Leonard Tim Hector, Caribbean activist, intellectual giant, journalist and newspaper publisher passed away at Holberton Hospital in St. John, Antigua on Tuesday November 12, 2002, twelve days before his 60th birthday.
Hector, who I first met in 1990, through our common friend the late Prime Minister of Dominica Rosie Douglas, was a true Caribbeanist who had no boundaries when it came to addressing regional issues. In December 1996, he was the guest speaker at Erna-Mae Francis’s fundraising dinner banquet at Sambuca Restaurant in Simpson Bay.
While in St. Martin he appeared on the Conscious Lyrics radio magazine and stated, “Caribbean people are great people, we are creative, we have build civilization throughout Europe by the wealth extracted from these countries, in sugar, tobacco, and cotton, and we have nothing to show for it. We are still poor. This is the kind of absurdity that still exists, we need programs like Conscious Lyrics to make our people conscious of their historical weaknesses and ills that have been put against us, not just to feel sorry for ourselves, but to correct them”. By the way, he also noted to a few of us that he had good reason to believe that the resourceful Pan Africanist T.R. Makonnen, who rose to prominence in London, England in the 1930s, and whose place of birth remains a mystery, was a St. Martiner.
Tim, a former senator of Antigua’s parliament, gave up partisan politics in 2000, and at the time of his death he was adviser on regional affairs to the country’s Prime Minister Lester Bird.
The untimely death of this Caribbean brother and scholar—and the tremendous output of his insights into national, regional and world affairs that appeared in Fan The Flames, the popular column of his Outlet newspaper—will be a great loss to the people Antigua and the entire region.
Tim’s explorations of the many topics over the years have contributed immensely to the holistic development of the true Caribbean man and woman. He was surely a visionary, a great thinker who brought out the best in everyone he talked to, whether on the cricket ground, the radio studio or in the “halls” of government.
Like the great ones before him such as Marcus Garvey, Walter Rodney, and Rosie Douglas—just a few of those that he untiringly praised, critiqued and brought before us in fresh light and as great examples of dedication to liberation—Tim wanted to unite Black people in Africa, the Caribbean, the Americas, and Europe to fight for more victories and against the ills of poverty that are still plaguing our nations and communities from Soweto to Tobago.
In September 2001, Tim was the recipient of the CLR James award at the centennial conference in honor of that grand intellect that was held at the University of the West Indies in Trinidad. Tim’s addressed the CLR James conference on the enduring value of James’s work and on radical politics and the contemporary world.
The passing of this Caribbean hero can be described in his own words. The same words he used to eulogize his comrade Rosie Douglas: “Shock, at this Titan’s sudden fall, has given way to calming superlatives, superb and well deserved. Death has revealed this nationalist becoming internationalist in great quantity and high quality. Thy will be done. And was done.”
Today another titan has fallen among us, well known throughout the region for his exceptional development of ideas as a journalist and activist. My friend, you have been one who have, by your life’s contribution and sharing of knowledge, past on the burning torch of hope to the younger generations. We too are duty-bound to continue fanning the flames for a united Caribbean, to uproot colonialism wherever it is still festering in our region, continue planting and culturing a true Caribbean civilization.
Rest in peace, my comrade.