By Rickey Singh From Barbados Nation News

The lad who grew up humbly in rural Chaguanas and Tunapuna to later scale primary, secondary school and university successes before achieving recognition as a pre-eminent diplomat and head of Trinidad and Tobago’s Public Service has much of relevance to recall for today’s generation – beyond the shores of his twin-island Caricom member state.

With remarkable eloquence, in a 247-page book, chock-full of relevant statistical references and descriptions, Reginald Dumas shares with readers in refreshing prose a retrospection that provides the title for The First 30 Years.

That is the first three decades of his now 81 years, during which he has achieved considerable respect and admiration for his contributions as a former head of Trinidad and Tobago’s public service, long-serving diplomat and currently still a notable reference source on matters of good governance and management – public and private sectors.

It was my own good fortune to have first met Mr Dumas (now a familiar “Reggie”) in my early, salad years as a regional journalist in Barbados when he first served as Trinidad and Tobago’s High Commissioner for the Eastern Caribbean.

Most of Dumas’ adult working years have been devoted to serving his country as a “public servant” diplomat. Subsequently, he was to become a much sought after “resource” for national and regional “consultations” on developments in the public and private sectors for which he was to provide expertise, with customary humility and an expertise.

Now Dumas, rather “Reggie” – his trademark casual form of identification – has written and released The First 30 Years. It reveals, with the finest of inspiring prose, a life – supposedly in “retirement” – that continues to be at the service of regional governments, organisations, including the media, and institutions that consider it useful to tap his intellectual resources.

For Jamaica’s former three-time prime minister, P.J. Patterson – himself a prolific writer and commentator on Jamaica and regional affairs – Dumas is one of “the premier intellects of Caricom, an independent thinker who candidly expresses his opinions which, not surprisingly arouse strong reactions on different side . . . .”
Dedicated to the “young people of the Caribbean – whom he encourages to see the past as the indispensable port to the present and the future”, Dumas leaves no doubt about the tremendous influence on his life by his mother Adeline.

Dumas credits his mum, a licensed government nurse and midwife at the time, with his general upbringing and education – from kindergarten to university (Cambridge). He tells us that he was a “regular visitor” to the “pawnshop”, along with his mum during those very difficult growing up years.

That, incidentally, is an experience with which a lot of West Indians, including this columnist, can easily identify.

However, while Patterson commends Dumas for dedicating his book to the young people of the Caribbean and encouraging them to “see the past as the indispensable portal to the present and future . . . .” the well known Caribbean writer and social commentator Ian McDonald offers another perspective.

Also a Trinidadian by birth and with two years overlapping between them at Queen’s Royal College and Cambridge University in England, McDonald, in reflecting on Dumas’ First 30 Years, poignantly notes that having well articulated how that “foundation was laid”, the author must now tell “how successfully he built on that foundation . . . .We look forward to this account of his maturing achievements . . . .”

I think that readers of Dumas’ absorbing The First 30 Years would readily concur with McDonald.

• Rickey Singh is a noted Caribbean journalist.

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