The Region Honours Its Own: UWI Names 13 Honorary Graduands for 2026
The University of the West Indies has named 13 honourees for its 2026 graduation ceremonies. The award of these prestigious honorary degrees continues the university’s long standing tradition of celebrating the region’s most notable luminaries for their contributions to Caribbean life and development. This year’s awardees boast outstanding careers spanning journalism and media, ministry and community service, diplomacy, medicine, agricultural development, law and public service, culture, sport, and music.
Approved by the University Council, the honorary degrees will be conferred at The UWI’s 2026 graduation ceremonies carded to take place between October 10 and November 14, 2026.
The schedule for the 2026 ceremonies and the list of honorary graduands follows.
Five Islands Campus – October 10
- Don Rojas of St. Vincent and the Grenadines for his contribution to Caribbean and American Media – Doctor of Letters (DLitt)
- Thea LaFond of Dominica for her contribution to Sport – Doctor of Laws (LLD)
Cave Hill Campus – October 17
- Doug E. Fresh, of the United States of America for his contribution to the arts through Hip-Hop music – Doctor of Letters (DLitt)
- Reverend Dr. Lucille Onita Baird, M.B.E., J.P. of Barbados for her contribution to the church, community leadership and social commentary – Doctor of Letters (DLitt)
St. Augustine Campus – October 22 to 24
- Ambassador Colin Granderson of Trinidad and Tobago for his work in diplomacy – Doctor of Laws (LLD)
- Professor Shaneeta Johnson of The Bahamas for her contribution to the development of surgical sciences and health care – Doctor of Science (DSc)
- Winston R. Rudder of Trinidad and Tobago for his contribution to Agricultural development, public service, food and sustainable development – Doctor of Science (DSc)
Mona Campus – November 5 to 7
- Arnold Bertram of Jamaica for his contribution to Caribbean scholarship and public advocacy – Doctor of Laws (LLD)
- Damian Marley of Jamaica for his contribution to culture – Doctor of Letters (DLitt)
- Dawn Robinson-Spence of Jamaica for her contribution to culture – Doctor of Laws (LLD)
- Milton J. Samuda of Jamaica for public service, advocacy and administration – Doctor of Laws (LLD)
Global Campus – November 14
- Melvin L. Claxton of Antigua and Barbuda for his contribution to journalism – Doctor of Letters (DLitt)
- René Baptiste CMG of St. Vincent and the Grenadines for her contribution to governance, law and culture – Doctor of Laws (LLD)
ABOUT THE AWARDEES
Don Rojas
Doctor of Letters (DLitt)
In 1979, Don Rojas, a US-based multimedia journalist born in St. Vincent and the Grenadines, moved to Grenada at the invitation of then Prime Minister Maurice Bishop to help build a media infrastructure for the Grenada Revolution that Bishop had led. For the next four years, up until the US military invasion of Grenada, Rojas worked as the editor-in-chief of the Free West Indian, the official newspaper of the Revolution, and later became Bishop’s press secretary.
In that role, Rojas travelled around the globe with Bishop, meeting world leaders from Africa, Asia, Europe, and Latin America and reporting on these meetings for media in Grenada, the Caribbean, and North America.
This position would become one of the early pillars in the foundation of a career that would place him at the centre of Black Liberation journalism and civil rights communications media for the next five decades.
Returning to the US media space in 1990 after a three -year stint as a senior executive in the Prague-based International Organization of Journalists (IOJ), Rojas went on to establish and direct the first communications department for the National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NAACP), giving America’s oldest civil rights organisation a strong institutional voice. A few years later, he founded The Black World Today (TBWT), the first black-oriented digital newspaper. From 1999 to 2003, he served as executive editor of the New York Amsterdam News, the country’s largest and most influential black newspaper, and later served as the general manager of the legendary WBAI radio station in New York City and also as the executive director of Free Speech TV in Denver, Colorado.
