The stalemate between the WICB and the nucleus of the West Indies Team is a labor dispute. There are many other issues like performance and profits that come to the fore in a labor dispute. But it’s only in this context, labor as a commodity, that we find a real solution: abolition.
Labor disputes and the struggles of working people form an essential part of the Caribbean history: Its culture, its creed, its cricket. It is a region the ancestors of whose inhabitants, in the overwhelming majority, were brought to the region for their labor. Moreover, as noted Caribbean economist, Dr. Clive Thomas, opined, “I don’t think that we can easily forget that this was the cradle of capitalism. We really forged in many ways through the plantation, and through slavery, through all those experiences, the prototypical capitalistic institutions”[1]. Slavery and indenture paid for the machines that powered the age of industrialization and its excesses continue today in the advance of technology and globalization. However, the structure and institutions that created that society remain in large part. The West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) developed in this context. There is no external mechanism to disband it. Regional governments have no power to challenge it. It is closest in structure to the corporation which, as a legal construct, cannot die except by suicide or mass revolt. It is tyrannical by definition.
Within this labor rich construct developed a class, originally peopled by Europeans, but later to include others of color, that built and maintained the local institutions. The ‘make-up’ of the West Indies cricket team (WI) reflected this construct. These institutions, at first, excluded the laborer and their children. So, in the late 1920s, when Sir George Headley slaughtered bowlers wherever they met, the hearts of workers grew, chests pushed up and necks stiffened. Every blow was a blow for us in a team which he could not Captain because of his color and class. He did eventually captain the team, on a short term basis, but this was after the war, 1948, and at the end of his career as the modern labor movement was beginning to make its next strike at the ruling class. Yet it would be another decade before a ‘Black’ would be captain of the West Indies team in the form of Sir Frank Mortimore Maglinne Worrell; the Don of West Indies cricket. Slowly the locals were allowed-in and rose through the ranks replacing the European ruling class: quicker in some territories than others. It was the dapper, on and off the field, Frank Worrell who refused, in 1948 to tour India because the West Indies Cricket Board refused to meet his pay demands. He would have made captain earlier perhaps but for his ‘strike’ for a better wage. When he finally donned the captain’s blazer the discussion of the West Indies Federation was the hot topic: The Caribbean as a single economic and political entity. And he more than most embodied that dream of the Caribbean as one but moreover sought to throw off the yolk of imperial power. He would again refuse to tour the sub- continent ostensibly because of his university studies. So this legacy of labor as a commodity and the struggle for a better wage did not begin with Chris Gayle.
The labor movement in the region did not begin in 1948. The history of the movement is written in rebellion and revolution on every plantation. Haiti in 1804 being the most notable, but often forgot is Berbice in 1763 as well as the Maroons’ lengthy struggle with the British in Jamaica. These struggles continue until today. Names like Uriah ‘Buzz’ Butler in Trinidad and Hubert Nathaniel Critchlow in Guyana who is reported to have formed the first labor union in the region: the British Guiana Labor Union. This was followed by Bustamante and the older Manley in Jamaica, Jagan in Guyana and others. Young boys born in Guyana during the post war years, with the names Hubert or Nathaniel, were usually named after the famed labor leader, Critchlow, who started as a stevedore, a laborer on the waterfront, to become a regional figure. I suspect this was instrumental in naming, Sir Clive Hubert Lloyd, OA, OR PhD[2]. Lloyd, perhaps the next most important captain, indicated in his retirement speech to the WICB that he saw himself as “the continuation of the revolution started by Sir Frank Worrell”. It was Sir Clive who abruptly resigned from the West Indies team and captaincy and went to play instead for World Series Cricket started by Australian media mogul, Kerry Packer. He resumed his career as WI captain 18 months later and richer.
