Hector Wynter (right) former chairman, Council of Institute of Jamaica, receives a cheque from Cecil Lloyd Facey (left), managing director, Jamaica Property Company Ltd. Looking on is Cheryl Ryman, who was the development officer at the Institute. - File SENATORS ON Friday paid tribute to Hector Wynter, former Gleaner Editor-in-Chief and one of the first members of the Upper House, who died recently.
Leader of Government Business, Senator Burchell Whiteman praised the former Senator as "a distinguished servant of the Jamaican people."
According to him, Mr. Wynter gave a high quality of service in the areas of politics, journalism and academia where he dedicated his life. He also noted that Mr. Wynter was the first person from the English-speaking Caribbean to serve on the executive board of UNESCO.
"We shall miss him," Mr. Whiteman said.
Anthony Johnson, leader of Opposition Business also paid respects to Mr. Wynter, who was a Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) Senator in the 1960s. Mr. Wynter also served the party in several other capacities over many years.
Mr. Johnson said Mr. Wynter was a "universal man" who usually delivered himself with great flair.
He praised Mr. Wynter's work as a legislator as well as his contribution to academia. He also joked about Mr. Wynter's love for beauty contests and his involvement in chairing such events over many years.
"We are all pleased to have had him as a friend, a colleague and a mentor," Senator Johnson said.
Mr. Wynter died on December 31 in the University Hospital of the West Indies, Mona. He had been admitted to the Intensive Care Unit on December 27, after being injured seriously in a traffic accident in the Liguanea area of St. Andrew.
He leaves behind his wife Diana, six children, brothers and sisters and other relatives. His body was cremated after a service of thanksgiving for his life last Wednesday.
Mr. Wynter became Executive Editor of The Gleaner in 1974, during Theodore Sealy's tenure. In 1976, he succeeded Sealy as Editor-in-Chief and was immediately caught up in a confrontation with the Michael Manley-led People's National Party (PNP) and its socialist policies.
During the State of Emergency introduced by Mr. Manley in June 1976, the media were instructed by government to submit political statements to the head of the military or the head of the police force, another situation which created a major conflict between Mr. Manley and Mr. Wynter in the 1970s.
Born in Camaguey, Cuba, on July 27, 1926, he was the son of Percival Wynter, a tailor, and Lola Maud Reid-Wynter, who later remarried to E.C.L. Parkinson, a solicitor, and JLP Speaker of the House of Representatives. Mr. Wynter would later chair the JLP.
He was educated at St. Simon's College, Wolmer's Boys' School and Havana, London and Oxford universities. He was trained as an international civil servant at the United Nations, was a resident tutor, registrar and director of extra-mural studies at the UWI at various times.
In 1948, Mr. Wynter gave up the Issa Scholarship for that year, and it was eventually awarded to Meredith Murray of Kingston College. Instead, he took up the Rhodes Scholarship.