From 2013 to 2024, Rojas served as Director of Communications and International Relations for the Institute of the Black World 21st Century (IBW21) and the National African American Reparations Commission (NAARC). For his outstanding contributions to journalism, Rojas was honoured at the 2001 Caribbean-American Heritage Awards in Washington, DC, and in 2017 he received the UWI Vice Chancellor’s Award for his co-founding role at UWItv, a global multi-platform network owned and operated by the university.
Rojas considers his core mission to be a bridge-builder, connecting the struggles and movements emanating from the Caribbean region, including the movement for reparatory justice, with the Caribbean diaspora in North America and with the African American community.
Over the course of a career spanning five decades, he has edited three books, lectured at universities in Europe and North America, and consulted for Oxfam America, Greenpeace, the Praxis Project, and other international agencies.
Thea LaFond
Doctor of Laws (LLD)
Thea LaFond-Gadson is a Dominican-born Olympic champion raised in Maryland after migrating to the United States with her family at age five. After eight years of dance, she found a new calling on the track team at John F. Kennedy High School under head coach Kevin Monroe. It was there, still in high school, that she first began competing internationally for her home country of Dominica.
A full scholarship brought her to the University of Maryland, where she became a multiple-time conference champion, an All-American track and field star, and still holds the school record in the women’s triple jump.
After graduation, she met Aaron Gadson, who would become her coach and husband. In 2024, he led her to capture Dominica’s first-ever World Indoor title, a gold medal jump of 15.01 meters.
Soon after that win, LaFond learned she had suffered a serious knee injury. She was advised to either shut down her Olympic campaign or risk surgery but she chose to compete. At the 2024 Paris Olympics, one of only two athletes representing Dominica, she delivered the country’s first-ever Olympic medal, a gold in the triple jump with a national-record jump of 15.02 metres. She also became the tenth Maryland alumna to win Olympic gold and the first since 1988.
For her outstanding athleticism, sporting tenacity, and for representing Dominica on the Olympic stage, Thea LaFond has since been honoured by Dominica’s Prime Minister and tourism sector with the titles of National Sports Ambassador and Destination Brand Ambassador.
Doug E. Fresh
Doctor of Letters (DLitt)
Long before beatboxing had a name, a young performer from Harlem was teaching the world that the human voice could be a standalone instrument. Doug E. Fresh, known as the “Original Human Beatbox,” has spent more than four decades turning that discovery into part of the foundation of hip-hop culture.
His 1985 recording “La Di Da Di,” created with the Get Fresh Crew and MC Ricky D (Slick Rick), went on to become one of the three most sampled recordings in music history, reimagined by Beyoncé, Mariah Carey, Snoop Dogg, and more than a thousand other artists. In 2024, the Library of Congress inducted “La Di Da Di” into its National Recording Registry, and the Kennedy Center honoured Fresh as a distinguished representative of the Apollo Theatre’s legacy in Black artistry.
Among his many honours are the Source Awards 2004 Lifetime Achievement Award; the 2014 BET Hip Hop Awards Icon Award; and induction into the Hip Hop Hall of Fame.
Fresh’s influence reaches well beyond entertainment. He co-founded Hip Hop Public Health, which has produced free, evidence-based health resources for schools worldwide, including “Stroke Ain’t No Joke,” a song credited with helping children recognise stroke symptoms in caregivers in time to save their lives. A lifelong activist, he has championed causes addressing racism, drug abuse, illiteracy, police brutality and homelessness.
His ties to the Caribbean are significant. Since the 1980s, he has performed throughout the region, collaborating with regional artistes, supported disaster relief efforts, and personally funded scholarships for students at The University of the West Indies, in addition to his role as chair of the American Foundation for UWI’s (AFUWI) annual gala. Fresh remains one of the world’s most active touring musicians, averaging 150 live performances annually for more than two decades. The Human Beatbox has taken artistic innovation and continues to expand hip-hop’s influence for public health advocacy, social change and cultural preservation.
Reverend Dr. Lucille Onita Baird, M.B.E., J.P.
