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Wednesday, February 19, 2025

Field widens for Caribbean Awards Laureates

by

News Desk
2150 days ago
20190401

The field of nom­i­nees for the An­tho­ny N Sab­ga Caribbean Awards for Ex­cel­lence can now in­clude peo­ple from coun­tries which do not have any nom­i­nat­ing com­mit­tee, ac­cord­ing to Sir Shri­dath Ram­phal, chair­man of the re­gion­al se­lec­tion pan­el.

He was speak­ing on Sat­ur­day, at the San­dals Roy­al in Bar­ba­dos, where four peo­ple were award­ed for their work in sci­ence, art, en­tre­pre­neur­ship, and ac­tivism.

Sir Shir­dath praised the ANSA McAL Foun­da­tion, which funds the awards. The pro­gramme was cre­at­ed by the late Dr An­tho­ny N Sab­ga, founder of the ANSA McAL Group, a re­gion­al con­glom­er­ate based in T&T.

The awards, said Sir Shri­dath, “ac­knowl­edge the one­ness of our (Caribbean) so­ci­ety. They lift our sights to lev­els of per­for­mance which we do not be­lieve to be at­tain­able.”

Sir Shri­dath al­so re­vealed that the awards com­mit­tees of var­i­ous is­lands would be em­pow­ered to seek nom­i­na­tions from out­side their ter­ri­to­ry. There are nom­i­nat­ing com­mit­tees which seek can­di­dates in Ja­maica, Bar­ba­dos, Guyana, T&T and the OECS.

This new de­vel­op­ment means any nom­i­nat­ing com­mit­tee could reach in­to ad­ja­cent ter­ri­to­ries, like The Ba­hamas, the Cay­mans, or Be­lize, which have no lo­cal nom­i­nat­ing com­mit­tee.

Al­so speak­ing at the event was Dr James Hus­bands, Bar­ba­dos’s first ANSA Caribbean Lau­re­ate (Sci­ence and Tech­nol­o­gy, 2008). He said the awards were the “re­gion’s great­est pri­vate sec­tor con­tri­bu­tion” to arts, sci­ence, pub­lic and civic con­tri­bu­tions and en­tre­pre­neur­ship. He al­so praised the tan­gi­ble fi­nan­cial sup­port giv­en which al­lows lau­re­ates time to think and pro­duce.

A Nor­man Sab­ga, chair­man of the ANSA McAL Foun­da­tion, and Chair­man and Chief Ex­ec­u­tive of the ANSA McAL Group, reaf­firmed that “The ANSA McAL Group will con­tin­ue to sup­port these awards.”

Trinida­di­an film­mak­er Danielle Di­ef­fen­thaller broke in­to tears at a mo­ment, re­call­ing her late fa­ther, as she ac­cept­ed her prize on Sat­ur­day night at the San­dals Roy­al in Bar­ba­dos.

Di­ef­fen­thaller and three oth­er win­ners, Ki­mala Ben­nett from Ja­maica, Michael Tay­lor from Ja­maica, and Corey Lane from Bar­ba­dos, were ho­n­oured by the An­tho­ny N Sab­ga Caribbean Awards for Ex­cel­lence.

Di­ef­fen­thaller al­so thanked “those who had come be­fore her” as she ac­cept­ed her prize. The oth­er lau­re­ates were al­so vis­i­bly moved as they thanked their par­ents, men­tors, and fam­i­lies for the sup­port which had al­lowed them to do the work they had done to be de­serv­ing of the award. Di­ef­fen­thaller is a Trinida­di­an film­mak­er who has pro­duced, most fa­mous­ly, the se­ries West­wood Park; Tay­lor is a world-renowned cli­mate sci­en­tist; Ben­nett is a me­dia en­tre­pre­neur in Ja­maica, founder of The Lab agency; and Lane is a youth ac­tivist in Bar­ba­dos, founder of the Na­ture Fun Ranch.

Dame San­dra Ma­son, Gov­er­nor Gen­er­al of Bar­ba­dos, and Mia Mot­t­ley, Bar­ba­di­an Prime Min­is­ter, were present on Sat­ur­day night to wit­ness the pre­sen­ta­tion, and Bar­ba­di­an songstress Al­li­son Hinds gave an un­for­get­table per­for­mance.

The win­ners were pre­sent­ed with cheques for $500,000, a medal and a ci­ta­tion. These four lau­re­ates join 35 oth­er lau­re­ates from through­out the Caribbean who have been ho­n­oured in the re­gion since 2006 when its in­au­gur­al cer­e­mo­ny was held in T&T. This is the first time the awards were staged in Bar­ba­dos, but the third year in a row they were held out­side T&T. In 2017, the cer­e­mo­ny was staged in Guyana, and last year in Ja­maica.


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