(Note: I updated the previous post with a new letter written by George Baker of the ANSUS, published in Het Parool. Baker admits that his invasion plans were supplied by seemingly American intelligence services.)
1
One evening, our family sat down to watch must-see TV—Suriname edition. Bouterse nationalized all television, so options were limited to a single channel on the Nationale Voorlichtings Dienst (N.V.D). Due to power grid issues and rolling blackouts, all scheduled TV programs ended at nine o'clock.
The lineup included Benson, Good Times, Sanford and Son, and The Jeffersons. As a fifth grader, I couldn't figure out why a man who literally ruled his own country picked shows casting other black men as butlers, junkyard operators, and a family in the projects. At least The Jeffersons made sense—George and Weezy were moving on up to big leagues of Manhattan, although they never seemed to catch a break. One thing they all were was funny.
Bouterse touted the idea of “fake news” well before President Trump popularized the concept decades later. He installed a jammer near the military barracks where he transmitted “official news” to prevent daily broadcasts of Radio Netherlands Worldwide from reaching citizen’s radios.
Eager to match efforts, the Council for the Liberation of Suriname launched Radio Vrij Suriname ('Radio Free Suriname') in Amsterdam, powered by a transmitter provided by the Cuban exile movement CID (Cuba Independiente y Democrática), operating from the U.S.2 An anonymous politician funded the hire of a pirate radio operator to secure a formidable ship, outfitted with transmitters and capable of carrying soldiers for a planned invasion. The vessel was to station itself off the coast of Suriname, ready to broadcast.3
This was about more than just delivering news; it was a struggle for the hearts and minds of the Surinamese people, who were on the cusp of receiving a hero narrative transmission spun with an expertise the Americans had honed in the 80s: crafting compelling, if two-dimensional, action figures.
As Radio Vrij Suriname prepared to fill the airwaves, and reporters readied their pens, it was clear: the battle for Suriname's future wouldn't just be fought on the ground. It would be waged in the stories told, the heroes made, and the hearts won. The stage was set, the players were ready, and the world was watching, and so was our family.
That evening’s programming kicked off with scrolling bars of text—Star Wars-style—called News for the Gehoorkastorken (deaf). It was accompanied by the Baroque musical stylings of Bach’s “Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring,” which I could only assume were for the non-Gehoorkastorken.
Most of the news that particular evening was about Bouterse’s former personal bodyguard—an former Uzi kid—like the ones patrolling our back fence. His name was Ronnie Brunswijk. Post-1980 coup, he enlisted into the National Army, climbing the ranks faster than a gecko, thanks to his brute strength and athleticism. After a stint in Cuba for commando training, he began studying with the Libyans learning terror tactics like how to kill presidents of countries by planting bombs on planes.4 One of Brunswijk’s job descriptions was keeping Bouterse supplied with a bevy of young women.
Amidst these accolades and his rise through the ranks, the tide had quickly turned for Brunswijk. Wanted posters began circulating about town, accusing him of everything from bank robbery to rape. He was considered armed and dangerous, accused of senseless acts of aggression against defenseless people.
It was all very scary (and kind of exciting)! This was my first real-life bad guy, like the kind I read about in books. It was also the first time I noticed my mother’s hair turning gray, and I begged her to dye it back to the way it was before.
The news concluded by saying that Brunswijk showed no criminal tendencies until his discharge from military service. The authorities involved in the investigation were unable to provide an explanation for his 'sudden outburst,' and crime spree.
A few days later, on May 1, the headlines on page 3 of the Dutch morning newspaper De Telegraaf told a wildly different tale: “Robin Hood Successfully Takes Action Against Bouterse.” The story continued...
“One of dictator Desi Bouterse's bodyguards has recently been taking actions against the regime in Suriname like a Robin Hood. Soldier 1st Class Ronny Brunswijk, who started robbing banks months ago and distributing the loot to the poor population, is now the terror of those in power.”
The article commented on how Brunswijk mainly targeted "money and foreign exchange from the military and government." His gang is said to have a large number of automatic firearms; at least ten major bank robberies and other robberies are said to have been committed. According to De Telegraaf, the "activities" of this "Robin Hood" were followed with "growing sympathy" by the population of Suriname. Support among the "forest dwellers" seems to be increasing, and although described by police as extremely dangerous, the Robin Hood of Suriname has not shed a drop of blood so far.