Doctor of Letters (DLitt)
For over four decades, Reverend Dr. Lucille Onita Baird, M.B.E., J.P. has dedicated her life to advancing the gospel of Jesus Christ and to an unwavering commitment to serving humanity. In 1995, she founded Mount Zion’s Missions Foursquare Church in Barbados, growing it from a single congregation into five outreach ministries across the island’s highest-crime communities, Gall Hill, Deacons Farm, Eden Lodge, Rock Dundo, Chapman Lane, and New Orleans.
Reverend Baird’s impact and ministry extend well beyond the walls of the church. Through practical outreach and rehabilitation programmes, counselling, education, and mentorship, she has contributed significantly to community transformation.
From 1997 to 2001, she served as one of Barbados’s first government-appointed Rehabilitation Officers at Glendairy Prison, building a rehabilitation programme from the ground up. Over her 25 years in prison ministry, dating back to her time as a volunteer chaplain from 1980, she saw hundreds of men complete the programme she helped design, and supported many of them through aftercare and family home visits long after their release.
Her public service impact has been extensive. Since 2011, Reverend Baird has chaired One Man a Month, a preventative and rehabilitative outreach programme still active today. She has also served as Chair of the Government Industrial School from 2021 to 2024; as Programme Director of the Values Impacting Peers programme, counselling students across Barbados; and served on the Prison Advisory Board from 2018 to 2026 and the Police Complaints Authority, 2018 to present.
Her academic path reflects the same relentless commitment as her ministry, with qualifications in addiction studies from Howard University, adolescent psychology, and violence prevention. In 2004, she was conferred an honorary Doctor of Divinity degree by the International Theological Seminar, California.
Named a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire in 2009 and a Justice of the Peace in 1997, Reverend Dr. Lucille Onita Baird, M.B.E., J.P. was honoured with the Pride of Barbados Award for the Parish of St. James in 2025.
Ambassador Colin Granderson
Doctor of Laws (LLD)
In December 2000, the United Nations Secretary-General turned to a Caribbean diplomat to lead one of the most sensitive human rights investigations of the era: the International Commission of Inquiry into Human Rights Violations in Ivory Coast. It was one appointment among dozens across a career that has placed the Trinidad and Tobago-born Ambassador, Colin Terrence Granderson at the centre of the Caribbean’s engagement with the world for nearly five decades.
A graduate of universities in France, Ghana and The UWI, St. Augustine Campus in Trinidad and Tobago, Granderson’s path to diplomacy began in the classroom, teaching French literature and English in Bouaké, Ivory Coast, before joining Trinidad and Tobago’s Ministry of External Affairs in 1977.
He rose steadily through the country’s foreign service, serving as First Secretary in London, Counsellor at the United Nations (UN) in New York, during Trinidad and Tobago’s 1985 to 1986 term on the Security Council, and eventually Ambassador-at-Large in 1993.
The years 1993 to 2000, marked another defining chapter for Ambassador Granderson when he served as Executive Director of the OAS/UN International Civilian Mission in Haiti. There he led a human rights observation mission of up to 250 international observers and 100 local staff, one of the largest such operations the hemisphere had seen. He went on to head election observation missions across Haiti, Suriname, and Guyana, and served on the UN’s Brahimi Panel reviewing the future of global peace operations.
For almost twenty years, from 2002 to 2022, Ambassador Granderson served as Assistant Secretary-General for Foreign and Community Relations at the CARICOM Secretariat, shaping the region’s collective voice on the world stage. Today, he remains active as Special Adviser on Haiti to the CARICOM Secretary-General and Political Adviser to the CARICOM Eminent Persons Group on Haiti.
For his contributions to global diplomacy and ensuring that the Caribbean is represented in important multilateral engagements, Ambassador Granderson has been honoured with Trinidad and Tobago’s Chaconia Medal Silver and Chile’s Order of Bernardo O’Higgins.
