deep divide.

But Munroe said Seaga’s landslide victory put a damper on important reforms such as worker participation in decision-making.

Still with a charismatic Manley pushing through reforms without sound economic backing, the country’s finances collapsed.

The professor, who now heads the National Integrity Action lobby, admitted that there might have been an overestimation of what was possible.

“We didn’t sufficiently grasp that programmes of social justice had to be based on a sound economic foundation. In addition to that, there is no question at all that Manley’s challenge to the Establishment meant that they responded in a hostile way,” Munroe said, citing the economic conditions that had deteriorated under Manley in the late 1970s.

“I think in cases of this sort where you have sharp division and confrontation, each side exaggerates the flaws and negatives of the other side and the other downplays and underrates the positives, so Manley’s economics was nowhere as negative as was portrayed, particularly the growth of the domestic agriculture,” said Munroe.

Similarly, Seaga’s politics was not as negative as portrayed, said Munroe.

“There is no question at all that the big blemish on his historical contribution has been his role creating garrison constituencies. But apart from that, Seaga matured and made a great contribution to Jamaica’s cultural institutional development,” Munroe, who is a former senator, said.

romario.scott@gleanerjm.com