BRIDGETOWN, Barbados – The South African Government will today confer its highest national honour on Sir Shridath Ramphal, former three-term Commonwealth secretary general, as well as posthumously on Trinidad and Tobago’s longest serving prime minister, Dr Eric Williams.

The awards will be presented at a state ceremony in South Africa by President Thabo Mbeki. Both will receive the ‘Order of the Companions of O R Tambo’, for peace and friendship, as well as outstanding contributions against apartheid and racism.

The award, named after the late Oliver Tambo, one of the founding leaders of the African National Congress (ANC) and one of the most influential international mobilisers against South Africa’s heinous apartheid system, is normally awarded in three categories – Gold, Silver and Bronze.

Williams, author of Capitalism and Slavery and father of Trinidad and Tobago’s Independence, and Ramphal, former chancellor of the University of the West Indies as well as chairman of the West Indian Commission, will both receive the O R Tambo gold award from President Mbeki.

They will join the two former Caribbean Community leaders to have been similarly honoured, posthumously, in 2004 – President Cheddi Jagan of Guyana and Prime Minister Michael Manley of Jamaica.

Williams’ daughter, Erica, is expected to receive the award on behalf of her father who died in 1981.