The Progressive Labour Party is rightly marking the tenth anniversary of its late leader Frederick Wade this week, but it is unlikely that the question of what might have been had he not fallen ill in 1996 will be answered.

Like the late British Labour Party Leaders Hugh Gaitskell in the 1960s and John Smith in the 1990s, Mr. Wade will be forever be in ?the best Opposition leaders never to become Premier? category.

It is likely that had he lived, he would have led the PLP to victory in 1998 and become Premier, but the great imponderable is what kind of Premier he would have made.

One cannot help but think, however, that he would have been more accessible than Dame Jennifer Smith turned out to be, and it is hard to imagine the split that occurred in 2003 would have taken place under his watch.

What can be said with more certainty is that Mr. Wade was the person primarily responsible for the reincarnation of the PLP after the disastrous 1985 election when it was reduced to just seven seats out of 40 and it was not at all clear whether it, or the National Liberal Party led by expelled PLP members, would emerge as the main opposition to the United Bermuda Party.

As it was, Mr. Wade first rebuilt the party and then pushed it to the brink of victory.

There were perhaps two seminal moments during his 11-year tenure as PLP Leader. Until 1989, he was not generally regarded as a great speaker and did not have the stature of then-Premier Sir John Swan.

But in a debate before the 1989 general election, he exceeded expectations and many felt beat Sir John in the debate. In 1995, he went one better when he all but destroyed Sir John?s Independence campaign by boycotting the referendum based on the argument that other constitutional reforms, notably constituency reform (later seen through by Dame Jennifer) had to come first.

In doing so, Mr. Wade shattered Sir John?s already slim hopes of securing a majority in favour of Independence and drove the man the PLP feared most out of office.

Mr. Wade was a humble man who rose to great heights and at his death had won the respect of his party and many outside of it. He brought the PLP to the centre of Bermuda politics and in doing so, paved the way for its 1998 victory. That is his legacy.