Greenidge says new emerging industries...

freedom, once achieved, has to be safeguarded by those who wish to enjoy the freedom, by being alert and defending their freedom and enduring many, many type of sacrifices and privations,” he stated.

Trade union

According to the minister, within a year of the deaths of the 15 martyrs, a New Amsterdam reverend sought to organise workers and established a trade union in New Amsterdam to protect the rights of workers. However, he noted, those efforts failed due to retaliation by plantation owners and others.

“Whilst that particular effort didn’t last very long, in a relatively short space of time, Guyana was home to the first functioning trade union throughout the British empire,” he further noted, referencing the influence of Hubert Nathaniel Critchlow.

The minister stressed that in striving to improve Guyana and by ensuring that the interests of all Guyanese are pursued, citizens can ensure that their efforts bear fruit in the long term and that they achieve their goals by focusing on more “narrow personal or sectorial interests”.

Additionally, he noted that there are many chapters in the history of Guyana’s struggle for justice, acceptable working conditions and recognition of the rights of workers. “The sacrifice of the Rose Hall workers is but one chapter in a long and extensive book of episodes that describe the experiences of the workers, their working conditions and the reactions to their efforts to improve those conditions,” he said.

According to Greenidge, the struggle for change touched relations between employers and labourers, and also between government and labourers. “Because at that time, even picketing posed a problem and in law was effectively defined in such way, that even peaceful picketing could land those accused of it— those accused specifically of hindering other workers from work, even if they didn’t use violence—it could involve them in being jailed and exposed to the full force of the law,” he related.

Also present at the wreath laying remembrance ceremony in Rose Hall, East Canje, Berbice, were Ministers Keith Scott, Karen Cummings, Khemraj Ramjattan, George Norton and Jaipaul Sharma and Regional Chairman, David Armogan, who delivered brief remarks. Also present were children of some of the martyrs and members of the East Canje Humanitarian Organisation.