Honouring A Friend

[Moorbey]

DeWayne Wickham's Oct. 12 commentary, "Fugitive of his past," brings back old memories.

The late Tony Bryant was a friend. A former Black Panther, he hijacked National Flight 97 from New York City to Havana in 1969 in order to garner heavy weapons from Fidel Castro so that the Panthers could wage revolution (a race war) in the U.S.

While on the way to Havana, Tony robbed passengers at gunpoint. One of his targets turned out to be a Castro secret agent, and as a consequence, Tony spent the next 11 years in Fidel's gulags. When I last saw Tony in 1989, he still despised Fidel, loved his fellow man and would bristle whenever Castro's race-war strategy was the topic.

For Tony's sake, I oppose any endeavor that will cut any slack for Cuba until the premier race warrior himself, Fidel, is dead, buried and long forgotten. And let us not forget the victims of those thugs on the run in Cuba like Charles Hill.

Jack Waldron