PM's brother Felix Joseph laid to rest

The Prime Minister says his late brother’s acceptance of his terminal illness consoled and strengthened him.

Dr Rowley was speaking during the funeral of Felix Joseph at the St Andrew’s Anglican Church, Scarborough, Tobago, on June 6.

Joseph, who would have turned 80 on August 10, died at the Scarborough General Hospital on May 23 after a brief battle with cancer.

Rowley had mentioned his brother’s death that evening while making opening remarks at an instalment of Conversations with the Prime Minister at the Scarborough Library.

Joseph, who lived at Signal Hill, was a retired technician with the Telecommunications Service of TT (TSTT).

In his tribute, Rowley told mourners his brother had lived “a full life of 80.

"The Bible says we are promised three score and ten. But by reason of strength we might get four score. Felix got his four score,” he said.

But Rowley, who was accompanied by his wife, Sharon, said human beings generally are never prepared to accept death.

“It doesn’t matter how prepared we think we are. We are never ready even to face death, far less to receive it.”

Rowley said when he got the news of Joseph’s illness, he was surprised because his brother was his usual jovial self. He later visited Joseph after learning he had been hospitalised.

“Surprisingly, he was so comfortable with the fact that his illness was terminal. He exuded a countenance that surprised me, an absence of sadness and sorrow. He was resigned to the fact that he was in a situation that could end his life.

“We talked a little bit and he never once expressed regret or sorrow. He was still teasing and making jokes like he always did, even when he couldn’t move himself around.”

The PM said on a subsequent visit, Joseph was still in that mood.

“That consoled me. It made me able to accept his circumstance and to accept that we were losing him.”

Rowley told the packed congregation that he and his brother, who were six years apart, came from an era when they had to “go to the pasture, walk to school barefoot, be respectful to the neighbour and of course, ambition to be something in life.

“That is where we came from.”

He continued, “Let us not worry about the years not lived by him, but let us accept and enjoy and remember the decades of happiness as lived by Felix, the happy man, the happy brother that we knew. If we do that, his passing would have strengthened us, as his demeanour would have strengthened me in his final days.”

Rowley also had mourners laughing as he recalled the somewhat adversarial relationship the brothers had in their boyhood, particularly in relation to cricket and kite-flying.

But he described his brother as “a happy person.

“Everything about life and about Felix was about being happy.”

Dr Llewelyn Crooks, Joseph’s childhood friend, also gave a tribute.

Joseph’s daughter, Helen, delivered the eulogy. She said her father was passionate about his job, education, music, dancing and socialising with family and friends. Helen added he also took his role as husband and provider very seriously.

Fr Wendell Bernard delivered the sermon.

Cabinet members Stuart Young, Allyson West and Kazim Hosein were among the mourners. Also attending were Minister in the Office of the Prime Minister Ayanna Webster-Roy, who is also Tobago East MP; PNM senator Laurence Hislop, also a Tobagonian; and THA Minority councillor Petal Daniel-Benoit.

Joseph was laid to rest at the Bacolet Public Cemetery.