Delano Franklyn hailed as leader, confidant, exceptional dad and KC devotee
DELANO Franklyn’s attributes as an advisor and confidant to Jamaica’s prime minister, student leader, exceptional father, Government senator, humanitarian and devoted Kingston College (KC) alumnus were highlighted Friday during a service celebrating his life at University Chapel, Mona.
For just over two hours, memories of the 63-year-old attorney and politico, who died on Friday, February 10, 2023, elicited laughter, tears and nods of agreement that he lived his life in service to his country and his fellow citizens.
“To leave an indelible footprint in so many facets of our nation’s evolution was clearly his destiny,” said former Prime Minister PJ Patterson.
“From his earliest days he identified what he wanted to achieve and embarked with remarkable resolve, exquisitely combined with abundant talents, to fully accomplish his lofty goals according to a precise timetable of his own making,” Patterson said in his tribute.
He said that Franklyn, during his years at KC, as well as at Mico Teachers’ College, and at The University of the West Indies “earned the democratic recognition of his peers as their duly elected leader and an articulate rebel in the assertion of student rights, academic freedom, gender equality and total intolerance of discrimination of any kind”.
He also noted that Franklyn’s determination to reject unjust authoritarian regimes or archaic rulings made without sound reason and based purely on habit often brought him in conflict with the powers that be. “But he was always prepared to stand his ground and quickly mobilise the collective force of his student cohorts to ensure that right and justice, rather than the sheer power of the high and mighty would, in the end, prevail,” added Patterson who, during his tenure as chief executive had appointed Frankly to lead the restoration of the National Youth Service.
“It was during his studies at The Mico that his pedagogic skills were sharply honed, for thereafter, no matter the sphere of his engagement he exuded the traits and techniques of a supreme teacher,” said Patterson who, in 1998, appointed Franklyn his chief of staff.
That assignment, Patterson said, was an “awesome responsibility” that demanded tact, but firmness; patience, but urgency; access, but confidentiality.
“It entailed the adroit separation and yet inextricably intertwined linkages between the official and political duties which required simultaneous attention of one who is both a prime minister and party leader,” Patterson said, adding that Franklyn “possessed the catalytic synergies which enabled him to discharge all these complex functions with exemplary distinction”.
Patterson added: “It is impossible to catalogue here the multifaceted services he rendered as a senior special advisor. Simply put, there was nothing too small, nor any task to big or daunting that Delano Franklyn refrained from undertaking. He was meticulous, analytical, visionary and strategic.”
He also recalled Franklyn’s appointment as a minister state in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, saying, “Wherever there was a unique situation demanding sophisticated treatment, one only had to beckon his way.”
That attribute, he said, influenced his decision to have Franklyn escort former Haitian President Jean Bertrand Aristide safely to South Africa in 2004 after he was deposed and had been staying in Jamaica.
Patterson, a Calabar High School alumni, triggered laughter when he made reference to the first word in KC’S motto ‘Fortis cadere, cedere non potest’.
“I’m going to make a surprising admission today. When Delano fell ill I never knew that I would use the word ‘Fortis’. As you all know, he was a very private person, but he was also a very stubborn person, and in the hospital when the KC medical massive had gathered from all over to come to his assistance he was refusing to take their prescriptions at times and I kept on saying to him ‘You have to do this with the Fortis spirit’,” Patterson said before ending his tribute thus: “Delano Roosevelt Franklyn, Fortisima forever more.”
Franklyn’s sister, Dr Marcia Franklyn-robinson, recalled that her brother, as a teenager, had displayed intense focus well beyond his years.
“I know no other teenager who carried a daily planner and scheduled his days like Delano did. Often he would tell mama that his diary was too tight to take out the trash,” she said, triggering laughter.
He developed core values through lessons from his parents and the Aleppo community in St Mary where the family lived before coming to Kingston.
“Diversity of town and country living taught Delano diplomacy and how to talk to all types of people,” she said. “Our parents drilled into our heads that manners, respect, and decency will take you everywhere.”
Her brother, she said, was an observant individual, “always thinking, testing theories, exploring ideas and trying to solve problems.”
Speaking to his commitment to community and his drive to change the circumstances of people, Dr Franklyn-robinson recalled when they had just graduated from high school and were in their first job they had an agreement that he would pay the electricity, she would pay the water bill and they would split the phone bill.
“Most months, and I mean 10 out of 12 months, I would get an urgent call from Delano reminding me that I need to pay all the bills,” she said.
When she asked him why, his response was that he had met some people with a need and he had already promised out his pay to them... “and then there was the excuse that ‘Marcia, I work with Government’.”
She recalled another occasion when, on returning home from school abroad, she noticed that all her clothes and treasured high school books were missing.
When she asked her mother
where they were, her mother told he to ask her brother. “Delano, where is my stuff? “Bwoy, I met a family, ennuh, and two of the children needed glasses, You weren’t using your clothes so I gave them away. They sold the clothes to buy the glasses.”
Franklyn’s daughter, Maya, in a salute by letter to her dad, said that although she may be in denial, she found
“peace with the thought of you wrapped around God’s arms in the safest space”.
“You embodied strength, perseverance and resilience, and I admire you so much because of it. You knew what it meant to continue with life, no matter the magnitude of your obstacles, and you did it with such boldness. I am going to miss you. I am going to miss the inspiration that you are, and the motivation that you had to create something magical out of life,” she said.
Her father, she said, had made it easy for her to be the proudest daughter, adding that her heart aches for future memories that she will never share with him.
Lifelong friend, orthopaedic surgeon and former president of the Jamaica Athletics Administrative Association, Dr Warren Blake traced