MEDIA STATEMENT from the Government of Antigua and Barbuda:
The Government of Antigua and Barbuda has learned of the death of Dame Edris Bird and expresses its condolences to the entire family of this exceptional national of our great little country.
Dame Edris Bird was quintessentially an educator whose
teaching history commenced during the colonial days. She was born in 1929, one decade before the trade union became a lawful entity, in 1939; and, twenty-two years before adult suffrage become the law of the land, in 1951.
She matured during an era when the struggle to achieve regional integration and sovereignty had begun to crystalize, and the emphasis on excellence was beginning to be pursued by the most ambitious among us.
Dame Edris Bird will be remembered for her intelligence
and wit, her ability to learn and to teach, and for the impact she had on a generation of potential leaders who would help to create the New Jerusalem. She taught and helped to shape a former prime minister, a slew of youth who fractured the past to plant new seeds and a modern
future, and countless men and women who were determined to scale the hurdles which colonial Antigua and Barbuda erected to prevent excellence.
The nation of Antigua and Barbuda feels the pain which her children, her family and her friends experience by this loss. The Government of Antigua and Barbuda expresses the condolences of our entire grateful population.
Dame Edris Bird’s impact on national growth is
immeasurable, and her love of country was expressed in her unstinting gifts of time and talent to nurture an ambitious and daring people.
The Cabinet of Antigua and Barbuda offers an Official
Funeral in celebration of Dame Edris Bird’s selfless contribution to nation-building, which has been praiseworthy.
May the God of our forebears guide her footsteps among our ancestors in the other world.