Some plantation proprietors, who believed Jagan’s activities were causing ill feeling and unrest among workers, took legal action to deny him access to their estates by means either of trespass notices or injunctions in the Supreme Court.

Such measures were taken, for example, by the owners of Plantations Ogle and Schoon Ord, prompting Jagan eventually to appeal to the British government for access to the sugar estates for political purposes.

The British authorities considered the issue a delicate matter. On the one hand, they regarded Jagan’s speeches as “inflammatory” and his activities on the estates as “subversive of the S.P.A.”. Nevertheless, they felt that it would be “difficult to deny Dr Jagan the right to speak to his constituents on political matters.” Moreover, some of them were conscious that one of British Guiana’s main problems was widespread poverty among the working class due to poor wages paid by employers, especially the owners of the sugar plantations.

In the circumstances Jagan was able ultimately to have access to the sugar estates and to mobilise the support of the workers there for the PPP in the 1953 elections.

He was, however, still regarded by the British government as a threat to British business interests in the colony.

After all, he was advocating radical economic reforms in keeping with the stated aim of the P.P.P. “to build a just socialist society in which the industries of the country shall be socially and democratically owned and managed for the common good”.

The second instalment of this article will deal with the other components of the British government’s perception of Cheddi Jagan in 1953.

In 1953 Cheddi Jagan, the leader of the People's Progressive Party, was regarded by the British imperial government in London as the most important politician in British Guiana. The government's overall perception of him was the product of at least five major components. One of these components, namely, the fact that Jagan was regarded as a threat to British capital in the colony, especially British investment in the sugar industry, was discussed in the first instalment of this article. This second and final instalment will focus on the other four main elements in the British government's perception of Jagan early in 1953.

In 1953 Cheddi Jagan was regarded in London as "one of the leading labour politicians" in British Guiana, as Dr. Rita Hinden, the Secretary of the Fabian Colonial Bureau, described him in a letter to the Secretary of State for the Colonies. This reputation was derived partly from his strong championing of the interests of workers in the Legislative Council since 1947 as well as during workers' protests, such as the one at Enmore in 1948.

In 1953 Cheddi Jagan was also viewed in London as a strong opponent of the British government's plans for decolonisation in British Guiana. In particular, it was known that he did not approve of the British government's policy of gradual political and constitutional evolution towards independence. Instead, Jagan was demanding "immediate independence and self-government".

Jagan and the British government were at loggerheads especially over the new Waddington constitution, which was hailed in London as a major constitutional development with its innovations of universal adult suffrage and the grant of a measure of ministerial responsibility to the winning political party. For Jagan, however, the constitution was unacceptable for it fell short of self-government.

Jagan was particularly critical of the checks and balances embodied in the new constitution. He felt that these features were "studiedly put in at various stages to perpetuate the old order" and "will not permit any solution of the pressing social and economic problems of the people". As Minister of State Lennox-Boyd noted after an interview with Jagan in London in November 1951, Jagan believed that the constitution's checks and balances "would involve the continuance of that degree of vested influence in governmental affairs of which he complained the country had suffered so much in the past." Jagan contended that there was no need for such checks and that the elected members of the proposed new House of Assembly were capable of running the country "efficiently and prosperously".

Jagan's views, however, were not shared by the British government, who felt that the elected members would need to prove themselves able first before they could be granted greater or full responsibility. The Colonial Office maintained that until the elected members were able to demonstrate that they could handle a measure of ministerial responsibility competently, they would not inspire the confidence needed to attract foreign capital which was regarded as vital for the country's development. In short, one objection which the British government had to Jagan's views was that it was not clear what were the grounds for thinking that the territory would be more prosperous under self-government.

The British government in 1953 saw Cheddi Jagan not only as being at variance with its approach to decolonisation in British Guiana, but also as opposed to its vision of what Guyana should be after it gained political independence. It was very conscious that he was the leader of a party which was opposed to capitalism, and had announced aims and a programme "to build a just socialist society in which the industries of the country shall be socially and democratically owned and managed for the common good." It found Jagan's advocacy of nationalisation of the sugar, bauxite, gold and timber industries unwelcome.

Jagan's economic vision for British Guiana was a reflection of his Marxist ideas. The allegation that Jagan was a "communist" was, in fact, the aspect of his political make-up and activities that the British found most disturbing.

Jagan recognised that in the existing Cold War environment that it would be prejudicial to his political prospects if he acknowledged that he was a "communist" and so he sought to avoid a clear declaration of his commitment to Marxism. This was evident, for example, in the interview which he had in Georgetown with N.L. Mayne, a visiting official from the Colonial Office, in March 1952. According to Mayne, "I asked him point blank whether he thought that British Guiana would be better off as a satellite of Russia. He said no and denied he was a communist. He complained that he was being called a communist by his local political opponents for their own purposes. I said I thought he acted very much like a communist."

The British government not only recognised that Jagan's economic ideas were Marxist. It also took note that he made visits to countries behind the Iron Curtain and that he and his wife, Janet, were presented in Political Intelligence Reports from Georgetown to be "actively and openly engaged in the distribution of propaganda material of Communist origin." So, in spite of Jagan's denials and evasion, by 1953 many of the officials in the Colonial Office had come to the conclusion that he was a "communist". However, Jagan and the PPP were "not thought to be communist in the sense of being controlled by any communist organisation outside the colony."

By 1953 the British government had begun to classify Cheddi Jagan and two other leaders of the PPP namely, Janet Jagan and Sidney King, as "communists" or "extremists", while others, notably Forbes Burnham, Ashton Chase and Jainarine Singh were deemed "moderates". In short, as early as 1953, two years before the split in the original PPP, the British government had began to view Cheddi Jagan as a greater danger or evil than Forbes Burnham.

This was the earliest manifestation of a British policy, which would increasingly become more clear-cut, of preferring and eventually ensuring that British Guiana would gain political independence under Burnham's leadership rather than under that of Cheddi Jagan.