NEW YORK – A prominent Caribbean American publication here has named Hurricanes Irma and Maria, described as “the two mega, Category 5 hurricanes of 2017,” as its “Person of the Year.”
The Brooklyn-based EVERYBODY’S Magazine, owned and published by Grenadian Herman Hall, said it is the first time the 40-year old publication “selected a phenomenon as its Person of the Year”.
“It can be said that the numerous and ferocious hurricanes of 2017, Usain Bolt failing to win his final track and field races, and Trinidad and Tobago knocking out the US from entering FIFA World Cup in 2018 were the major 2017 headlines in the Caribbean and within Caribbean communities overseas,” Hall said.
“Maria and Irma may well have affirmed Atilla the Hun’s classic calypso recorded in New York City in 1935, ‘Woman Is Not The Weaker Sex’ and Denise Plumber’s 1988 calypso ‘Woman is Boss’,” he added. “Hurricane Maria and Hurricane Irma showed their male counterparts, Hurricanes Harvey, Lee, Jose and Bret, who is really the boss and the stronger sex.
“The handwriting is on the wall, in that Caribbean governments can no longer expect the US to eagerly and generously help them in time of natural disasters,” Hall continued.
In September, Hurricanes Irma and Maria ripped through the northern Caribbean, leaving a trail of destruction and ravaging 12 of 32 countries, according to reports.
Most of the islands affected included Barbuda, Dominica, Puerto Rico, St Kitts and Nevis, the Turks and Caicos, the Bahamas, the Dominican Republic and Cuba.
Hall said previous EVERYBODY’S Magazine “Person of the Year” included St Lucian Nobel Laureate Sir Arthur Lewis; the late Caribbean American Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm, of Barbadian and Guyanese parentage; former Prime Ministers Patrick Manning, of Trinidad and Tobago, Dame Eugenia Charles, of Dominica, Tom Adams, of Barbados, and Baldwin Spencer, of Antigua and Barbuda.
Others were: The Mighty Sparrow, Jamaican-born Olympian and WNBA player Tina Charles; Grenadian Olympian Kirani James; and former West Indies cricket captain Guyanese Clive Lloyd. (CMC)
