Roy Sawh: Indo-Caribbean By Birth. Pan-African By Conviction.

Born on a sugar estate in British Guiana, Roy Sawh came from the long shadow of indenture—but he didn’t stay there.

Most people have never heard of Roy Sawh—but they should. He wasn’t polished or platformed, but he understood power.

In 1960s Britain, Sawh carved out a political voice that refused to be boxed in. He confronted casteism in South Asian communities, racism in Black ones, and colonial hangovers everywhere else. A self-proclaimed “angry brown man,” he disrupted every room he walked into.

Sawh believed in political Blackness—not as identity cosplay, but as strategy: a united front against empire. He joined the British Black Panthers and worked alongside Black radical figures like Olive Morris and Darcus Howe, insisting that the fight for liberation must cross color lines and class divides.

He founded the Indo-Caribbean Society and used platforms like Race Today to call out anti-Blackness within South Asian communities, long before it was trendy—or safe—to do so. His politics weren’t performative—they were practiced, loud, and inconvenient.

He challenged the idea that Indo-Caribbean identity was somehow apolitical or peripheral. For Sawh, solidarity was not theoretical. It was lived, argued for, and sometimes shouted into existence.

No grants. No PR. No cultural capital. Just fire, footwork, and an unshakable belief in collective liberation.

Sawh was surveilled by the British state and was a thorn in the side of polite multiculturalism. He didn’t care about fitting in. He cared about calling things by their name.

If you care about real Black and Brown unity, study Roy. He walked so we wouldn’t ask for permission.

Jonah Batambuze is a Ugandan-American interdisciplinary artist and founder of the BlindianProject, a global platform remixing Black x Brown identity through art, history, and storytelling. His work moves across installation, film, writing, and education—challenging systems of erasure while building new cultural blueprints.

Batambuze speaks and facilitates internationally on topics including Black South Asian solidarity, caste and colonial legacies, diasporic memory, and cultural resistance.

For speaking engagements, workshops, or media inquiries, contact: jonah@blindian-project.com or visit jonahbatambuze.com/speaking