Guyana has produced many outstanding citizens who have dedicated their lives to lifting up their fellow human beings both as individuals and as communities. These people quietly, without fanfare, just do their thing. One such person was Ms. Elaine Greene. Last weekend Guyanese in the Washington DC metropolitan area and further afield bid farewell to this outstanding Guyanese of Buxton extraction—Miss Greene, as she was fondly called by at least four generations of Buxtonions. On Saturday, May 2, Buxtonions in Buxton will say final farewell to this matriarch of the village at home and abroad.
Miss Greene was the quintessential Community Servant-Leader. She served selflessly in numerous organizations—from the Girl Guides and The Mothers Union to the Women’s Auxiliary and the PNC to the Committee for the Improvement of Buxton (Cimbux) in the USA where she spent the last decades of her life of nine decades and more. As another Buxton-bred Community Servant-Leader, Eusi Kwayana, observed: “There was nothing important going on in Buxton-Friendship that Mrs. Greene was not involved. She was part of everything positive in the village.”
As I moved around Guyana and the rest of the Caribbean I realized that every village and ward has had a Miss Greene. This is what makes this one from Buxton more important; she was part of a noble tradition. Miss Greene was a nation builder long before that term became popular. She had a peculiar instinct for organization both as process and institution. She was one of the most able organizers. Her philosophy was that leadership was also followership. As a leader she planned and participated; she partook in planning the Souse Party and cooked the Fishcake for the party which was held in her yard. Servant-Leader to the end.
As a political activist, she was an early builder of the PNC’s Women’s Auxillary which later became the WRSM and now the NCW. She served the party and the village in the Buxton Village Council. What I admired about her as a political person was the fact she was a loyal party member but not a partisan. When some PNC members took sides after the Burnham-Kwayana split in 1971, Miss Greene shunned that road.
My own personal attachment to Miss Greene goes back to when I was seven years old. She casted me as a lead actor in a play she directed. At the end of the successful run of the play she told my aunt that I would become a politician or a dramatist. That I have participated in both politics and drama was due in large part to Miss Greene’s constant encouragement which never waned. I am eternally grateful to her for that early confidence. I end with something that many people did not pay attention to about Miss Greene—she was never afraid to be led by people who were generations younger than her. That alone elevates her to a different category. I salute you Ms. Greene.
Dr. David Hinds, a political activist and commentator, is an Associate Professor of Political Science and Caribbean and African Diaspora Studies at Arizona State University. More of his writings and commentaries and other news and views on Guyana and Caribbean politics can be found on his YouTube Channel Hinds’ Sight: Dr. David Hinds’ Guyana-Caribbean Politics and on his website www.guyanacaribbeanpolitics.com