Forbes Burnham

Forbes Burnham (born February 20, 1923, Kitty, British Guiana—died August 6, 1985, Georgetown, Guyana) was the prime minister of Guyana (until 1966, British Guiana) from 1964 to 1980 and president from 1980 to 1985.

Burnham received a law degree from the University of London in 1947, returned home in 1949, and formed the People’s Progressive Party the following year together with Cheddi Jagan, the left-wing labour leader. Burnham split with him in 1955 to form the more moderate People’s National Congress. After Jagan’s party won control of the colonial legislature in two successive elections (1957 and 1961), the British, acting to halt the leftward momentum of the government under Jagan, changed the constitution in 1964 so that Burnham could form a coalition government with a small right-wing party. When Guyana became an independent nation in May 1966, Burnham was securely established as the new state’s first head of government.

Until 1970, Burnham steered a moderate course, seeking foreign investment and keeping his distance from Cuba and the socialist countries. In 1970, however, he veered sharply to the left, declaring Guyana a “Cooperative Republic,” establishing diplomatic relations with Cuba, the Soviet Union, and other communist countries, and seeking a position of leadership among Third World nations. Between 1971 and 1976 he nationalized Canadian- and American-owned bauxite mines and British-owned sugar plantations and refineries. By 1979 his policies of nationalization had reduced the private sector’s share in the economy to 10 percent. In a referendum held in July 1978 and with electoral results widely believed to have been fraudulent, Burnham sought to strengthen his party’s nearly total control of the government.

In 1980 a constitutional change replaced the premiership with a more powerful presidency, and Burnham was declared the winner of the presidential election of 1980 (which was also internationally condemned as fraudulent). Burnham’s quasi-socialist policies led in the 1980s to economic stagnation, with the country unable to export sufficient amounts of sugar, bauxite, and rice to earn the foreign exchange needed for vital imports. Burnham died while undergoing a throat operation in a Georgetown hospital.