Citation to the recipient of the Jamaica Observer Business Leader Lifetime Achievement Award

In the end it’s not the years in your life that counts; it’s the life in your years. US President Abraham Lincoln must surely have been thinking of people like Christopher Zacca when he gave that gem of wisdom which would be handed down through the ages.

The trajectory of the life and times of Christopher Zacca was determined from his birth in Kingston on August 10, 1959 to mother Hope Haddad Zacca and father, now retired Chief Justice Edward Zacca, who stamped on the psyche of his son his earnest belief that a man’s worth is in how he gives of himself.

Zacca was a brilliant child who sailed through St Cyprian’s Preparatory School; Mt Alvernia Prep; Sts Peter and Paul Prep; Campion College and then the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in 1976, from which he brought home a BSc in mechanical engineering in 1979.

Zacca was, clearly, a man in a hurry. In 1980, he joined Desnoes and Geddes as trainee plant engineer and left 10 months later to do his MBA at the University of Florida. Upon completion, he rejoined D&G as project engineer in 1982 and sped through the ranks to become vice-president of engineering in 1989.

Barely 30 years of age and the youngest non-family VP in the history of the beer company, Zacca was managing the massive engineering division with over 100 direct employees and another 100 contractors. Three years later he moved on to become managing director of Caribrake after an interview with Gordon “Butch” Stewart under whose tutelage the name Chris Zacca would become a national entity.

By 1994, he had become managing director of the ATL Group and appointed a member of the board of the Jamaica Observer, a director of the Sandals Group, and in 1997 deputy chairman of the ATL Group with oversight responsibility for Appliance Traders Limited, ATL Automotive, Caribrake, BML, and Jamaica Observer.

Zacca would have fond memories as leader of the team that won the bid for the highly successful Honda dealership during that period. It would also be a period marked by brisk sales growth, profitability, high staff morale and a solid reputation in terms of service delivery by the companies under his charge.

In that same year, 1996, he was appointed to the board of then Air Jamaica and became its deputy chairman and CEO two years later, remembering it as one of his toughest assignments to date, but yet one of his proudest for the adulation of Jamaicans at home and in the Diaspora for the re-imaged national airline.

Two years after the Air Jamaica assignment, he was elected by his peers to be president of the Private Sector Organisation of Jamaica (PSOJ), after the now ‘infamous’ battle with Scotiabank’s William “Bill” Clarke in late 2006, serving until 2009.

It was inevitable that the hunger for service of his compatriots would sooner or later return to Chris Zacca’s brain. Indeed, it never left. In 2010, he ignored the personal maths and accepted Prime Minister Bruce Golding’s invitation to be his special advisor on the economy, business climate and energy, marked by his chairmanship of the crucial LNG project.

He also served on several State boards, including the Development Bank of Jamaica; Factories Corporation of Jamaica; National Education Trust; and Jampro, until a new administration in 2012, at which time he was recalled to the presidency of the PSOJ.

At the helm of the PSOJ, he advocated for a dramatic change in the way the energy sector in Jamaica was being developed and the Electricity Sector Enterprise Team was born, bringing with it significant impact on the economic landscape.

On July 31, 2013, Zacca created history when he, on behalf of the Jamaican private sector, signed the first ever Partnership for Jamaica Agreement, along with members of the Government, academia, and civil society. During this time, he partnered with an ex-ATL colleague, Christopher Foster to start Enerbiz.

He is currently chairman of the NDB and the National Health Fund, where he is spearheading a National Health Insurance Plan for Jamaica, as well as a director of Youth Upliftment Through Employment.

In recognition of his invaluable contribution to the private and public sectors, Zacca was honoured by his nation on August 6, 2014, with the Order of Distinction in the rank of Commander (CD).

Among his proudest achievements, he boasts, is his family — wife, the former Gillian Levy and their son Ryan, as well as their daughters Ashley and Summer from a previous marriage.

The Jamaica Observer on December 4, 2016 presented its 2016 Lifetime Achievement Award for business development in Jamaica to Christopher Wadie Zacca, CD, JP, private equity investor, business consultant, and business leader.