Abeng Interviews Clairmont Mali Chung from Roots and Culture Media (Part 2):The Cuffy Project

A documentary on slave revolutionary leader Cuffy is Roots and Culture Media's next project

Kaya @TheAbeng: So Clairmont, what new projects you got going on?

Clairmont Mali Chung: The new work is, I'm working on a documentary on Cuffy. As I said before, you cannot understand that history, or it's of less value, if you are not able to put in into the present; not just the information, the story, but the feeling, the ethos of revolution should be taken from the past and be placed into  present context. This is my belief. And this is what I tried to do with W.A.R.. Stories, the documentary of Walter Rodney, and this is what I'm trying to do with Cuffy. Because you cannot understand Walter without understanding the history from which Walter came - the personality, the ideas.

The idea of self emancipation didn't begin with Walter Rodney, it started a long, long, long time ago. He contextualized it and made it present; but Cuffy, when he stood up and said, "I'll never be your slave again!" to the governor, the Dutch governor at the time of Berbice, that's what he was talking about- self emancipation.

And so, doing a documentary on Cuffy is an attempt to bring that ethos into the present, but also to introduce Cuffy, not just as a figure in Guyana, as Guyana's national hero, governor of Berbice as he declared himself, but to introduce him as a world figure, someone who understand the way the world was working and  he needed to revolt and to lead a revolt. Because often times these figures are just seen in the context of their time, and never, we never extrapolate their feelings and place it amongst the present.

And so it's important for me to show the world that Cuffy was not just an enslaved African fighting for freedom, it was much more than that. Secondly, when Europeans write about enslaved men that revolt, they often contextualize it as though it were some kind of revolt or complaint about the series and the kinds of punishment that were being meted out to them. For example, in the trials that followed the Berbice revolt, many of the enslaved who testified, testified to the violence of the punishment that they received and European writers wrote about this violence as though it was something the Africans were revolting against; when in fact, it wasn't the violence, but the system that they were against. And so when, it makes sense that when Cuffy says, "I will not be your slave!" he was not talking about treatment he was receiving, it wasn't as though he was saying, "OK. I'll be your slave, just don't beat me as much." It was a much larger view, a world view.

And when you see the documentary, I hope that is the sense I am able to convey, that this was a world figure, operating in a context thirty years before Toussaint L'Ouverture, before the French Revolution and before the American Revolution - those are important points.

Kaya +The Abeng World-wide: 1763. I would always refer the whole thing as more than a revolt...more classify it as a revolution...that it wasn't something so much reactionary, it was something revolutionary.

CMC: Well, without a doubt, in my mind and in my view, after reading his letters that he dictated and  reading the journals of the sailors who visited both with captive cargo and as part of the hierarchy, it is clear to me that Cuffy and his lieutenants were much larger figures and much more informed.

"...it was a revolution because the government, the local government, the Dutch representatives, were forced to flee their seat of government. Whenever that happens anywhere in the world that's called a revolution. Why wouldn't it be a revolution simply because it was Africans who had been captive?" ~ Clairmont Mali Chung

It was a revolution because...it was a revolution because the government, the local government, the Dutch representatives, were forced to flee their seat of government. Whenever that happens anywhere in the world that's called a revolution. Why wouldn't it be a revolution simply because it was Africans who had been captive? See if the government, if you're forced to flee the seat of government, you're no longer in control.You see.  If you were to remain in control and were able to quell the revolt then you can call it a rebellion. But this was not just a rebellion, this was for control of the government of Berbice because Berbice was a separate colony. It was not attached then to Demerara or Essequibo which now makes up the Guyana border. Berbice was a separate Dutch colony, separate administration. So when they fled the seat of government, politically and otherwise, this was a revolution. The fact that they were able to come back and recapture it years later, a year later, does not change what happened. I often compare it to a heavyweight boxing match: you can beat me next week but if  I beat you today, and you're the champion and I beat you, I am the champion. You may come back two days later or a week later and regain your crown. But for the time that I was, remained unbeaten, I was the champion and so I am the government, I am the King, I am the Governor of Berbice.

And this is what Cuffy said, that he is the Governor. And so yeah, you couldn't be the governor of Berbice unless you were successful in a revolt, in a revolution.

Kaya Omodele interviews Clairmont Chung from rootsculturemedia on Vimeo.

