The late Edward Seaga’s children by Mitsy Seaga, along with their mom, have made a desperate appeal for a kidney for his first son, Christopher, who has been on dialysis for the last two years and appears to be losing the battle after suffering stage four kidney failure.

“It has weakened him. His muscles are atrophying and his spirit is waning. He needs a kidney but he lives in a country [Jamaica] where people like to be buried with all their body parts… There are no indications on driver’s licences; organ donors don’t really exist,” Anabella Seaga wrote on behalf of her brother.

“So, if any of you know of any way to help us find a kidney donor for Chris, please reach out to me. We are all worried about him, Mommy especially. We have no idea where to turn. We, Mitsy Seaga and Andrew Seaga, need your help,” she urged.

Her cause, first posted on her Facebook page, has been supported by Nationwide News Network broadcaster Vernon Derby on his Bark Di Trute blog, in which he urged Jamaicans to donate a kidney that could save the younger Seaga’s life.

“Their father gave his life for this nation. His son needs your support to find a kidney donor and with your love I know we can find someone. Mr Seaga was a former prime minister of Jamaica and Mitsy Seaga Mian, his former wife, is a Miss Jamaica Queen,” Derby implored.

Christopher, 55, who stands out among Seaga’s children because he is black, was adopted by the former Jamaica Labour Party leader and has remained below the political radar, only surfacing usually to receive an impressive array of swimming trophies and accolades.

His sister admitted being ashamed that it wasn’t until she watched a recent Netflix series that she’d belatedly come to realise her brother’s awesome achievement as a multi-sport athlete.

“Chris was one of Jamaica’s champion swimmers by the age of nine. At the time, daddy had taken a two-year sabbatical from politics and would coach Chris daily at our pool. Himself an avid sportsman, he encouraged Chris’s athleticism with his customary dedication and systematic approach,” she recounted.

“Wearing his iconic black ‘darkers’, I’d see him leaning over the edge of the pool with his stopwatch in his hand and a little black book in the other, where he painstakingly recorded all of Chris’ swim times,” Anabella said in her heartfelt account of her brother’s time in the pool.

“On the weekends, we’d go to swim practice and meets at the National Stadium, where Chris swam for the indefatigable Neville Alexander’s Flying Fish Ambassadors Swim Club Jamaica.

“The young swimmers would parade in their unmistakable canary yellow track suits, while us younger ones shelled salty, roasted peanuts and licked colourful snow cones, frolicking under the stands.

“The meets ran late into the nights. Dinner was cups of yellow, steaming corn soup under the dark skies and glaring floodlights. As sleep came and the temperature dropped, I’d shroud myself in a towel and lie on a makeshift bed of even more towels padding the hard bench and rest my head in Mommy’s lap. Whistles, horns and starter guns sounded in the background and cheers lulled me to sleep.

“Chris enjoyed the rivalry from his competition on the Marlins and the YMCA [Young men’s Christian Association] teams. They were in his head and he was in theirs. His rivals’ names were part of family conversations as we noted their performance and psyched him up for his next. Nonetheless, he dominated his age group at home and abroad. His butterfly stroke was sheer beauty in motion!”

Anabella recalled that just before a race, the elder Seaga would caution Chris: “Remember, don’t look beside you!” noting that Chris would be tempted to do that when he neared the finish, and that sideways glance could shave fractions of a second off his time and cost him a win.

“As he got older, he tried other sports while at Campion College and then at St Andrew’s College in Canada where he made the team in every sport: swimming, ice hockey, cricket, soccer, squash, and American football and even captained the cricket team.

“There is a photograph of him hanging in the entrance… He was the first student in the school’s history to make every team! His housemaster, Mr Harrison, would tell stories of seeing Chris ice skating on the pond at below freezing weather, dressed only in a terry robe and shorts as he taught himself to ice skate.

“Recently, I was told a story about Chris bringing his Canadian school’s cricket team to play Campion’s cricket team, where from the tip of his bat, he hit the winning six runs way out of the park! He became a legend.

“It’s only now that I realise what a big deal it was for Chris to then transition to American football in university. His American coach (Ford Ackerman) in Canada introduced him to the game and saw talent.

“He encouraged Chris to go to an American university rather than a Canadian one so he could play on a college team. Chris was enticed by the sport and Daddy encouraged him, thinking it would be a good career for him.

“Once at University of Miami, he started training with the Hurricanes. He became so muscular and big that Mommy would tell him his neck was beginning to look like Herschel Walker’s. I didn’t know who that was, but the name became a familiar one every time she saw him come home for vacations.

“Two years later, Chris transferred to University of South Carolina and he ‘walked on’ to their Gamecocks team. He started out as a lineman but was running as fast as the wide receivers so his coach switched him to a running back position.

“American football is a sport where boys train in their high school junior varsity and varsity teams just to become noticed to be able to vie for a chance to be considered for this level of play. Here, a boy from Jamaica; who never grew up playing American football, trained and played with two of the most prestigious college teams in the country at the time!

“As I learn more about sports teams, I realise just how impressive all his achievements are. It all came so naturally to him; he made it seem effortless. So, it’s hitting me even harder that Chris, at 55 years old, is in stage four kidney failure,” said Anabella.