WAL­TER AL­IBEY

wal­ter.al­ibey@guardian.co.tt

Ray­mond An­tho­ny Tim Kee was eu­lo­gized as an un­com­pro­mis­ing fam­i­ly man who loved to help peo­ple and carve out a de­cent lifestyle for his fam­i­ly.

At his fu­ner­al ser­vice at St There­sa’s RC Church in Wood­brook yes­ter­day, those words didn’t come as a sur­prise to the many who paid their fi­nal re­spects, in­clud­ing Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley, Fitzger­ald Hinds, Min­is­ter in the Min­istry of Le­gal Af­fairs, Port-of-Spain May­or Joel Mar­tinez, Jer­ry Narace, Camille Robin­son Reg­is, Win­ston ‘Gyp­sy’ Pe­ters, Jack Warn­er, Neville Fer­gu­son and oth­er mem­bers of his po­lit­i­cal and sport­ing fam­i­lies, but on­ly served to con­firm what they had al­ready known.

His daugh­ters Taheera and Ra­mona, in glow­ing trib­utes, said he loved them and their broth­ers un­con­di­tion­al­ly de­spite hav­ing dif­fer­ing views at times.

Taheera said: “For most of my life, I’ve been guid­ed by this de­sire to make my dad hap­py and proud. For me he was about suc­cess, in­tegri­ty and hard work, he was a be­liev­er that the sky was the lim­it and nev­er made me feel that my gen­der or race should hold me back. In­stead, he helped me to em­brace the pow­er of his qual­i­ties. Com­ing from very hum­ble be­gin­nings he had a vi­sion for the life he want­ed and the man he want­ed to be­come. His per­se­ver­ance, sac­ri­fice and au­dac­i­ty to think that he could, he made it hap­pen.

“As a fa­ther, he was lov­ing and af­fec­tion­ate, but al­so had high ex­pec­ta­tions of his chil­dren. He had a love for deep con­ver­sa­tions but of­ten made things lighter with jokes. He had a true pas­sion for af­fect­ing change and fig­ur­ing out how to make things bet­ter, more ef­fi­cient, more sen­si­ble, es­sen­tial­ly he was dri­ven to achieve ex­cel­lence in every event he un­der­took.”

Tim Kee’s hunger for suc­cess land­ed him in top po­si­tions in many or­gan­i­sa­tions, in­clud­ing trea­sur­er of the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM), May­or of Port-of-Spain and al­so as pres­i­dent of the T&T Foot­ball As­so­ci­a­tion, where his de­sire to ef­fect much-need­ed change in the or­gan­i­sa­tion’s con­sti­tu­tion, led to him be­ing oust­ed in 2015.

Close friend Noel Con­liffe, whom he met when he joined the Po­lice Ser­vice back in 1968, said Tim Kee was a gift to his fam­i­ly, friends, as­so­ciates and the wider T&T.

He said Tim Kee left the ser­vice to join Caribbean’s lead­ing in­sur­ance agency where he be­came one of the youngest unit man­agers at age 26. Af­ter im­prov­ing his abil­i­ty and qual­i­fi­ca­tions in the field, he was pro­mot­ed to man­ag­er of the Tu­na­puna agency. Con­liffe said be­cause of his acute man­age­r­i­al skills, Tim Kee stood-out when there was a tran­si­tion to Guardian Life.

Tim Kee’s oth­er daugh­ter, Ra­mona, said she couldn’t put in­to per­spec­tive why her fa­ther made her wait for long pe­ri­ods when she was a child, but she re­alised it was be­cause he al­ways said yes to help­ing peo­ple.