The author of the article was journalist Arnold Burlage who was living in Paramaribo then, and regularly wrote on Suriname. Some, like Dutch journalist Willem Oltmans, were critical of Burlage, calling his writings the “criminal fabrications” of a “madman.”5 Oltmans accused De Telegraaf of colluding with intelligence services for years and called them the real culprits for articles like the Robin Hood tale.
Oltmans was right on at least some accounts. Burlage stated that Brunswijk had a “small armed force of an estimated 100 forest land residents” who were “equipped with modern automatic weapons.” This wasn’t true. Mercenaries who later visited Brunswijk described his arsenal as but a few shotguns, fire extinguishers, rusty guns so old they could have been auctioned at Christie’s and swords left over from the 19th century.6 They said the rebel leader had requested a cross-bow, because he’d seen it in a movie. 7
The 1962 movie, “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance," directed by John Ford, popularized the phrase, “When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.” Whether the Robin Hood story was true was secondary. American intelligence services loved it and the liberation movements in the Netherlands were desperately for freedom fighters they could put their weight behind. In Ronnie Brunswijk, they found their man.
The blueprint for using the Robin Hood narrative politically had already been laid out by Dr. Jack Wheeler. “The Indiana Jones of the Right,” Jack grew up on a steady diet of Ayn Rand and adventure novels. He’d been the State Chairman of Youth for Reagan in the original 1966 Reagan for Governor campaign.
One day it dawned on him that there were anti-Marxist guerilla movements popping up in Soviet colonies, but nobody had really spotted this. So he mentioned it to a friend of his at the White House, Dana Rohrabacher who was startled and said: "I haven't heard anything like that; how are you going to prove it?" Jack replied: "I'll tell you how I'm going to prove it; I'm going to go out there, and find out, and come back and tell you!"
From June to November 1983, Jack, on a grant from Bob Poole and the right-wing Reason Foundation in Santa Barbara, California, journeyed with anti-Soviet liberation movements in Nicaragua, Afghanistan, and Angola. His efforts didn’t stop there.
After six months alongside the Contras in Nicaragua, the Mujaheddin in Afghanistan and UNITA in Angola, Jack became convinced that people were fighting the Soviets all over the world, but no one in Washington had a clue. So, he hatched a plan to fix that.
He flew straight from Costa Rica to Washington D.C. in November 1983 for a meeting on the third floor of the OEOB of the White House. The room was full of members of the CIA, NSC and West Wingers who Dana had put together. Jack spread pictures across the table and began telling a tale of world-wide rebellion in need of support.8
Jack’s radical notion of destabilization from within was the launch of the Reagan Doctrine, and a strategy to dismantle the Soviet Union. With backing from the Conservative Caucus in Washington, Jack founded the Freedom Research Foundation (FRF), embarking on a mission to document and support anti-communist insurgencies worldwide. His articles, such as the one headlined 'Robin Hood Commandos Battle Odds In Cambodia' (August 10, 1984), and subsequent pieces on Afghanistan, sound eerily similar to the emerging Brunswijk narrative.
Jack’s strategy wasn’t just about fighting; it was about storytelling. Wheeler envisioned using the same tactics of subversion and propaganda that he believed the Soviets employed against the West. Wheeler also put his stamp on Project Democracy through his friendship with Oliver North. The Washington Post had this to say,
“Wheeler was introduced to Lt. Col. Oliver North, the National Security Council's contact with the contras. Soon, Wheeler began advising his new friend. He also briefed William Casey, the CIA director, and he lectured Jeane Kirkpatrick in what might be called her metamorphosis from neoconservative into full-throated neocontra. The president's speeches began to ring with tributes to ‘freedom fighters,’”9 inspiring men like George Baker to believe he’d have America’s support in their private covert operations.
All in all, Jack took a total of five in-country excursions, between 1983 and 1988, often seeing combat.10 One of the countries he visited was French Guiana, which we know as a put in for uninvited reporters and mercenaries alike. In fact, Jack was spotted in French Guiana a year after the Robin Hood story broke posing as an American reporter while working with former Surinamese president in exile, Henk Chin A Sen, an advisor to the black Robin Hood himself.11
But who was this masked man? Was Brunswijk a criminal? A phantom, as some reporters suggested, created by Bouterse's propagandists? An agent provocateur of the military regime in Paramaribo? Perhaps he was a contrived strawman, concocted in Jack Wheeler’s anti-Communist fever dream? Or maybe it was all true. Could he be a modern-day William of Orange in the Surinamese struggle for independence?
