Thursday, December 2, Gables
Born in 1930 in Boston, Massachusetts, Edward Phillip George Seaga grew up in Jamaica. He graduated from Harvard University in 1952. An early career in cultural anthropology leading to music promotion became subordinate to one in politics, from 1959. He served in the Jamaica Labour Party’s (JLP) Bustamante and Shearer governments in the 1960s as a gifted Minister of Finance. As leader of the JLP from 1974 he served as Prime Minister from 1980 to 1989 and as Leader of Opposition from 1974 to 1980 and 1989 until his retirement in January 2005, after 45 unbroken years in Parliament, a record unsurpassed by anyone. Since then he has pursued research as a Distinguished Fellow at the University of West Indies, Mona, and Pro-Chancellor of the University of Technology. In My Life and Leadership: Volume II: Hard Road to Travel 1980-2008 (Novelty Trading, $29.99) it is 1980, the JLP stormed to election victory and Seaga became Prime Minister. His immediate task was to tackle the immense problems inherited from the Manley PNP government, a challenge that dominated Seaga’s time in office. His detailed strategy for economic and social revival together with his analysis of the ongoing issues that confront Jamaica today provide the framework of this second volume of autobiography, closing with an absorbing account of Seaga’s final years as leader of the JLP and the moving occasion of his farewell to the Parliament he served for so long. 8pm
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