| Though initially reluctant, lone-suspect and former Sergeant of the Guyana Defence Force (GDF),Off White Air Max 97 For Sale, Gregory Smith, agreed to assist in the violent plans Dr. Walter Rodney had in 1980 for a better Guyana.Nearly 35 years later, the Sergeant’s sister, Anne Rita Wagner, yesterday, returned to testify before a Commission of Inquiry that on the fateful night the late Politician set out to further his cause by “any means necessary” and had earlier recruited Smith to build a triggering device for a bomb.The 72-year-old woman told Commissioners that as far as her brother knew, the explosive was to be used on a building and Dr. Rodney could not ascertain whether anyone would be hurt in the process.Wagner, who migrated to the United States of America in 1970, testified for the second time before a High Court Library packed with reporters, family, lawyers and political activists. Her tale was based on conversations she had over the years with her brother.Yesterday, the witness told Commissioners that on the night of June 13, 1980 when the Rodneys ventured to her brother’s Russell Street residence, a triggering device was uplifted.“He (Dr. Rodney) called my brother and said he (Dr. Rodney) had a window of opportunity and he must get this device now. It wasn’t a walkie-talkie, it was a triggering device,” the witness stressed as she was being grilled by Andrew Pilgrim, the Attorney representing the interest of the late politician’s immediate family.Wagner had previously said that her brother and the late politician were friends who met often and were working against the oppression in the country. She said that the politician wanted handmade bombs to further his cause. Smith had not wanted any part in violence.She said that Rodney and his brother, Donald Rodney, were the ones who inserted a bomb in the device since her brother had only created a triggering device at the late politician’s behest.Wagner said that Smith was a member of the Working People’s Alliance (WPA) and it was the said party that wasted no time in smuggling him to Cayenne, French Guiana after the bomb-blast that killed their leader, Dr. Rodney on June 13,Brent Seabrook Jersey, 1980.Dr. Rodney was the party leader and Wagner was sure that his death was an accident; a result of the politician’s own doing. Wagner told commissioners that despite many accusations those days, her brother was not responsible for Dr. Rodney’s death.Wagner, who authored “Assassination Cry of a Failed Revolution: The Truth about Dr. Walter Rodney’s Death” with Smith, recently returned from her New York,Gorgui Dieng Jersey, United States of America residence to offer her version of events to the Commission and clear her brother’s name.Yesterday as she continued, the Commission heard that the triggering device was something the siblings discussed prior to the June 13, 1980 bomb-blast. Wagner said her brother assured that “he said he was not involved in killing anyone.”According to Wagner, Smith believed that Dr. Rodney would be “blowing up buildings.” She told the Commission that her brother asked the late politician whether lives would be involved; a question Dr. Rodney could not answer.It was to this end that her brother reportedly told the politician that he wanted no part in making bombs. Wagner said, however, that constant meetings and conversations with the politician was what led to him deciding to help Dr. Rodney.Wagner categorically stated that she knew what Dr. Rodney wanted to do. “You could read the newspapers and you could hear all the different things all the different plans. I have got the newspaper articles…I understand that my brother was going to help with a triggering device.”Asked about any advice she offered Smith, “I told him to stay away from the WPA, I don’t trust them…but he was just focusing on Walter; saying Walter is a good person. He just saw him as wanting to do better for Guyana.”Wagner told Commissioners that her brother was assisting Dr. Rodney. “This is what I understood. Dr. Rodney had his plan and he was doing it by any means necessary and what he did is use my brother and got what he wanted,” she said.“Dr. Walter did not explain to him what building, what time; nothing. When they picked it up, he (Dr. Rodney) called my brother and said he (Dr. Rodney) had a window of opportunity and he must get this device now. It wasn’t a walkie-talkie,Adam Foote Jersey, it was a triggering device,” she stressed.This, Wagner interpreted to mean that Dr. Rodney had a chance and “had to do what he had to do.”She said she learnt of the politician’s death via reports in the media circulating.Claims that Smith was a member of the WPA also came under question. Wagner said that long before the incident her brother told her that he was a member of the party but at the time she did not probe it because at the time it didn’t matter to her.Wagner said that it was after the fateful night that her brother further discussed his membership with her.Most of which she said was documented in notes Smith made during his lifetime as well as the manuscript he later handed over to her on September 30, 1999 for her to write the book.Pilgrim questioned Wagner, too, on the aircraft that had transported her brother, asking whether she knew to whom it belonged but the woman could not answer. She said while she knew that there was not many aircraft in the country at the time, she did not focus on politics as she was more concerned on what he had endured.On Monday when Wagner offered her evidence in chief, she said that after the incident her brother was deployed to Kwakwani, a mining community in Berbice, then moved onto Trinidad by boat before returning to Guyana. Later, he was smuggled to Cayenne, French Guiana.This, she said, was orchestrated by the WPA.Her brother, she said, felt abandoned by the WPA when he arrived in Trinidad. When he later made it back to Guyana, he went to the house in Alberttown and the names of the “brothers” that he met there were documented in the book, as written by Smith.She told Commissioners that in writing the book she was afraid and didn’t interview anyone or research who those men really were. “I didn’t really do any research to attract any attention to me…He told me they were WPA operatives.”Smith’s passport was submitted before the Commission and it came under scrutiny by the Rodneys’ lawyer. A trip by Smith to Guyana in 1982 was highlighted by Pilgrim.She said in it wasn’t until 1987 that she found out that her brother had ventured to his homeland five years before. She said that her brother knew how worried of him she had been and withheld that information from her.“When he told me he went in 1982, I almost died…I was worried because of what he had gone through. By 1987, you know how many attempts he had on his life? I almost died when he told me,” she said.The passport showed that Smith had purportedly left Guyana on June 19,Andy Greene Jersey, 1982 for Guyana and returned to his Cayenne residence later that month.Despite being questioned that it was during that period that Smith got his “new identity” in form of a birth certificate, but the witness insisted that the identity of “Cyril Johnson” was given to him when he received a package with the documents, passport and birth certificate included, from Brother Fowler and “some guys” the night they took him to the airport for Cayenne.Pilgrim also questioned the view that Smith and Rodney were friends.The 72-year-old woman told Commissioners that she drew this conclusion not only from conversations with her brother but also after speaking with Holland “Jomo” Yearwood, her brother’s interview with the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), newspaper articles,Air Max Zero Sale, the stories she heard on the radio and conversation with his spouse.Her brother, she told the Commission, was very selective about the friends he kept.WPA lawyer, Christopher Ram commenced cross-examining Wagner yesterday and will continue when she returns to the stand today. |
