The late Ambassador Dudley Joseph Thompson was born on January 19, 1917. He died at age 95, one day after his birthday, on January 20, 2012. Born in Panama to Jamaican parents, Dudley Thompson grew up in Westmoreland, Jamaica.

He served as a vice-president of the People’s National Party, senator, later an elected Member of Parliament, and a Cabinet minister from both the Senate and the House of Representatives.

It was Dudley Thompson who said that “no angels died at Green Bay”, ironically at a time when he was not yet the minister of national security, although a Cabinet minister. The Green Bay affair took place on January 4, 1978, but Dudley Thompson became minister of national security later that same year.

He received much flak from the general public for his “no angels” statement. Some years ago, while in retirement, he made a wholesome public apology for the statement.

Between 1972 and 1976, Thompson was minister of state in the ministry of foreign affairs, and as of 1975 the minister of foreign affairs. Between 1977 and 1978 Thompson was minister of mining and energy. And from 1978 to 1980 he was minister of national security.

Dudley Thompson was an internationally known pan-Africanist who was the first politician to call for reparation from slavery. Several years ago, in an article on Dudley Thompson, I mentioned that he was baptised in the Roman Catholic Church. On the very day it was published I received a phone call from Dudley Thompson who let me know that he was more than just baptised, but a practising Roman Catholic.

The Roman Catholic Church teaches that all races are equal — because it cannot be proven either in the Bible or in a science laboratory that any race is superior to the other. And the Church also teaches that God made man, who made culture, so the Church works through culture.

In the document Gaudium et Spes (The Church in the Modern World) of the Second Vatican Council, the Church teaches that culture is to be respected and revered in ways that include the way in which beauty is promoted. And Dudley Thompson’s call for reparation long before Mike Henry ever made a similar call was also in keeping with Roman Catholicism.

Thompson reminded us that the Jews got reparation from the Germans and the Japanese got reparation from the United States of America. So the descendants of slaves in the former British Empire should also receive reparation for the damage done by slavery. And he said this in international circles on behalf of Jamaica.

As a negotiator, Dudley Thompson helped secure for Jamaica the seat of the International Seabed Authority — although it did not come about until the 1980s when the People’s National Party was not in power. The Jamaica Labour Party Government led by Edward Seaga as prime minister, however, gave the previous Government full credit for securing the seabed authority for Jamaica.

A lawyer, Dudley Thompson was among those who defended Jomo Kenyatta, in Kenya, in the aftermath of the Mau Mau rebellion in the early 1950s. His actions blended with the social teachings of the Roman Catholic Church.

Thompson won the Rhodes Scholarship without attending a high school. In those days, Mico Teachers’ College was the closest one could get to receiving tertiary education in Jamaica. Graduates from primary schools were sent there to be trained as schoolteachers. It was while he was a student at Mico Teachers’ College that he won the Rhodes Scholarship.

Dudley Thompson, who also went to war, was a flight lieutenant in the British army and flew warplanes in the Second World War. After residing in Africa, Thompson returned to Jamaica. He eventually entered politics but also served for a time as the president of the Jamaica Bar Association.

Thompson was an unsuccessful candidate in the Federal elections of 1958 for the Westmoreland Constituency. For information, Jamaica had 17 seats in the federal parliament. Each of the 14 parishes was a constituency and each of the three counties (Cornwall, Middlesex and Surrey) were constituencies. The electorate voted for two representatives; one for the parish and one for the county. In 1962, Dudley Thompson ran in Western Kingston for the People’s National Party, but was defeated by Edward Seaga. Running a second time in West Kingston in 1967, he was defeated again by Edward Seaga.

Thompson resigned from the Senate in 1978 to contest the St Andrew Western by-election upon the resignation of Finance Minister David Coore. He won the seat, but it was contested in court as being ultra vires. The Jamaica Labour Party did not contest the by-election but several individuals by the name of Thompson turned up at the nominations. This caused a brawl and Prime Minister Michael Manley postponed the by-elections. At the time the prime minister had no such power.

The court upheld the petition of the other candidates that the election was illegal but did not grant the petition of one of the Thompsons who was duly nominated the first time around, that he was elected unopposed, as Dudley Thompson was not nominated before the melee on the first occasion.

Dudley Thompson appealed the verdict, but the appeal was not heard before Parliament was dissolved in October 1980 to make way for fresh elections. However, as a result of that problem, the law was later amended.

In 1980, when the Jamaica Labour Party won 51 of the 60 seats available, Dudley Thompson was declared winner in St Andrew Western on the night of the elections. His 600-odd-vote lead, however, was reduced to a minority of a few votes and the JLP’s Owen Stephenson (now deceased) was declared the winner.

As a result, the People’s National Party boycotted the opening of Parliament that year. On a petition by Dudley Thompson he was declared winner by 85 votes. So, once again, Thompson took up his seat in Parliament. He served in the House until the snap election called by then Prime Minister Edward Seaga in 1983.

ekrubm765@yahoo.com