Professor Shaneeta Johnson
Doctor of Science (DSc)
When Professor Shaneeta Johnson took the chair of surgery at Meharry Medical College, she became the fourth black woman ever to lead a department of surgery in the United States, and the first in the Southeast. A native of The Bahamas, a surgeon, educator, global health leader, and Associate Dean of Global Health Partnerships and Engagement at Meharry, she has built her career on expanding access to advanced surgical care and on developing the workforce and systems that sustain it.
Professor Johnson earned her Bachelor of Arts in Neuroscience from Johns Hopkins University and her Doctor of Medicine from Loma Linda University, before completing her general surgery residency at Howard University Hospital and a fellowship in Minimally Invasive and Bariatric Surgery at the Cleveland Clinic.
She is board certified in General Surgery and Obesity Medicine and is a fellow of the American College of Surgeons, the American Society for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery and the International College of Surgeons.
At Morehouse School of Medicine and Grady Memorial Hospital, she built a robotic surgery programme from the ground up, securing more than $2 million in in-kind grant funding and uniting Grady, Morehouse, and Emory University in a single initiative that brought advanced minimally invasive surgery to more than 1000 patients annually, who did not have access.
Professor Johnson’s expertise has informed state and federal health policy. Her global health work has impacted care across Africa, the Caribbean, and Latin America, including partnerships with The University of the West Indies, where she has also served as an External Examiner. Following Hurricane Dorian, she directed more than $1 million in medical aid to recovery efforts in The Bahamas.
Author of more than eighty manuscripts, chapters, and books, and the only Surgeon contributing author for the 2023 and 2024 Lancet Countdown U.S. Policy Briefs, Professor Johnson has lectured on five continents, including at the University of Oxford in Europe. Her honours include the inaugural SAGES Social Justice and Health Equity Award; the American College of Surgeons Claude H. Organ, Jr. Traveling Fellowship; the Ken Lee Award for Surgical Sustainability; the National Medical Association Emerging Leader Award; and recognition among Top Women in Medicine and Atlanta’s 40 Under 40.
Winston R. Rudder
Doctor of Science (DSc)
Winston R. Rudder is a celebrated Trinidad and Tobago Agricultural Economist and Development Consultant who has spent over five decades leading in development policy and planning at the national and international levels. This has included project implementation in post-disaster and post-conflict emergency rehabilitation operations as in the aftermath of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami. As Representative of the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), he arrived in the Maldives establishing the organisation’s post-tsunami office in Malé, coordinating relief and recovery across fisheries and agriculture.
An alumnus of The University of the West Indies, St. Augustine Campus, where he earned his Bachelor of Science in Agriculture in 1965, Rudder went on to complete his Master’s in Agricultural Economics at the University of Manitoba and was a Fellow of the Economic Development Institute, on the World Bank Agricultural and Rural Development Project Analysis in 1980. He spent his early career rising through Trinidad and Tobago’s Ministry of Agriculture. From 1988 to 1998, he served as Permanent Secretary across three government ministries, providing strategic leadership during a decade of institutional change.
His international work took him far beyond the Caribbean. As FAO Representative to Nepal from 1998 to 2002, and later Sub-Regional Representative for the Caribbean, he helped shape agricultural policy in two sub-regions. After the Maldives, he led FAO’s Emergency Rehabilitation and Coordination Unit in Russia’s North Caucasus, coordinating agricultural recovery for Internally Displaced Persons from the Chechen War.
Rudder’s leadership continued at home with his serving as President and CEO of the Cropper Foundation; Chair of Trinidad and Tobago’s Agricultural Development Bank and Cocoa Development Company; Chair of the Cocoa Research Advisory Board at The UWI, St. Augustine since 2013; and Chairman of the Public Service Commission (2020 to 2026).
For his work, Winston R. Rudder was recognised in 2012 among 50 outstanding public servants marking Trinidad and Tobago’s first 50 years of independence, and was awarded the Chaconia Medal Gold in 2016.
