From printer to partner – What a wonderful journey!

by Harold Hoyte

Editor Emeritus

The Nation

Newspapers

THIS 20th anniversary juncture is a very gratifying moment for the founders, directors and staff of Interactive Media Ltd, and we, your friends at The Nation Publishing Company in Barbados happily raise a toast across the Caribbean Sea to your significant accomplishment.

We ourselves, at THE NATION, had just celebrated our own 20th anniversary when we were engaged by SEARCHLIGHT to consider printing your newspaper.{{more}}

What a wonderful journey it has been for us from printer to partner.

This association has brought us great personal and business satisfaction in watching you grow and mature to sustain a high level of both professional journalism and print quality in the wider interest of your countrymen.

Our minds naturally go back to the germ, the idea of SEARCHLIGHT, brought to our interest by the most gentle, soft-spoken woman of influence and humility in St Vincent and the Grenadines, and the pleading pioneer, the amicable and assured ambassador, Norma Keizer of fond, belated memory.

Every aspect of her person and persistence impressed and convinced us that we had to line up behind her ambitious dream. We pledged to rise or fall with her vision. We saw in her eyes and ideas exactly where we were in 1973 and knew that much in the same way as the Trinidad Express newspaper bought into our aspiration and held our hands in our formative years, it was our turn to show similar kindness to kindred souls, closer to our shores than any other Caribbean island.

How do you say no to a matriarchal figure, a renowned teacher and a recognized patriot with a scorching desire to introduce a national newspaper in the finest traditions of both forthrightness and fairness?

We did not know how. Our one condition was that the people behind her project were persons of integrity. In response, Mrs Keizer, managing editor, promptly brought a delegation of founders to our offices in Barbados, including first directors Dr Adrian Fraser, Mr Sebastian “Bassy” Alexander, Mr Renwick Rose and Mr Oscar Allen.

We were impressed that such a powerful cadre of investors were sincerely obligated to the cause.

Both in St Vincent and Barbados, we moved with alacrity to settle all the outstanding essentials needed to turn this bold idea into a product for the hands and eyes of readers and advertisers in St Vincent and the Grenadines. Along the way we were happy to provide personnel with the requisite experience to guide SEARCHLIGHT staff and we even forfeited one of our own young men, whose attachment to the paper and the country was so strong, he never returned to Barbados.

Then we saw the company anticipate new horizons and acquire its own premises and then, in conjunction with others, establish a high-speed rotary press, the first of its kind for the island, affording the self-sufficiency you not only wanted, but also fully deserved.

We entirely respect the ambitions of those who secured the opportunity for full independence of production. We also applaud how you favourably retain a continuing relationship with us, even as the baton of leadership passed uneventfully from mother Keizer to daughter Clare.

It delights us to observe how she has led the company’s expansion into a second publication, Searchlight Midweek to accompany your premier publication, Searchlight Weekend.

Newspapers are evolving. To this end we acknowledge your transition to the digital era with a web site, Facebook page and an e-paper. The diligent directors of Interactive Media will want to stay on the cutting edge of trends to ensure that the hard work of 20 years is not sacrificed on the altar of complacency or smugness.

A new generation of staff, as well as an injection of new minds into the directorate have continued to shelter SEARCHLIGHT’s honoured place in preserving your democracy and upholding the fine traditions of a diligent people and a proud country.

From this you must never divert.

The journey has just begun. Your 20-year milestone is not a destination. It is but a landmark in the continuum of your expedition to provide the ultimate platform for your citizens to safeguard a society that satisfies the legitimate aspirations of a deserving people who want to keep Hairoun forever free.

As your anthem asserts, we trust that “What e’er the future brings,” your faith will see you through. And indeed as it goes on to state: “May peace reign from shore to shore.”

And may God bless and keep you true, as SEARCHLIGHT remains the perpetually luminous source to which your people can turn for enlightenment and education.