More recently in a www.cricinfo.com article, Nagraj Gollapudi wrote about and quoted Lloyd, “His main grouse was why the board needed to pay the five players who had to opt out of the IPL mid-way to join England tour earlier this summer. ‘WICB received $2 million for the England series but our players wanted 600, 000,’ Lloyd said. ‘Then we had to compensate someone for missing out on the IPL(Indian Professional League). What I can't understand why we need to compensate and pay somebody to play for your country. That to me is nonsense. We moved up to $1.48 million but they stuck to their guns and said the board still had to compensate the players who missed out on the IPL’.” Chris Gayle and Fidel Edwards were the only two players who cut-short there contract with the Indian Professional League to play for the West Indies. This is a big difference from cutting short your contract with the WICB to play for someone else: as Sir Clive did. How soon we forget. Its difficult, perhaps impossible, to put any quote in its original context. Lloyd as well as Michael Holding, another World Series graduate, also attacked the Players’ representative, WIPA[3] and the WICB. According to the same article Holding called the WICB ‘dysfunctional’.
Cricket, and not the WICB, is viewed as a unifying force. The ‘Federation’ died and Caricom appears comatose: certainly impotent against the might of the WICB and its benefactors. The WICB is on its way. Given the context and history that created the WICB one would have to argue for its abolition. Some may point to past successes. But it is possible that the machine is broke in more ways than one and broke beyond repair. We need a knew machine. And this, finally, is the struggle. We need a new machine because we failed to shake the yolk of foreign interference under this construction of the WICB as Worrell had envisioned it. That a WICB executive, who continues to receive a salary whilst the main workers strike, can refer to the striking workers as ‘unprofessional’ highlights the point. The local ‘middle’ classes, who form the WICB hierarchy, see themselves as the inheritors of this historical power and at the same time as vanguard against foreign dominance: A kind of Caribbean Power as opposed to Black Power. This power shares none of the values of the working people. Ever present is the foreign power.
A few years ago, the WICB attempted to renegotiate its sponsorship deal with Cable and Wireless: A ‘foreign’ corporation and perennial sponsor. Somewhere in the process, Digicel, another foreign corporation, was able to negotiate a lower price. This is a first in contract negotiation that the winner under-bids the loser. That contract was extended in 2007 with some changes that supposedly favored the WICB. Bruce Aanensen, the then CEO of the WICB negotiated on behalf of the WICB and proclaimed, (excerpted from the WICB website) "...I honestly believe that this new agreement is good for West Indies cricket, and I think that the relationship that WICB have with Digicel is a very good one, and we can build on this relationship.” Chris Gayle and company appear to disagree. A clear example of the disconnect that exists between players and the WICB. These negotiations benefited from no player input. Dinanath Ramnarine of WIPA resigned after a short-lived stint on the Board. Early this spring, 2009, during the series against England in the Caribbean, players threatened to strike. They claimed they had not been paid for the previous tour to New Zealand. Instead they settled for tape over the Digicel insignia on their uniforms. After the hastily planned tour to England that Lloyd referenced in his comments, players failed to show for a photo opportunity scheduled for the benefit of sponsors. The current strike followed soon after. Some prominent voices have come out in support of the WICB, but a cursory check show that either the Board or Digicel pay the salaries of those voices or support their institutions. In the meantime the strike continues.
The Board proceeds with business as usual albeit with an unrecognizable team. Much like the introduction in the Caribbean of Indian indentured labor after the abolition of slavery, this is designed to divide, confuse, defeat and cheapen labor. Our problem is not with the new indentures. The institution must go. The corporations have replaced "massa".The question remains, as a legal matter, how will this happen. The International Cricket Council (ICC) remains curiously silent, except for Clive Lloyd, and that is because it too stands on shaky ground. Who gave them the mandate of world cricket? The WICB is dead. It struggled with class and lost. Let’s bury it.
[1] Excerpted from an interview with Roots and Culture Films included in a soon to be released documentary entitled, “W.A.R. Stories: Walter Anthony Rodney” and included in the book, "A Promise of Revolution" edited by Clairmont Chung;published by Monthly Review Press, 2012.
[2] Sir Clive Lloyd received the Order of Australia, Order of Roraima, and honorary degrees from The University of the West Indies, Mona Jamaica, University of Manchester and University of Hull.