Caribbean Short Story: Mother To Son (Comrades and Thieves II- Mass Games)

In the third row behind his school banner, the Son marched wearing crisp, clean school khakis his mother had ironed the previous night, with her own bare-ring-fingered hand; right before she had hauled back that said hand and slapped all the thiefingness out of him. The mother had scolded her son:
"If you too 'fraid to do something in front somebody face, then yuh coward if you hide and do it behind they back."
In truth, he rathered licks from her hands, any day; licks, after all, would burn and cool. But them words out her mouth always lingered, haunting him like jumbie.*
By this time, the Third-World sun had climbed nearly midday high and was pelting rays upon rays down on wave after wave of marching, perspiring school pickney.** From all over this Cooperative Republic, children like plenty-thousand ants, but in line-tight rows.
Left, Right. Left, Right. So they marched in synch, second nature after months of training drills.
'Just don't miss a beat,' the Son told himself.

Earlier that morning, these primary and secondary school students' numbers swelled under Cuffy's shadow*** as they gathered in Revolution Square. With a late start they flowed like a river up Vlissingen Road, swirled left by Camp Ayangana, then surged down towards the National Park. Marching soaking wet - but with frozen faces straight in-front; left feet forward, right arms up; right foot forward, left arm up - in perfect timing.
In the section ahead, the older National Service teens marched in military gear, lean and green like bamboo shoots in spit-shine boots.
The whole time, the Son thinking, 'Try, don't bother stand out.' The entire school seemed like government supporters- from the Head Mistress straight down to the Prefects. So each morning he just went through the motions with the rest of his classmates, pledging allegiance while a photo of Comrade Prime Minister sat high up on the classroom wall, staring down on them like a god. The son kept his family's Alliance business to himself. Like his mother said, you never know who is who.

The marching river veered right and streamed through the National Park gate. Splashes of applause from the not-far-distance dribbled through to the Son as schools, sections ahead of them, flowed and disappeared into a bowl-like canyon of stands.
Left, Right...Left...
He wondered how his cousins and them were making out marching with their own schools.
His mother's tinny voice pinged in his head. "Must remember in all the Mass Games marchin' and all yuh salutin' that is them same ones lockin' up your uncles and yuh aunties them lef' an' right."
She ain't have to keep telling him; he'd been there playing chinkie with his cousins the day when the Land Rovers rolled up. Brandishing weapons of destruction and wrong-and-strong mentalities, the babylon**** rushed in his Uncle's yard.
"Where the printin' press deh?"
"Yuh slandering' Comrade Leader with your subversive paper, eh? He should hang the whole set of all you for treason." They rounded up every adult present and carried them straight to Eve Leary.*****

Left, Right. Left, Right...Under the flogging sun the youths marched in a steady, mind-bleached rhythm. His school curved 'round a slight bend and finally entered the already crowded canyon of stands. People everywhere; the all-'bout energy slammed him like the Atlantic crashing against the sea wall.
Ahead, the rows of National Service teens rolled by the Grand Stand. As the bamboo-green uniforms passed the Prime Minister's box, they stiffened their backs all together, turned their heads right to face him, and saluted while in midstride. They held the salute 'til  they cleared the Grand Stand, then faced front with perfect tempo, marching on. Left, Right...

The Son's school now approached the Grand Stand. Just a few more yards to go.
"The government boots is not your own, y'hear me Boy?" He could hear his mother say.
At the Prime Ministers' box, one of the banner-bearers commanded:
"EYYYYES RIGHT!"
As one, they all stiffened their backs, turned their heads right and, with a snap of their right hands over their right brows, saluted in stride.
The Prime Minister and his henchmen saluted back, sharply.
As he marched by, the Son squinted into Comrade Leader's box. There, one of the bodyguards, the one with a head bigger than a lorry and a snout like a bush cow; it was Mr. Hang-All-Yuh-For-Treason, himself.
The command was shouted from up front. "FAAAACE FRONT!"
Smirking, the Son swung his head to front a full second before the rest. Chest swelled and he could hear his mother say, "Ow, de boy,"****** with she rebel self.

* jumbie- ghost, spirit
** pickney -child or children
*** referring to the monument of the Revolution of 1763 - a statue of slave revolt leader Cuffy (Kofi,Cuffie, Cuffe)
**** oppressors; an oppressive, corrupt system; or, as in this case, police forces of a corrupt system
***** Eve Leary was the Criminal Investigation Department headquarters in Georgetown
****** atta boy; like a pat on the back; subtle praise or congratulations

Mother to Son I http://consciouspen.blogspot.com/2015/09/caribbean-short-story-mother-to-son-of.html

©2015 K. Omodele