Arnold Tennyson Bertram
Doctor of Laws (LLD)
For almost six decades, Arnold Tennyson Bertram has spent his career contributing to shaping Jamaica’s political and cultural history, first as an elected political leader and later as a historian and writer.
His capacity for leadership showed itself early. He won the Parish Scholarship to Calabar High School, where he represented the school in cricket, tennis and debating. Later, also as a scholarship student at The University of the West Indies, Mona, Bertram was elected Vice-President of the Guild of Undergraduates in 1967, one of his first roles in elected office. He also represented The UWI at the International Union of Students Conference in Leicester, England. Having spent his university years balancing academics, student leadership and a place in the University Band, The Logarhythms, he graduated in 1969 with a Bachelor of Arts Special in History (Hons.).
That early leadership capability carried directly into national politics. Under the Michael Manley administration, he served as a Senator and Parliamentary Secretary and was elected Member of Parliament (MP) for North West St. Ann in 1976. He served as Minister of State in the Office of the Prime Minister before being appointed Cabinet Minister for Information and Culture from 1977 to 1980. Bertram returned to public life under P.J. Patterson, re-elected MP for North West St. Ann from 1997 to 2002 and appointed Minister of Local Government, Information, Youth and Culture, while also serving as Vice-President of the Commonwealth Association of Local Government Ministers.
Alongside politics, Bertram built a parallel career as a historian and as a columnist for the Sunday Gleaner. His impressive body of published work, which chronicles Jamaica’s political, cultural, and sporting history, includes a study of N.W. Manley’s role in shaping modern Jamaica, The Making of a Sprinting Superpower (2013), a history of Jamaica’s rise on the athletics track, and Jamaica at the Wicket. His contributions to Caribbean scholarship also include public lectures: “Sam Sharpe and The Emancipation Rebellion” for the National Heritage Trust; “A History of Falmouth”; and “Salute to the Parish of St. Ann” for the Institute of Jamaica.
Damian Marley
Doctor of Letters (DLitt)
Born in Kingston in 1978 to Bob Marley and Cindy Breakspeare, Miss World 1976, Damian Marley, known worldwide as ‘Jr. Gong’, could have coasted on a legendary surname. Instead, by the time he released his debut album at eighteen, he had already carved out something distinctly his own: a sound built on toasting and dancehall that set him apart from every one of his musical siblings.
Marley began performing at age 13 in a group called “The Shepherds” before touring with his brothers Stephen, Ky-Mani, Julian, and Ziggy. His 2001 album Halfway Tree blended dancehall, reggae, and hip-hop, spending 158 weeks on the Billboard Top Reggae Albums chart and earning him his first Grammy in 2002.
That success laid the groundwork for Welcome to Jamrock, whose title track The New York Times would later call the best reggae song of the decade. At the 2006 Grammy Awards, Marley won Best Reggae Album and Best Urban/Alternative Performance in the same night, making him the only Jamaican reggae artist in history to win two Grammys at a single ceremony. His fourth studio album, Stony Hill, earned him a fourth Grammy in 2018.
In 2010, Marley’s album collaboration with Nas, Distant Relatives, explored the connections between reggae, hip-hop, and Africa, debuting at Number 5 on the Billboard 200 and Number 1 on the Reggae Albums chart. He continued crossing genre lines in 2012 collaborating with Skrillex on “Make It Bun Dem,” which Rolling Stone called a “monster mash up of dubstep and dancehall.” Nearly two decades after its release, Welcome to Jamrock was certified Platinum in the United Kingdom in December 2024.
Marley continues to build reggae’s future alongside its past. He produced Kabaka Pyramid’s Grammy-winning album The Kalling in 2023, and through Ghetto Youths International, the label he runs with his brothers Stephen and Julian, he works to discover and develop new Jamaican artists for the global stage.
Dawn Robinson-Spence
Doctor of Laws (LLD)
A native of Jamaica’s Westmoreland rural countryside, Dawn Marie Robinson-Spence has dedicated her career of more than four decades to preserving and promoting Jamaica’s rich cultural heritage through authentic folk music, dance, education and community development.
