President sympathises on passing of Lennox Canterbury
President Irfaan Ali yesterday expressed sadness at the passing of Lennox Canterbury, Former Director of the Mash Secretariat.
The Head of State said, “I am deeply saddened to have learnt of the passing of my dear friend, Lennox Canterbury. I had the privilege of working with Lennox on many projects at the Ministry of Housing and Water, the Ministry of Tourism, Industry and Commerce and as President. His most recent project was Guyana’s 55th Independence Anniversary.
“As Minister, we worked together on numerous projects- Guyana Festival, Building Expo, GuyExpo and numerous other national events. His love for culture and country was boundless and unquestionable. In our most recent conversation, he was excited about the ‘One Guyana’ concept and was blooming with his own ideas on how this could be realised. He was a true Nationalist, and I will greatly miss him. My sincere condolences go out to his family at this difficult time. May his soul rest in peace.”
A former colleague of Canterbury, Kemie Williams, told this newspaper that she worked alongside him for many national events. She mentioned that she worked with Canterbury on Mash, the Guyana Festival, GuyExpo, Flag raising and the National Holidays’ Anniversary Celebrations among other projects since her employment at the Tourism Ministry in 2009.
She said, “he was a good friend of mine we worked on several events together. He as entertainment manager and I as his deputy. He was a person that believes in putting his best foot forward, he was dedicated to his job, always willing to help others, he went by the book always saying leave no room for people to question your integrity.” She also said that Canterbury was a jovial person who would listen to others’ ideas and always gave credit when it was due. She noted that the last time she spoke to him was last week and he had told her that “he wasn’t feeling too hot”.
In 2011, Canterbury joined Director of Culture Dr James Rose to represent Guyana at a meeting in Paramaribo, Suriname, at which Guyana, Suriname and French Guiana signed a memorandum of understanding to take part in an Inter-Guianas Cultural Festival.