A state funeral, with special arrangements for as many heads of government of the Caribbean as possible, is being planned for July 11 for the former Salvation Army Captain who became one of the most enduring and outstanding of West Indian politicians - Vere Cornwall Bird.

"Papa" Bird, as he is fondly referred to in his native Antigua and Barbuda, where he was accorded the status of the country's first National Hero in 1994, died at the Holberton Hospital on the evening of June 28, after prolonged illness. He was 89.

The man who refused to be knighted by the Queen, titular head of his country, but willingly accepted the honour of being the first person to be awarded a local knighthood, is to be buried following next week's Caribbean Community Summit which ends on July 7.

Unlike most of the West Indian politicians, who headed governments or led their respective countries into political independence, this recognized "grand old man" of West Indian politics was unique in not having been a product of a university. He emerged from the school of "hard knocks" familiar to the poor of his generation.

Moving from humble origins with just primary education to serve the Salvation Army, he was to devote some 56 years of his working life in the fields of trade unionism and politics, achieving in the process a number of significant firsts in the leadership of his two-island state which he took into independence in November 1981.

He was the first elected member of the colonial legislature back in 1945, having been elected two years earlier as the president of the Antigua Trades and Labour Union from which he was to subsequently forge his Antigua Labour Party.

He was the first and only chief minister, first and last premier and first prime minister, a position he held from 1981 to 1994 when he resigned amid failing health and increasing internal wranglings within his government and party, to be succeeded by his second son, current head of government and party leader, Lester Bird.

His critics reveal a kind of love-hate relationship in speaking of Vere Bird, this last of the survivors of that group of West Indian politicians who had gathered in the city of Montego Bay, Jamaica, 52 years ago, to share their vision and ideas on preparing their countries for the new dispensation emerging after the second World War.

They have frequently castigated his style of governance, blaming him for alleged public corruption and cronyism within his party, running of Antigua and Barbuda as a "family estate" and ensuring the predominance of the Bird dynasty in the control of political power.

Such power and influence had made his name virtually synonymous with the governance of Antigua and Barbuda during more than four decades, except for one election in 1971, after becoming the first elected member of the colonial legislature in 1945.

At the same time, as they reflect on the contributions of Sir Vere to the social and economic advancement of the country, one of the major tourist destinations in the region, his critics also speak, almost reverentially, of how he championed the causes of the masses in bravely and successfully defying the plantocracy and the British colonial overlords.

Prime Minister Lester Bird told Cana Tuesday that school children and labour unions would be integrally involved in the arrangements leading up to next week's state funeral to ensure that the "enormous contributions of my father, our national hero, this outstanding defender of the rights of the peoples of Antigua and Barbuda and the Caribbean Community" were recalled for the benefit of the current generation of citizens.

Bird was a contemporary of other outstanding West Indian politicians who had emerged from within the ranks of organized labour. Among them were Grantley Adams of Barbados, Alexander Bustamante and Norman Manley of Jamaica, Robert Bradshaw of St Kitts and Nevis, Hubert Nathaniel Critchlow of Guyana, Theophilus Albert Marryshow of Grenada and Uriah "Buzz" Butler of Trinidad and Tobago.

He is revered, even among opposition politicians, for his remarkable contributions in ending the dominance of the colonial sugar planters, acquiring their lands and instituting a policy of land ownership that has resulted in a high level of land ownership by nationals - some 70-80 percent - that is perhaps unique within the Caribbean Community.

His vision of a modern post-independence Antigua and Barbuda was also to lead, as former Prime Minister John Compton of St Lucia has stated, to his country having the first international airport (named after him) in the Leeward and Windward chain of islands - a development that was to greatly enhance the vital tourism industry.

Regionally, the vision that had led him to participate in the historic Montego bay conference on the future of the West Indies, was to subsequently inspire his involvement with Guyana's Forbes Burnham and Barbados' Errol Barrow, in the creation in 1965 of the Caribbean Free Trade Association (Carifta) that was expanded and transformed into today's Caribbean Community and Common Market (Caricom).

At last year's 19^th Caricom Summit in St Lucia, Vere Bird was among four distinguished West Indians awarded Caricom's highest honour, the Order of the Caribbean Community.

Since then, he and that world renowned "master blaster" of cricket fame, Vivian Richards, became the recipients of Antigua and Barbuda's first award of a national knighthood.

Sir Vere Cornwall Bird Snr., OCC, national hero of Antigua and Barbuda, who had declined the traditional British knighthood awarded to some other Caribbean heads of government, was very proud of this highest national honour.

(Cana)

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