I suppose it must have been the summer of 1964 when I visited Punta Gorda for the first time. PG’s Vance and Lennox Vernon had joined our 1963 S.J.C. graduating class in fourth or fifth form, I’m not sure. Then when a group of us began the sixth form in January of 1964, we were joined by Marion J. Paulino, also from PG.
These three guys from PG were pretty popular. ‘Nox was a big basketball star. Vance was smooth and polished. Marion was a bit of an adventurer, like myself. He became my best friend in sixth form.
Anyhow, the rest of us from the sixth form wanted to visit these brothers’ district home town to pay them respect and also have a good time. Most of us were rum drinkers at that time, and when drinking we would often be joined by Trevor Agard, a Caribbean (Trinidad, I think) soldier in the British Army who eventually married one of the Vernon sisters.
I remember that we traveled by boat, probably the Heron H. And I remember that we played a game on the PG basketball court against the PG college students. There was a tall young man who was giving us all kinds of trouble. It must have been forty years or more later, when Supreme Court Justice, Adolph Lucas, told me that he had been that tall young man.
Anyway, this column is about Herman Lewis, Herman Lewis of Punta Gorda. I don’t recall exactly where or when I met Herman. Must have been the middle 1970’s. Sometime in that decade, Herman began publishing a newspaper in Punta Gorda, and I remember that at one time he was referring to his newspaper as “the mighty cream of the South.” In Belize City, we used to be marketing our newspaper as “Amandala is cream,” so we began to think of this man from PG as our soul brother.
There is a certain kind of personality that has problems functioning inside the systems of the major political parties. I am one of those, and it appears that so is Herman Lewis. He actually ran as PUP candidate for Toledo East in 1979, when he was defeated by the UDP’s Charles Wagner. Herman was appointed a Senator in the 1979 to 1984 PUP administration.
Since that time, Herman has remained a fixture on the Toledo political scene, but as the years went by, he became more and more isolated. A sincere man who is an accountant by training, Herman began to feel victimized by the spokesmen and the functionaries of the two major parties. I know the feeling. He began to lash out at those who were using the cover of their political parties to seek to marginalize and ridicule him. I’ve passed that way before, brother. I’ve passed that way before.
In February of 2003, Herman was planning to run as an independent in Toledo East when I visited him in Punta Gorda to suggest that he sit and consult with PUP Leader, Hon. Said Musa. The two men did so sit, and came out of this meeting with an agreement that Herman would not run in the election. His running, in the PUP’s thinking, might have muddied the waters, so to speak.
Herman made it plain in his newspaper, in the months and years following his withdrawal from the March 2003 race, however, that Mr. Musa had not fulfilled his side of the agreement. And Herman, who had become more and more dissatisfied with Mike Espat, to the point of outright anger with the PUP Toledo East incumbent, vowed that, come hell or high water, he would run and defeat Espat in 2008.
Herman felt, and argued in his newspaper, that the UDP challenger, Peter Eden Martinez, though educated, was inadequate, and apparently convinced himself that he could beat both the PUP and UDP candidates as an independent. This has never been done before in modern Belizean politics. Plus, Herman had been getting into too many disputes with too many people.
When Wil Maheia entered the race, Wil was younger, better financed, and more exposed, throughout Belize and internationally, than Herman was. Through his environmental organization, TIDE, Will was riding a popular wave, and he had no longstanding enemies, as Herman did. Amongst the younger people at Kremandala, Wil Maheia had become very popular.
But Herman Lewis had his reasons, which he expressed, for disliking Wil’s policies and programs. The political situation in Toledo East had become cluttered, and then the National Reform Party (NRP) also ran a candidate there, to make five in all.
In the polling, Wil did much better than Herman. Peter Eden won big, and Mike Espat went down to crushing defeat.
I want Herman to know this, and I am saying it publicly. He is my friend, and he will always be my friend. That is because he has qualities I admire. As much as it hurts, he should not take personally what happened on February 7. Electoral politics in Belize is about the party organization, and it is about money. Herman had none of these.
I have not called Herman since the election, because I don’t know what to say to him. I would have to criticize Herman for not listening to me, but I would also want him to know that I am and will be a true friend. That is my column for today. Power to the people.