Next national hero should be cultural icon, says Lewis

Jamaica’s next national hero should come from among the island’s cultural icons, says Garvey student and 1960s black power activist Professor Rupert Lewis.

Lewis and Wesley Vanriel were presenters at the fifth annual Edward Seaga Distinguished Lecture, held under the theme, ‘Bringing Garvey Home: The Continuing Project’, on Friday at the Edna Manley College in St Andrew. It was hosted by Dr Amina Blackwood Meeks.

Lewis is echoing sentiments expressed by many Jamaicans who believe that reggae king Robert Nesta ‘Bob’ Marley and poet Louise Bennett-Coverley should be accorded national hero status.

“It is the creativity in culture that has given us our identity and our true sense of independence,” Lewis argued.

“Miss Lou and Bob Marley stand out among the many generations of Jamaican talent in music and athletics who have made us self-confident in the world.

“It is from our cultural icons that the next set of national heroes must come from as they are the true creators of a new Jamaican identity working with the Jamaican people,” he went on.

Lewis spoke of the impact that Garvey had on the cultural creativity of Jamaica, including his role as a playwright.

He said while much has been written of the cultural impact of the Garvey movement in the United States, especially on the Harlem Renaissance, the same is not true in Jamaica. He noted that Garvey’s cultural impact includes the arts, cricket and boxing.

“He was a big cricket-lover and big supporter of legendary Jamaican batsman George Headley. He wrote poetry, some of which has been set to music. He wrote a number of hymns and there was a Garvey hymnology,”Lewis noted.

Garvey also wrote seven plays, he disclosed, although the scripts have never been found. The titles of some of the plays include Roving Jamaicans, Slavery From Hut to Mansion, Coronation of an African King, and Let My People Go.

Return of Garvey’s remains

Lewis, who acknowledged that the return of Garvey’s remains to Jamaica in 1964 impacted him as a student at Calabar High School at the time, reminded that efforts to return those remains from England did not begin with the government of Jamaica, but with Garvey’s widow, Amy Jacques Garvey.

Her efforts failed as the British government feared the return of Garvey’s remains would stimulate unrest on the island.

Alexander Bustamante, who was prime minister at the time, later tasked Edward Seaga, then minister of development and welfare, to get Garvey’s remains to Jamaica.

However, there was no extravagance on the part of the government and suggestions to place several of Garvey’s quotes on plaques were rejected before it was finally settled on that the plaque would simply read, “ Here lies the remains of a patriot Marcus Garvey”.

Lewis said this was not surprising as Garvey’s remains were returned to Jamaica the year after the infamous Coral Gardens incident of 1963, which led to around 150 Rastafarians being killed by the security forces.

In the meantime, despite being declared Jamaica’s first national hero in 1969, much more needs to be done to make Garvey truly a national hero, said Vanriel, and economic/management consultant.

Vanriel’s comments come as successive administrations drag their feet in placing the study of Marcus Garvey on the curriculum of public schools, despite it being discussed, generally, for several decades.

It also brings into focus, a comment by the late Walter Rodney in 1968 that, “they brought Garvey’s bones but not his philosophy”, following the return of the national hero’s remains to Jamaica.

According to Vanriel, even though Garvey had been elevated into the pantheon of national heroes, it cannot be said that all Jamaicans regard him in the same light.

“For working-class Jamaicans, there is a distinctly anti-establishment register when it comes to homages to Garvey. Burning Spear’s classic, Old Marcus Garvey, laments Garvey’s unique position is not fully recognised when he’s placed in the shadow, as it were, of others declared national heroes,” Vanriel argued.

Vanriel said Garvey’s prophesy of the coronation of Haile Selassie I as emperor of Ethiopia gave him a special status within the Rastafarian ideology as a messenger roughly equivalent to John the Baptist in the Judeo-Christian tradition.

“For many of the people oppressed under colonialism, Garvey was seen not only as an extraordinary political leader, but also, and perhaps more so, as a prophetic forerunner, someone endowed with extraordinary powers. Garvey’s movement achieved tremendous success overseas, but in his native land national recognition came belatedly. Much needs to be done to make Garvey truly a national hero,” Vanriel contended.

editorial@gleanerjm.com