Issue#1
Nov. 2nd 2000
Is the National Democratic Movement the People’s Political Party?
...by Whirlwind Storm.
This famous quote appears on page 1 of The Democrat - The NDM’s Common Sense Solution to a Corrupt and Bankrupt Political System, Year 2000 and Beyond. Being a student of Garveyism myself, I thought I would take the time to enlighten the NDM as to the extent of their relationship with Marcus Garvey. They should know that he spoke of them long before they quoted his words.
Following his conspiratorial deportation from the United States in 1927, Garvey had returned to his homeland to continue his work. Under constant pressure from the colonial government of the time and branded a criminal, Garvey tackled them head on and ran for office. In 1929 he began campaigning for a seat on the legislative council to represent the parish of Kingston/St. Andrew. In his campaign he called for the implementation of strict laws to deal with corruption at the highest of levels. This did not sit well with the judiciary officials of the day and they charged him with libel and sent him to prison for three months. How convenient was it for the colonial government to have Mr.Garvey in a Spanish Town jailhouse during the elections? However, even with his incarceration Garvey came close to winning a seat on the parish council, but he had refused to indulge in and compete with the corrupt practice of giving political hand outs prior to an election. Many years later the words of Bob Marley would tell us in song “they sold Marcus Garvey for rice”!
Still, he continued to accomplish what he would. Shortly after his defeat in the parish council elections, Garvey, disgusted with the levels of corruption and hypocrisy within the government of the day and ever the pioneer, struck back and formed the People’s Political Party. This preceded both the JLP and the PNP by a decade. His platform was built upon tearing down corruption and implementing those changes necessary to ensure that the machinery of government operates efficiently and effectively in providing representation for all the peoples of Jamaica. Indeed, he was among the first to blow the trumpet for constitutional change in the 20th Century. Yet, the heathen continued to rage and conspire against Garvey’s efforts and in the early 1930s, feeling dejected and betrayed by his own homeland, Garvey abandoned his political efforts in Jamaica and went into self imposed exile in London. Here he would later succumb to a stroke and pass into the next dispensation, forsaken by a nation he had fought to uplift from the dungeons of mental slavery. He would be forgotten, for a time, by a country he had represented world wide through the strength of his own name and the efforts of the Jamaican born UNIA-ACL. Garvey made no apologies for being Jamaican. He was an African by race, but a Jamaican by birth and this fact he hid from no one!
Marcus Mosiah, like his namesake of biblical lore was a prophet. In 1929 he prophesized to the people of Jamaica (though in a less dramatic fashion I suppose, than in the days of Moses) the coming of two great movements. The first is well known throughout the world today having materialized from a dramatic stage production by Garvey at his headquarters in downtown Kingston where he told his audience “Look to Afrika for the crowning of a Black King… for the hour of our redemption shall be at hand”. This was the birth of the Rastafarian movement. Yet Garvey made another prophecy that year when he said publicly to the nation that should the day arrive when a third party would arise in Jamaica, this would be the People’s time!
So my friends I put the question to you… Is the NDM the People’s Political Party? Does history repeat itself or could it be that we as Jamaicans struggle today against the very same forces that conspired against Marcus Garvey? The NDM’s platform is built around constitutional reform and aimed at dismantling the corruption that has plagued our politics for decades. Think about this, Marcus Garvey was jailed for libel when he spoke out against corruption at the judiciary level of government, didnt the present day Prime Minister file suit against the President of the NDM when he spoke out against the injustices involved with the Mobay Street People scandal? I wonder, how many of our young and promising leaders of today find themselves feeling betrayed by their country? How many have migrated to other countries in self imposed exile much as Garvey did? Perhaps even Marcus Garvey himself knew not the full extent of what he had said, but is that not the case with any great prophet? Seventy years later, I say to the people of Jamaica, let us not sell Marcus Garvey once again for “rice". The prophet has spoken so forsake him no more. When a third party arises in Jamaica, this shall be the people’s time. Is the National Democratic Movement the People's Political Party that Garvey believed in and spoke of? To the NDM and its President Bruce Golding, I say to you as another election approaches- Go up to this Mighty Race! Accomplish What You Will!
NEW JAMAICAN Vol.1