Since 2000, Robinson-Spence has led the Hertford Folk and Cultural Group, one of Jamaica’s premier traditional folk ensembles, guiding them through performances on some of the world’s grandest stages while training the generation that will carry the traditions forward. These traditions she was herself trained into, first under the tutelage of Daphne Perrin. She went on to study under other cultural icons, including the renowned ethnomusicologist, folklorist and researcher Dr. Olive Lewin; members of the Jamaica Folk Singers; the Hon. Rex Nettleford; and experts in Revival and Gerreh dance and music.
Under her leadership, the Hertford folk ensemble has performed for Queen Elizabeth II on two occasions, in 1989 and 1994. They have also represented Jamaican culture at CARIFESTA celebrations in Cuba and Trinidad and Tobago; the Jambana Festival in Canada; and delivered cultural performances in USA and Mexico. The group’s engagements on Jamaican soil are just as extensive including performances at the 9th G-15 Summit, CARICOM Heads of Government Conferences, Jamaica’s Independence celebrations, and Red Stripe Bowl cricket.
Widely recognised as cultural ambassadors, Hertford Folk and Cultural Group is highly decorated and celebrated within Jamaica’s national cultural framework. They have had long-term competitive success within the Jamaica Cultural Development Commission’s national festival and traditional folk form competitions and were awarded a Jamaica 25 Award at Jamaica’s silver jubilee independence celebrations for cultural preservation.
Dawn Robinson-Spence continues actively as a performer and has spent nearly a decade collaborating with the Jamaica Tourist Board to promote Jamaican folklore and cultural traditions. She is a trainer for the Annual JCDC Festival Queen Competition and continues to train young people in traditional Jamaican music and dance, conducting cultural workshops in schools and communities across the island.
Milton J. Samuda
Doctor of Laws (LLD)
Milton Jefferson Samuda, noted Attorney-at-Law, thought leader in cultural and economic diplomacy, and opinion shaper of national development, is a distinguished alumnus of The University of the West Indies and Wolmer’s Boys’ School.
His public leadership across business culture, education and sport has been prodigious. As President of the Jamaica Chamber of Commerce from 2008 to 2012, he was a leading and influential voice in the country’s business and commercial life and received the 2010 Gleaner Honour Award on behalf of the Jamaica Chamber of Commerce for advocacy. A former Chairman of JAMPRO and past director of a plethora of organisations spanning the public, private and NGO sectors,
Mr. Samuda’s impact on the nation’s commercial sector and his committed service as the UWI Chancellor’s Nominee to the Finance and General Purposes Committee for a decade (2013 to 2023) and Lead External Legal Counsel to The University of the West Indies Business Development Office (2001 to 2008), are well deserving of admiration.
In the fields of culture and entertainment, his chairmanship of the National Dance Theatre Company and leadership as the Chief Negotiator of Jamaica’s delegation to the Midem Music Conferences in Cannes and Miami in 1997, exemplify his invaluable contribution to Jamaica’s cultural and entertainment assets.
Education and sport have benefitted significantly from Mr. Samuda’s insight and foresight. As Chairman of the Wolmer’s Trust, the governing body for the boys, girls and preparatory schools, Chairman of Sabina Park, lead advisor to Cricket West Indies, and Chairman of Television Jamaica for thirteen years, his service and reach are not only national but regional. His conviction in the value of scholarship, has led him to publish in the Journal of the Caribbean Shipping Association and co-authored “Recovery of Debts and Judgments in Jamaica,” an ACP Publication.
Impelled by a humanitarian spirit, he served as Chairman of the Jamaica Save the Children Fund, Chairman of the YMCA and director of VOUCH – which deepened his civic conviction and cemented his confidence in the endless potentiality of the next generation.
A prolific guest speaker at private and public events, he has twice delivered the prestigious Norman Manley Lecture in 2017 and 2024. Milton J. Samuda’s long career of service and advocacy is testament to his deep commitment to national advancement.
