JOURNALIST and public relations consultant Byron Balfour, who died Tuesday in the Cornwall Regional Hospital in St James from liver failure, has been described by fellow journalist and friend, Lloyd B Smith as a hard-nosed go-getter.

Balfour, Smith said, who was at times controversial, very hard hitting and possessed a wealth of experience.

“He was a personal friend of mine,” said Smith, the president of the Montego Bay Chamber of Commerce. “He was a very good friend and I am very saddened by his passing.”

Just before his death, Smith said, he had encouraged Balfour to publish a book on his many exploits and vast experiences in journalism.

Clinton Pickering, a fellow journalist and friend, also remembered Balfour as a go-getter who had journalism in his blood. “He gave of his expertise and advised to me freely at all times and certainly will be missed from the media landscape.”

Pickering said Balfour was a lover of country music, who became an avid collector and later close associates with the late musician Johnny Cash, who was often in Montego Bay, and movie star Charlton Heston.

Communications consultant and friend Carmen Patterson, meanwhile, extended condolences to Balfour’s family, especially his daughter Andrea who had returned to Jamaica only recently from Toronto to support her father’s business.

“This has been such a sad time for us who knew and still love him,” she said.

Balfour started his career as a trainee reporter at the Gleaner in Montego Bay after completing his secondary education at Cornwall College. He later did stints as editor of the now defunct Beacon newspaper and later as a reporter for the Jamaica Broadcasting Corporation.

He also served as press secretary to then prime minister Edward Seaga in the 1980s; later as press attaché at the Jamaican High Commission in Canada and did correspondence work for international news agencies such as Reuters, Associated Press, National Enquirer and the United Press International.

He subsequently published a tourism guide Passport to Montego Bay and at the time of his death operated Balfour Communications, providing public relations work for several politicians, including Tourism Minister Edmund Bartlett and several business people. He also produced a weekly column on political affairs in the Western Mirror.

“He died right in front of me,” said his eldest daughter Andrea. She said her father, who was diabetic, had been hospitalised for a week.