Senate welcomes Poet Laureate Kwame Dawes, pays tribute to Harding, Francis and others

KINGSTON — The Senate of Jamaica on Friday, July 17, 2026 welcomed Poet Laureate Professor Kwame Dawes, CD, and later paid tribute to several national figures whose deaths were recorded during the sitting.

President of the Senate Thomas Tavares-Finson called the House to order and suspended ordinary business for the special visit. Dawes, invested as Jamaica’s fourth Poet Laureate since Independence in January 2025 for a three-year term, was accompanied by his sister Adja Dawes, nieces Janelle and Abigail, Jamaica Library Service special programmes director Francine Francis, and Mario Ricketts of the national libraries’ public relations unit.

The President noted Dawes’s Musgrave Silver Medal (2004), Order of Distinction (Commander, 2022), and posts including professor of literary arts at Brown University, artistic director of the Calabash International Literary Festival, and earlier laureates Mervyn Morris, Lorna Goodison and Olive Senior. Dawes outlined his duty to deepen public appreciation of Jamaican poetry and the spoken arts, described poets as chroniclers of sentiment, and read work including his father Neville Dawes’s “Acceptance,” his own “Telma’s Precious Cargo,” poems from an Ethiopia assignment, “Replenishment” after Hurricane Melissa, and “In This Saying,” dedicated to his wife Lorna.

Education Minister Senator Dana Morris Dixon thanked Dawes and pledged cooperation so schools foster literature that affirms Jamaican children’s identity. Senators Scott Motley and others also spoke; Justine Henzell of Calabash was acknowledged on the record.

Resuming public business, the Senate noted the morning’s reported death of West Indies cricket great Sir Garfield Sobers and then paid formal tribute to Professor the Hon. Oswald Harding, OJ, CD, KC, JP, former Senate president (1980–83, 1983–84, 2007–11), justice minister and attorney general, and Jamaica’s longest continuously serving senator. Members recalled his legal scholarship, founding role in UTech’s Faculty of Law, Hardingham ceramics collection, and civic service. Condolences were extended to his wife Marigold and sons Jeremy and Zachary. A minute’s silence followed.

Tributes also honoured coach Vincent Stephen “Franno” Francis, OJ, co-founder and technical director of MVP Track Club, credited with shaping world-class sprinters including Asafa Powell and Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce; a national celebration of his life was announced for August 15 at the National Indoor Sports Centre. Brief remembrances marked former MPs Dean Alexander Peart (Manchester North Western) and Arthur Eastern Nelson, OD (St. James West Central).

The House received a message that the Mediation Act, 2026 had passed the House of Representatives on July 14 with two amendments. After belated birthday wishes to the President, the Senate adjourned to a date to be fixed.