Melvin Claxton
Doctor of Letters (DLitt)
Melvin Claxton’s career has demonstrated the power of investigative journalism to hold institutions accountable for what they would prefer to keep hidden. Across 25 years, his work has changed laws, ended careers, and in several cases, saved lives. A native of Antigua and Barbuda, Claxton remains the only Black journalist ever named in a Pulitzer Prize gold medal citation in the award’s 110-year history.
Claxton’s career began at the Virgin Islands Daily News, where his ten-part 1994 investigation, “V.I. Crime: Who’s to Blame?,” exposed systemic failures in law enforcement. Published in the face of personal death threats, the important series led directly to the firing of the police commissioner and attorney general, the arrest of several officers, and won the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service in 1995.
He carried that same tenacity through senior investigative roles at the Chicago Tribune, The Detroit News, and The Tennessean. At The Detroit News, his 2005 investigation “Sexual Abuse Behind Bars” exposed the systemic rape of female prisoners by male guards, prompting legislative hearings within 24 hours and more than $300 million in state settlements. His 2002 investigation into 26,000 unpunished fugitives, “Hiding in Plain View,” was a Pulitzer finalist and led to a task force that arrested more than 16,000 felons within six months.
After his years as a senior investigative journalist, Claxton continued to work as a writer and Media Consultant to news organisations on investigative strategy, ethics, narrative structure, and newsroom leadership. Since 2007 he has also turned his storytelling instincts toward education and technology, founding Epic 4D LLC, the company behind the Itty Bitty Book App, a global publishing platform empowering young authors, and creating The Great Bible Race, the world’s largest Bible knowledge video game. Questions from the game are featured at the Museum of the Bible.
Melvin Claxton has received numerous honours for excellence in journalism. In 2025, Investigative Reporters and Editors, Inc., honoured Claxton as one of twenty investigative reporting pioneers at the association’s 50th Anniversary Gala.
René Baptiste, CMG
Doctor of Laws (LLD)
For close to 50 years, René Baptiste has practiced at the Bar of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, building one of the most varied legal and public careers in the Eastern Caribbean. Beyond the courtroom, her career has included sustained public, professional and civic service in Parliament and the Cabinet, in the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) Assembly, at the head of her national Bar, on the Council and committees of the Commonwealth Lawyers Association, in the co-operative and credit-union movement, in the Anglican Church and in the cultural and literary life of her nation.
Called to the Bar in October 1976, Baptiste became, at 24, the founding Manager of the St. Vincent Trust Authority, establishing the country’s offshore financial-services sector
from scratch and helping shape the regional legal framework still in use today. In 1986, she opened her own solo practice, now known as Baptiste & Co, the collaborating firm in St. Vincent and the Grenadines for Andersen Global. She was also admitted to the Bar in Antigua and St. Kitts.
Baptiste’s involvement in public life long preceded her election to Parliament. From 1975 she held active roles in the Labour Party including Assistant General Secretary of the Party in the early 1980s. In 2001, she became the first woman of the Vincentian Bar ever elected to Parliament, representing West Kingstown and serving as Minister of Tourism and Culture.
As Minister of Culture, she built the institutions that earned her a nickname that speaks louder than any title: “Mama Culture”. She established the National Cultural Foundation and the national sound archives, declared the country’s first National Hero, created the Carnival Development Corporation, also reimagining and rebranding the national carnival as “Vincy Mas.” Re-elected in 2005, Baptiste went on to lead the country’s first-ever Referendum on Constitutional Reform in 2009.
In 2011, Queen Elizabeth II appointed her a Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George (CMG) for her contribution to law, international finance, culture, and politics. The following year, Baptiste was elected the founding Speaker of the OECS Assembly, the regional parliamentary body for the Eastern Caribbean, a post she has now held, unopposed, for over a decade.
Today, René Baptiste still practices and legislates regionally, most recently having served as President of Soroptimist International of the Caribbean Network.
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