[3] WIPA, West Indies Players Association, headed by ex test player Dinanath Ramnarine
Labor disputes and the struggles of working people form an essential part of the Caribbean history: Its culture, its creed, its cricket. It is a region the ancestors of whose inhabitants, in the overwhelming majority, were brought to the region for their labor. Moreover, as noted Caribbean economist, Dr. Clive Thomas, opined, “I don’t think that we can easily forget that this was the cradle of capitalism. We really forged in many ways through the plantation, and through slavery, through all those experiences, the prototypical capitalistic institutions”[1]. Slavery and indenture paid for the machines that powered the age of industrialization and its excesses continue today in the advance of technology and globalization. However, the structure and institutions that created that society remain in large part. The West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) developed in this context. There is no external mechanism to disband it. Regional governments have no power to challenge it. It is closest in structure to the corporation which, as a legal construct, cannot die except by suicide or mass revolt. It is tyrannical by definition.
Within this labor rich construct developed a class, originally peopled by Europeans, but later to include others of color, that built and maintained the local institutions. The ‘make-up’ of the West Indies cricket team (WI) reflected this construct. These institutions, at first, excluded the laborer and their children. So, in the late 1920s, when Sir George Headley slaughtered bowlers wherever they met, the hearts of workers grew, chests pushed up and necks stiffened. Every blow was a blow for us in a team which he could not Captain because of his color and class. He did eventually captain the team, on a short term basis, but this was after the war, 1948, and at the end of his career as the modern labor movement was beginning to make its next strike at the ruling class. Yet it would be another decade before a ‘Black’ would be captain of the West Indies team in the form of Sir Frank Mortimore Maglinne Worrell; the Don of West Indies cricket. Slowly the locals were allowed-in and rose through the ranks replacing the European ruling class: quicker in some territories than others. It was the dapper, on and off the field, Frank Worrell who refused, in 1948 to tour India because the West Indies Cricket Board refused to meet his pay demands. He would have made captain earlier perhaps but for his ‘strike’ for a better wage. When he finally donned the captain’s blazer the discussion of the West Indies Federation was the hot topic: The Caribbean as a single economic and political entity. And he more than most embodied that dream of the Caribbean as one but moreover sought to throw off the yolk of imperial power. He would again refuse to tour the sub- continent ostensibly because of his university studies. So this legacy of labor as a commodity and the struggle for a better wage did not begin with Chris Gayle.
The labor movement in the region did not begin in 1948. The history of the movement is written in rebellion and revolution on every plantation. Haiti in 1804 being the most notable, but often forgot is Berbice in 1763 as well as the Maroons’ lengthy struggle with the British in Jamaica. These struggles continue until today. Names like Uriah ‘Buzz’ Butler in Trinidad and Hubert Nathaniel Critchlow in Guyana who is reported to have formed the first labor union in the region: the British Guiana Labor Union. This was followed by Bustamante and the older Manley in Jamaica, Jagan in Guyana and others. Young boys born in Guyana during the post war years, with the names Hubert or Nathaniel, were usually named after the famed labor leader, Critchlow, who started as a stevedore, a laborer on the waterfront, to become a regional figure. I suspect this was instrumental in naming, Sir Clive Hubert Lloyd, OA, OR PhD[2]. Lloyd, perhaps the next most important captain, indicated in his retirement speech to the WICB that he saw himself as “the continuation of the revolution started by Sir Frank Worrell”. It was Sir Clive who abruptly resigned from the West Indies team and captaincy and went to play instead for World Series Cricket started by Australian media mogul, Kerry Packer. He resumed his career as WI captain 18 months later and richer.