Grasping the truth about Ronnie, the Black Robin Hood, is a bit like reading the novel The Last Duel, where you get three wildly different perspectives on the same event. Which one you choose may be more reflective of you, the reader, than of the man. Bouterse stated the government’s position clearly: he was a robber, a rapist, and a traitor. The Dutch press and Suriname's liberation movements treated him like the second coming of Paul Atreides, ready to regain Arrakis. A Miami Herald reporter attempting to peel back the layers of legend and find the man behind the myth caught up with a relative of Brunswijk for something a little closer to the ground.12
“Ronnie is from the Bush Negro village of Moengotapoe on the main highway between the mining town of Moengo and Albina. He later lived with an uncle in the capital of Paramaribo while he attended the equivalent of junior high school, which he did not finish. His goal was to be a soldier, and he finally made it.”
Brunswijk also was both a soccer player and fan, and his troubles began in March 1985 in Moengo, according to the relative, when he was in the stands watching a match between Moengotapoe and an army team from the capital. The trainer of the army team was an officer who was among those military men who seized power in a 1980 coup. The army team won, says the relative, by cheating. There was a scene, and Brunswijk was in the middle of it, siding with Moengotapoe. The next week, back in Paramaribo, he was dismissed from the army, ostensibly for his role in the soccer melee, but really, says the relative, because of the fact that he was a Bush Negro who stood up for the rights of other Bush Negroes.
He returned to his home area, and a bank was robbed. Brunswijk was blamed, although the relative says Ronnie was not responsible. He turned himself in and was jailed, but a short time later, he mysteriously escaped or was released without any charges filed against him. He eventually returned to Moengotapoe, where he made money by showing movies to residents on a home video set. He may have given small amounts of his profits to relatives, giving birth to the Robin Hood story, says the relative.”
A comrade of Brunswijk confirmed elements of this story, saying that Ronnie and 19 other of Bouterse’s bodyguards were jailed for demanding more pay. While he and Ronnie had escaped, the other’s were killed by lethal injection. When the two men returned to the bush, Ronnie began seeing trucks filled with rice for Bouterse’s soldiers while the stores for the people in his hometown remained empty. He hijacked the truck and delivered the rice to the bush.13
These are those strange quirks of history—a butterfly effect, really. You can't help but speculate: if that NCO hadn't cheated in the soccer game, would Ronnie still have become the legendary Black Robin Hood? If Bouterse would have just paid they men a fair wage, could Suriname have avoided a civil war?
Back in Amsterdam, the name Black Robin Hood was hardly known. Interest piqued when the Council for the Liberation of Suriname announced its support for the renegade sergeant Ronnie Brunswijk's band of rebels.15 Curiosity drove Nieuwe Revu photographer Gerard Wessel and reporter Pieter Storms to seek a firsthand account. They planned to start their investigation with a visit to Andre Haakmat, the former Deputy Prime Minister now in exile, whom we encountered earlier as a named conspirator in Roy Horb's failed coup attempt. After surviving an assassination bid, Haakmat had aligned himself with the Surinamese resistance movement.
Storms and Wessel weren’t the only ones paying Andre a visit. The week before, Ronnie’s name had cropped up during another conversation with an anonymous figure closely tied to Suriname’s Mother Union, possibly his brother Jan, who was taking a break in Amsterdam.16
While those men were catching up, the question arose about salvaging Suriname from Bouterse’s clutches, the informant hinted at Brunswijk as a potential catalyst. “Maybe Brunswijk. He defies them and they can't catch him. They say he has magical powers. They once locked him up, and then he just walked out of Fort Zeelandia. The thing is: Brunswijk does defy and pulls stunts, but the guy has no clue about politics. Not a clue! The only thing is: he dares.” 17
When the reporters finally made it to meet Haakmat, they found a man deeply intrigued by Ronnie Brunswijk, despite never having met him. However, Haakmat was keen on making that connection. He asked the journalists to inform him immediately once they located Brunswijk, highlighting his interest in the rebel’s activities and potentially aligning with his cause.
