LONG-STANDING?Member of Parliament (MP) for St James North Rawle Eastmond was a no-show for his appreciation award at the Barbados Labour Party’s (BLP) annual conference but Dame Patricia Symmonds was on hand to be saluted and hailed as the party’s “biggest icon”.
Eastmond, a former Cabinet minister and the party’s standard-bearer in St James North since 1991, was not present to receive his award on the final day of the party’s annual conference on Sunday.
However, Dame Patricia, a former headmistress at The St Michael School, was in a standing-room-only Queen’s Park Steel Shed to hear party leader Owen Arthur describe her as the one of the most faithful servants of the BLP.
Arthur said that Dame Patricia embodied the spirit and soul of service.
“Dame Patricia, the party would have honoured you earlier this year by a special evening, but one event alone is not enough for you, and therefore before the assembly of the full family of the BLP?at this 74th Annual Conference, we are pleased to honour you for service superbly and splendidly done,” he said.
Arthur also presented the Political Leader’s Award to 12 women who had supported the party through thick and thin for many years.
The recipients were: Angela Lythcott, Rosetta Bishop, Winfred Meade-Griffith, Olive Small, Brenda Moore, Audrey Miller, Muriel Lowe, Gwendolyn Evelyn, Corlene Perch-Brome, Daisey Roach, Jean Jordan and Beverley Alleyne. (MK)
