The politicized complex became a hotbed of what Jamaica calls "garrison politics," where vote-rich slums become permanent power bases for one party. In the 1960s, Seaga gained fame for bulldozing an infamous slum and building Tivoli Gardens, the island's first public housing project, which he filled with supporters of the Labor Party. For some older Jamaicans, Seaga is forever linked with the state-sponsored political violence of the 1970s, when Jamaica's two major political factions used gun-toting gangsters to sway voters. Clashes between rival partisans killed nearly 800 people. The run-up to the 1980 elections that vaulted him to power was extraordinarily bloody. President Ronald Reagan's closest Caribbean ally and was able to boost a struggling economy that was hit hard by soaring inflation and widespread joblessness. When Seaga's Labor Party ousted the incumbent Manley and the People's National Party's "democratic socialist" administration in 1980, Seaga described the landslide victory as a "declaration against communism in Jamaica."Īs Jamaica's leader, Seaga instituted a pro-American, free-market economy, ushering in what many consider the island's most prosperous era. distribution company and played a role in introducing ska to the world.Īt 29, he was appointed to Jamaica's upper legislative house by Labor Party founder and Jamaica's first prime minister, Alexander Bustamante.Īs opposition leader in the 1970s, Seaga railed against the socialist agenda of then-Prime Minister Michael Manley, saying it crippled the island's fragile economy. Prior to entering politics, Seaga was a major record producer who operated the West Indies Record Ltd.
He studied anthropology at Harvard University and published several papers on Afro-Jamaican folklore and Obeah, a religion combining Christian and African rituals. citizenship at a young age to show his loyalty to Jamaica. He was West Kingston's representative for 40 consecutive years and held a parliamentary seat longer than anyone in Jamaica's history.īorn May 28, 1930, in Massachusetts to Lebanese-Jamaican parents, Seaga renounced his U.S. His political career began in the late 1950s and he won a parliamentary seat in 1962. Seaga, Jamaica's prime minister from 1980 until 1989, was the only remaining member of the generation of leaders who drafted the constitution when the Caribbean island gained independence from Britain in 1962. Seaga's death was announced on Twitter by Prime Minister Andrew Holness. Edward Seaga, a former Jamaican prime minister who shaped the island's post-independence politics and cultural life, died Tuesday at 89.
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