Rumors suggested that Brunswijk wasn't even in Suriname anymore. To avoid the intensifying crackdown, he supposedly had fled across the border into French Guiana, where he quickly became a person of interest to various intelligence services. It was here that Colonel Barend van Tussenbroek, affectionately known as Bas and by his code name “Bravo Tango”, entered the picture. Having been deported from Suriname in 1982 and now residing in Cayenne, the capital of French Guiana, the Colonel was an outspoken critic of Bouterse. He even advocated for direct action and possibly assassination. Recognizing a mutual adversary in Brunswijk, van Tussenbroek reached out, offering his expertise on guerrilla warfare and his knowledge of explosives.18 19
Through this connection, Brunswijk found himself with allies in high places, notably gaining the attention and support of France's intelligence agency, the SDECE, and a CIA team led by Frank Castro, known by the codename Foxtrot Charlie. 20 Whether he picked up a code name at this time is unclear, but later in life, when Ronnie went on to become a rapper (more to come), he went by the name Romeo Bravo.
After five days of wandering, Storm and Wessel finally succeeded in finding the legend in the making. They compiled an extensive report on Brunswijk and his men, initially observing them in French Guiana and later, under the cover of night, sneaking into the village of Moengo Tapoe. There, despite a police and army raid, Brunswijk's supporters managed to survive.
On June 4, 1986, at 6:00 PM, true to their word, the three men placed a call to Andre Haakmat. Andre hit 'record' on his tape player and waited for the greeting.
"It's Ronnie."
"Ronnie who?"
"Ronnie Brunswijk. You do know me, right?"
"I've heard of a Brunswijk they call Robin Hood in Suriname, but he's supposed to be in the forest. There's no telephone there, is there?"
"That Brunswijk you're talking about, that's me. I'm calling you from the French side, from Saint-Laurent."
"What are you doing there?"
"Well, as you know, I have problems with the brothers in Paramaribo. It's been like that for a long time. They're after me and it's getting harder here. Last night they surrounded and shot at my village Moengo Tapoe. I barely managed to escape. They burned down some houses. My people are now scared. They asked me to contact you to discuss the situation. Can I come?"
"Do you still hear me? I'm asking: can I come?"
"You know I'm in Amsterdam. How do you plan to come?"
"My people have raised the money. If you say I can come, then I'll make it."
"Of course, you can come. But, I don't know exactly how and with what I can help you."
"We'll see about that. Is it okay if I take the flight on Thursday? And then I have another question: can you pick me up in Paris? Because it's my first time in Europe."
"Yes, that's possible. Coincidentally, I have to be in Paris for business that day. But how will I recognize you?"
"That's no problem. I will recognize you. As Bouterse's bodyguard, I've seen you often enough when you were still in Suriname."21
With their story secured, the duo bid adieu to Ronnie and duly reported to Sergeant Doeder at the Ministry of Information, located at the Surinamese consulate in French Guiana. Posing as travel agents for the Travel Card Foundation, they applied for visas using documents that Surinamese officials deemed “poorly forged.” However, Storm’s boss back at the newspaper claimed he did own such an agency, named Reiskaart Nederland. Regardless of its registration, the men were not shy about their real intentions in Suriname. Once in Paramaribo, they officially requested to pursue journalism and received cooperation from the concerned ministry. Storms interviewed former political leaders Bruma and Arron, while Wessel took photos in the National Assembly.22
After a week, they headed east for a return flight home via French Guiana. While enjoying a celebratory beer at the border, the men were arrested. They faced charges of cooperating in an uprising against established authority (Article 132), attempting to cause a revolution from abroad (Article 135), and forgery (Article 278). They were returned to Paramaribo, where their heads were shaved and Storms was thrown into a 3 x 1 meter cell (Wessel’s cell had been recently renovated).
As for the Black Robin Hood, he had made a getaway with a little help from his friends.
Ronnie was welcomed at Paris airport by Haakmat and several top Dutch officials, carrying no visa and a fake passport under the name "John Hedwig."23 At a press conference held by a pro-Bouterse faction, The League of Surinamese Patriots, questions arose about how a well-known criminal managed such entry without Dutch government complicity. These inquiries gained significant media attention while Storms and Wessel remained imprisoned on accusations of supplying the false passport. They refuted these claims, insisting they possessed their own valid passports and that the fake one was already in Ronnie's possession upon their arrival.24
Haakmat, a lawyer by trade, decided to examine the charges against Ronnie. Convinced of Brunswijk's potential for acquittal, he also chose to help dispel the negative publicity surrounding him. A moment of inspiration came when Haakmat recalled Wim Hoogbergen's dissertation on the Boni Wars, which documented Boni's guerrilla fight against colonial rule in East Suriname—Brunswijk's own region and, like Boni, he was also a Maroon.25 Haakmat saw an opportunity to present Brunswijk as a contemporary Boni, poised to return to Suriname and launch strategic attacks on military targets.
