BARBADOS has lost its first visually impaired senator.
Ivan Lynton, who served in the Upper Chamber in the Owen Arthur administration between 2003 and 2007, passed away on Sunday. He was 81.
Opposition Leader and political leader of the Barbados Labour Party (BLP), Mia Mottley, paid tribute to the BLP stalwart, calling him a committed Barbadian who never allowed his disability to define him or the contributions he made to his community and country.
She said Lynton, known on the radio call-in programmes as “The Economist”, was a household name for defending the needs of ordinary Barbadians and his beloved party even before he was appointed to the Senate.
“Ivan took his appointment to the Upper Chamber seriously. And he did not allow his inability to see to limit the quality of his contribution.
“His tenure as the first physically challenged person to sit in the Senate showed all that it was possible for anyone to serve in our highest chambers in spite of their being challenged in some way physically,” Mottley said in a prepared statement.
Meanwhile, President of the Senate, Kerry-Ann Ifill, offered condolences to the Lynton family on behalf of the community of persons with disabilities and the Senate.
“He was the first totally blind person to serve in the Upper Chamber of Barbados and his commitment to the integration of persons with disability for their voices to be heard at all levels of society will always be remembered,” she said.
Lynton was a devout member of the Seventh-Day Adventist Church. He leaves to mourn a wife, two sons and four daughters. (HLE)
