Lucia - Prime Minister John Compton, 82, who guided his tiny Caribbean island to independence from Britain, has died, a member of his Cabinet said. Compton, a three-time leader of St. Lucia who became prime minister most recently in December, did not resume leadership duties after suffering a series of strokes in late April.
Compton, a farmer and lawyer, became chief minister of the colony in , negotiated for more autonomy from Britain three years later, and became the first prime minister upon independence in Voted out of power later that year, he returned to govern the verdant, mountainous island from to Many on the island, with a population of ,, knew him affectionately as "Daddy Compton," particularly in the eastern villages where he won his first election in He gained a reputation for fearlessness three years later as a union leader directing a strike against the sugar-growing elite for better labor conditions, getting arrested after a confrontation in which he dared a white planter to run him over with a tractor.
Like roughly 90 percent of his fellow islanders, Mr. Compton was black. Compton governed as a pro-Western conservative and took heat for welcoming U. He told critics the Caribbean needed Washington to fight drug trafficking and communism. Compton oversaw the development of highways, airports, industrial complexes and housing projects on the square-mile island. Born in on the nearby island of Canouan, Mr. Compton attended high school in St. Lucia and worked in oil refineries in Curacao for two years before studying in the United Kingdom, where he qualified as a lawyer at the University of Wales.
He was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in He is survived by his wife, Janice, and five children. Skip to content.
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