During his stay in the Netherlands, the 25-year-old Brunswijk made the rounds of the resistance organizations, including Paul Somohardjo's. This involvement sparked outrage among The League of Surinamese Patriots (a pro-Bouterse contingent), who alleged connections between individuals like George Baker and the Dutch intelligence service, the BVD. The truth of these claims remains uncertain, but what is known is that Baker possessed David Randolph Enterprise’s Plan B for unconventional warfare. This plan involved establishing a national liberation movement, which Baker implied he’d received from American intelligence.
Either way, the resistance became convinced that in Brunswijk—a 25-year-old junior high school dropout, who posed shirtless for reporters and was more knowledgeable about soccer counterattacks than counterinsurgency—they had found just the man for the job. For our American audience, it's akin to placing your hopes on a young, less educated Dennis Rodman.
Ellen de Vries, who earned her PhD from the University of Amsterdam and authored "Media Battle for Suriname" and "Suriname after the Civil War" (translation), offers perhaps the best analysis on Ronny Brunswijk's ascent as the Black Robin Hood. Reflecting on the events years later, she highlighted how the Surinamese resistance in the Netherlands sought Brunswijk's help, leading to a romanticized image of the freedom fighter that gained traction through vivid reports by Dutch journalists who visited him. De Vries characterized the media portrayal as "War as an exciting boys' book," noting that the brutal realities were often glossed over.
In Suriname, the enthusiasm for armed conflict wasn't as widespread, especially among those of us living through the times. Even democratic forces, which had started to regain hope for free elections after years under a military dictatorship,26 did not universally support the idea of an armed clash. It has been suggested that the without the involvement of the Surinamese resistance, propped up by deep state political ideologies, religious beliefs, and financial interests, the looming civil war could have been prevented.
But George Baker had other ideas. Captain Zak and his band of British, Canadian, an West German mercenaries were no longer viable options. The press and intelligence services had been tipped off. They needed fresh recruits and a strategy to get close enough to Bouterse to either kidnap or assassinate him.
Amid a stack of applications on his desk, George found an ad he had clipped from Gung-Ho magazine:
INTELLIGENCE/OPERATIONS OFFICER: Specialist in transporting cargo or people into or out of U.S.A. Use your organization or I will establish one for you. Security and confidence is guaranteed; TANGO LIMA DELTA INC., Rt. #4, Box 138, Grenada, MS 38901 601-226-5156.
He snatched up the receiver from its cradle, placed it to his ear and began to dial.
Patrick Meershoek. “Brunswijk was hier ineens enhelf,” June 14, 2017, sec. Kunst & Media. http://www.ellendevries.nl/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/parool14062017.pdf.
Amigoe. “Radio Vrij Suriname in de Lucht.” March 17, 1986, Monday edition. https://ufdcimages.uflib.ufl.edu/UF/00/10/14/47/14544/03-17-1986.pdf.
Olthof, Rob. “Herinneringen Aan Steph Willemse.” Freewave Nostalgie, 2005. https://freewave-nostalgie.nl/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/Freewave-374.pdf
The Atlanta Constitution. “Libyans Reportedly Help Bouterse Battle Rebels in Suriname Jungle.” December 28, 1986.
Oltmans, Willem. “62 Paramaribo.” In Is éénoog koning. Breda: Paper Tiger, 2003. https://www.dbnl.org/tekst/oltm003isee01_01/oltm003isee01_01_0026.php.
Chauvel, Patrick. “Mercs In Surinam: Brits Organize Jungle Army.” Soldier of Fortune Magazine, 1987. Internet Archive. 39. https://archive.org/details/soldieroffortunemagazine/Soldier%20of%20Fortune%20%5B1987%2706%5D/page/n39/mode/2up.
Penta, Karl. A Mercenary’s Tale. London : John Blake, 2002. http://archive.org/details/mercenarystale0000pent.
Karen Reedstrom. “Interview with Jack Wheeler.” Full Context, July 6, 2004. http://web.archive.org/web/20040706204214/http://209.197.94.171/people/jw_int.htm.
Blumenthal, Sidney. “Jack Wheeler’s Adventures With the ‘Freedom Fighters.’” Washington Post, April 16, 1986. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1986/04/16/jack-wheelers-adventures-with-the-freedom-fighters/7869872b-a5db-4acf-9ed9-7bc14dac9e9e/.
