Lick Bottom African: A Response to David Hinds
David Hinds of the WPA has once again found himself at the center of controversy in Guyana. This time, the controversy stems from a recent live in which he denounced certain Africans in Guyana as “lick bottom Africans.” This was a reference to Cro Cro’s use of the term in his song “Compare and Contrast.” At the beginning of the live, Hinds played this very song, so there was no question about the fact that Hinds’ comments were a direct reference to Cro Cro’s song.
What troubled me about Hinds’ use of Cro Cro’s song is what Cro Cro’s song represents. In “Compare and Contrast,” Cro Cro denounced Africans in Trinidad and Tobago who were publicly critical of Patrick Manning, who was the prime minister of Trinidad. The song was a response to Manning’s loss in the 2010 election in which the ruling People’s National Movement was defeated by a coalition led by the United National Congress.
In Cro Cro’s view, those Africans who dared to denounce Manning were “lick bottom Africans” for their criticism of Manning. In the song Cro Cro was expressing the view that Africans in Trinidad should support their leadership to keep their leadership in power. The song was an attack on Manning’s critics in the African community, rather than a critique of Manning’s own policies which contributed to him losing the election.
My issue with this particular song by Cro Cro is that he suggests that those who opposed Manning are responsible for selling out African people in Trinidad, but the song offers no commentary on the manner in which the African leadership of the PNM sells out its own people. For example, Chalkdust is among those whom Cro Cro decries as a “lick bottom African” for his history of criticizing African leaders, but the reason why Chalkdust denounced leaders such as Eric Williams, George Chambers, and A.N.R. Robinson was precisely because they pursued policies which were harmful to the masses of African people in Trinidad. As Chalkdust himself noted in “Too Much Party,” political parties in Trinidad do not represent the interests of the masses, which is why Chalkdust has typically avoided taking strong public positions in support of any of the major parties in Trinidad.
Cro Cro’s song was a defense of Manning. For this reason, readers should note that Manning was the same man who was criticized after he chastised Makandal Daaga for wearing a dashiki. Aside from Manning’s ill-informed attempt to denounce Daaga by ridiculing him for wearing traditional African clothing, Manning’s comments were also a bit hypocritical because of the fact that Manning himself had worn dashikis for Emancipation Day in Trinidad. Manning also upheld the ban on Kwame Ture. Ture himself joked about the irony that it was the African political leaders in Trinidad who banned him and that the ban was finally lifted by the nation’s first Indian prime minister. So Manning could hardly be viewed as a leader who upheld racial pride and or as someone who represented the African community.
Manning represented the neo-colonial ruling class which came to power following decolonization. This is the class of leadership which staunchly opposed the Black Power movement. This is the same class of leadership which Cro Cro was defending in his song.
It wasn’t Kwame Ture alone who found himself being targeted by these leaders. Walter Rodney was famously barred from Jamaica. He and Kwame Ture were also banned from St. Vincent. It was so-called “lick bottom African” Chalkdust who denounced these restrictions by African political leaders who opposed the Black Power movement in the region. Chalkdust saw these leaders as misguided individuals who had failed to heed the message of the Black Power movement.
Hinds himself wrote a paper on Chalkdust’s critiques of Eric Williams in which he presented Chalkdust as being the voice of the people and an artist who challenged authoritarian leadership. Hinds noted that Chalkdust’s music also advocated “Black Nationalism, Caribbean Nationalism and social justice.” Does Hinds now agree with Cro Cro that Chalkdust was a “lick bottom African” for his criticisms of Williams?
The Working People’s Alliance was founded as a political party which was meant to represent the working people of Guyana. It was not a party which was designed to engage in the type of narrow racialized view of politics which Cro Cro expressed in “Compare and Contrast.” In fact, that was the very approach to politics which the WPA of the past opposed.
A number of individuals and groups have come forward to denounce Hinds’ remarks including the Association of the People of African Descent (APAD). In my view the issue with the remarks is not simply the distasteful and derogatory nature of what Hinds stated, but also that the remarks seem to represent a deterioration in the political theory being advanced by the modern day WPA.