More recently in a www.cricinfo.com article, Nagraj Gollapudi wrote about and quoted Lloyd, “His main grouse was why the board needed to pay the five players who had to opt out of the IPL mid-way to join England tour earlier this summer. ‘WICB received $2 million for the England series but our players wanted 600, 000,’ Lloyd said. ‘Then we had to compensate someone for missing out on the IPL(Indian Professional League). What I can't understand why we need to compensate and pay somebody to play for your country. That to me is nonsense. We moved up to $1.48 million but they stuck to their guns and said the board still had to compensate the players who missed out on the IPL’.” Chris Gayle and Fidel Edwards were the only two players who cut-short there contract with the Indian Professional League to play for the West Indies. This is a big difference from cutting short your contract with the WICB to play for someone else: as Sir Clive did. How soon we forget. Its difficult, perhaps impossible, to put any quote in its original context. Lloyd as well as Michael Holding, another World Series graduate, also attacked the Players’ representative, WIPA[3] and the WICB. According to the same article Holding called the WICB ‘dysfunctional’.
Cricket, and not the WICB, is viewed as a unifying force. The ‘Federation’ died and Caricom appears comatose: certainly impotent against the might of the WICB and its benefactors. The WICB is on its way. Given the context and history that created the WICB one would have to argue for its abolition. Some may point to past successes. But it is possible that the machine is broke in more ways than one and broke beyond repair. We need a knew machine. And this, finally, is the struggle. We need a new machine because we failed to shake the yolk of foreign interference under this construction of the WICB as Worrell had envisioned it. That a WICB executive, who continues to receive a salary whilst the main workers strike, can refer to the striking workers as ‘unprofessional’ highlights the point. The local ‘middle’ classes, who form the WICB hierarchy, see themselves as the inheritors of this historical power and at the same time as vanguard against foreign dominance: A kind of Caribbean Power as opposed to Black Power. This power shares none of the values of the working people. Ever present is the foreign power.
A few years ago, the WICB attempted to renegotiate its sponsorship deal with Cable and Wireless: A ‘foreign’ corporation and perennial sponsor. Somewhere in the process, Digicel, another foreign corporation, was able to negotiate a lower price. This is a first in contract negotiation that the winner under-bids the loser. That contract was extended in 2007 with some changes that supposedly favored the WICB. Bruce Aanensen, the then CEO of the WICB negotiated on behalf of the WICB and proclaimed, (excerpted from the WICB website) "...I honestly believe that this new agreement is good for West Indies cricket, and I think that the relationship that WICB have with Digicel is a very good one, and we can build on this relationship.” Chris Gayle and company appear to disagree. A clear example of the disconnect that exists between players and the WICB. These negotiations benefited from no player input. Dinanath Ramnarine of WIPA resigned after a short-lived stint on the Board. Early this spring, 2009, during the series against England in the Caribbean, players threatened to strike. They claimed they had not been paid for the previous tour to New Zealand. Instead they settled for tape over the Digicel insignia on their uniforms. After the hastily planned tour to England that Lloyd referenced in his comments, players failed to show for a photo opportunity scheduled for the benefit of sponsors. The current strike followed soon after. Some prominent voices have come out in support of the WICB, but a cursory check show that either the Board or Digicel pay the salaries of those voices or support their institutions. In the meantime the strike continues.
The Board proceeds with business as usual albeit with an unrecognizable team. Much like the introduction in the Caribbean of Indian indentured labor after the abolition of slavery, this is designed to divide, confuse, defeat and cheapen labor. Our problem is not with the new indentures. The institution must go. The corporations have replaced "massa".The question remains, as a legal matter, how will this happen. The International Cricket Council (ICC) remains curiously silent, except for Clive Lloyd, and that is because it too stands on shaky ground. Who gave them the mandate of world cricket? The WICB is dead. It struggled with class and lost. Let’s bury it.
[1] Excerpted from an interview with Roots and Culture Films included in a soon to be released documentary entitled, “W.A.R. Stories: Walter Anthony Rodney” and included in the book, "A Promise of Revolution" edited by Clairmont Chung;published by Monthly Review Press, 2012.
[2] Sir Clive Lloyd received the Order of Australia, Order of Roraima, and honorary degrees from The University of the West Indies, Mona Jamaica, University of Manchester and University of Hull.
[3] WIPA, West Indies Players Association, headed by ex test player Dinanath Ramnarine
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