Heard, Alex. “Lord of the Big Guys.” Outside Online, May 2, 2004. https://www.outsideonline.com/adventure-travel/lord-big-guys/.
Leidse Courant | 30 maart 1987 | pagina 5. “Brunswijk Kan Allen Hopen []Og Wonder.” March 30, 1987. Historische Kranten, Erfgoed Leiden en Omstreken. https://leiden.courant.nu/issue/LLC/1987-03-30/edition/0/page/5.
The Miami Herald. “Is He a Robin Hood or a Terrorist.” July 13, 1987. https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-miami-herald-is-he-a-robin-hood-or-a/127346012/
Ellen Hampton. “Suriname.” The Miami News, January 13, 1987.
Leidse Courant. “Inwoners van Paramaribo Moeten Nu in Actie Komen.” December 4, 1986. Historische Kranten, Erfgoed Leiden en Omstreken. https://leiden.courant.nu/issue/LLC/1986-12-04/edition/0/page/5.
Leeuwarder courant. “Bevrijdingsraad Steunt in Suriname Guerrilla Gedeserteerde Sergeant.” May 27, 1986. Gevonden in Delpher. https://www.delpher.nl/nl/kranten/view?coll=ddd&identifier=ddd:010566047:mpeg21:a0170.
Paul Grumpma. “Alternatief Plan Surinaamse Democratie.” Het Parool. Gevonden in Delpher. Accessed April 7, 2024. //www.delpher.nl/nl/kranten/view?coll=ddd&identifier=ABCDDD:010833422:mpeg21:a0193.
Haakmat, Andre. De Revolutie Uitgegleden:Politieke Herinneringen. Amsterdam: Uitgeverij Jan Mets, 1987.
Frits Hirschland. Dossier Moengo “290 UUR.” The Hague: Cast Publishing, n.d. 32.
Nieuwsblad van het Noorden. “Ex-Ambassademan Zou Met Brunswijk Vechten.” Gevonden in Delpher. Accessed April 7, 2024. https://www.delpher.nl/nl/kranten/view?coll=ddd&identifier=ddd:011000985:mpeg21:a0235.
Dossier Moengo, 33.
Haakmat, Andre. De Revolutie Uitgegleden:Politieke Herinneringen. Amsterdam: Uitgeverij Jan Mets, 1987. 212.
De Volkskrant. “Arrestanten Maakten Zich Bekend Als Journalisten.” June 17, 1986. Gevonden in Delpher. https://www.delpher.nl/nl/kranten/view?coll=ddd&identifier=ABCDDD:010879263:mpeg21:a0764.
Limburgsch dagblad. “Duo Nieuwe Revue Hielp Lijfwacht Bouterse Bij Vlucht.” June 23, 1986. Gevonden in Delpher. https://www.delpher.nl/nl/kranten/view?coll=ddd&identifier=ddd:010610993:mpeg21:a0094.
Amigoe. “Brunswijk Had al Een Paspoort.” June 6, 1986. Gevonden in Delpher. https://www.delpher.nl/nl/kranten/view?coll=ddd&identifier=ddd:010641744:mpeg21:a0064.
Maroons are descendants of formerly enslaved people from Africa in the Americas who formed independent settlements after escaping from slavery. In Suriname, Maroon communities have a significant history and cultural heritage, tracing back to those who escaped from Dutch plantations in the 17th and 18th centuries.
The Road to Free Elections in Suriname (1986-1987):
In the middle of 1986, Willem "Wim" Alfred Udenhout stepped down. This move made way for Pretaapnarian Radhakishun, a key player from the VHP (a major political party) and part of the transition team, to start a new government. This was a big deal because it showed a shift towards a government made up of different groups working together. The new government, which Radhakishun led from July, included members from several major ethnic and political groups in Suriname, plus a few from the military’s own political movement.
This new team had about eight months to make a difference, focusing mainly on fixing the country's struggling economy, tackling corruption, and getting the country's finances back on track. One of their first moves was to reach out to the Netherlands for help, hoping to restart financial aid and get some technical support.
However, not everyone was convinced by the army leader, Bouterse's, sudden willingness to talk about moving towards democracy. Some people saw it as just another one of his games, pretending to be open to change when under political pressure, only to go back on his word later. This period is a critical chapter in Suriname’s history, showing the difficult path from military control to trying to build a government that represents everyone.