Carib Scope

分类： politics

  • Darializa Ávila Chevalier defeats Adriano Espaillat in New York’s Democratic primary

    Darializa Ávila Chevalier defeats Adriano Espaillat in New York’s Democratic primary

    In a stunning upset that has sent ripples through U.S. Democratic politics, first-time candidate Darializa Ávila Chevalier has claimed victory in the Democratic primary for New York’s 13th Congressional District, edging out long-serving incumbent Congressman Adriano Espaillat by a narrow margin. Latest certified election results show Ávila Chevalier secured 49.4% of the total vote, compared to Espaillat’s 46% — a result that upends expectations for a seat long held by one of the Democratic Party’s established Dominican-American leaders.

    The 13th District, which includes majority-Latino neighborhoods like Washington Heights in Upper Manhattan, is one of the nation’s most high-profile constituencies with a majority Dominican-American population. Espaillat, who has represented the district in Congress since 2017, built a reputation as a respected bridge between local Dominican community interests and national Democratic policy, making his defeat one of the most significant incumbent upsets of the 2024 primary cycle.

    At 32 years old, Ávila Chevalier brings a new profile to the race: a Columbia-educated sociologist, Dominican-American born in Miami to immigrant parents and raised in the heart of Washington Heights. She centered her entire campaign around three core pillars: grassroots community-centered representation, sweeping progressive policy reform, and pushing the Democratic Party to elevate younger, less entrenched political voices. Throughout her campaign, she repeatedly emphasized her dual rootedness in both the Dominican community and the New York district she now will represent, framing her connection to the area as a more authentic match for voters than the incumbent’s long tenure in Washington.

    Ávila Chevalier’s win cements her status as one of the fastest-rising stars within the progressive wing of the Democratic Party, and counts as a high-profile victory for the Democratic Socialists of America movement, which backed her campaign. Beyond the local result, the primary contest encapsulates the growing generational and ideological divides roiling the national Democratic Party: it pitted a decades-long incumbent with deep establishment ties against a young, outsider progressive candidate pushing for systemic change, a dynamic that has played out in dozens of primaries across the country in recent election cycles.

    Notably, even with the competitive race between two candidates with very different political profiles, Dominican representation remained the throughline of the entire contest. Both candidates built their campaigns around their deep ties to the Dominican diaspora in New York, meaning the outcome will not break the long tradition of Dominican-American leadership for the district. Instead, it brings a fresh, progressive voice from the community to the national congressional stage, signaling a shift in the priorities of voters in one of New York’s most politically active districts.

  • Monorath vraagt SRD 521 miljoen extra voor versterking veiligheidsdiensten

    Monorath vraagt SRD 521 miljoen extra voor versterking veiligheidsdiensten

    During 2026 budget deliberations in Suriname’s National Assembly, Minister of Justice and Police Harish Monorath has formally called for a SRD 521 million increase to his ministry’s annual allocation, framing the extra funding as a non-negotiable requirement to strengthen the operational capacity of the country’s security agencies.

    Monorath emphasized that public safety, legal protection, and consistent law enforcement form the foundational pillars of Suriname’s democratic constitutional state. His ministry currently faces mounting, cross-cutting challenges across core portfolios: organized crime reduction, road safety improvement, border security management, and civilian protection, all of which are strained by limited current resources.

    A key pain point laid out by the minister is the extreme imbalance in the ministry’s proposed SRD 5.3 billion baseline 2026 budget, which leaves almost no room for long-term investments in capacity building. Of this total baseline amount, 79% is allocated exclusively to employee wages and salaries, 18% goes to covering routine operational costs, and just 3% remains available to fund policy programs and service development across all security branches.

    “Ninety-seven percent of our entire budget goes to operational running costs. That leaves us with insufficient space to make the critical investments we need to strengthen our corps and services,” Monorath told lawmakers during his budget presentation.

    If approved, the SRD 521 million supplementary budget would be allocated across three key priority areas: SRD 406 million for purchasing new transport vehicles for all security branches, SRD 105 million for firearms and ammunition, and SRD 10 million for new computing infrastructure and expanded digitalization.

    Monorath detailed the critical equipment shortage facing nearly all of the country’s security units. For the Suriname Police Corps alone, an estimated 30 to 40 percent of the current vehicle fleet needs immediate decommissioning due to poor mechanical condition. Other agencies including the national fire department, prison services, and the Security and Assistance Service also face urgent unmet needs for new vehicles and updated operational equipment, he added.

    Beyond equipment gaps, the minister also highlighted persistent structural personnel shortages across the entire security sector. The Suriname Police Corps currently employs roughly 2,700 officers, while the mandated official staffing framework requires a minimum of 3,500 officers, with a long-term target of expanding to approximately 5,000 full-time personnel to meet public demand. To close this staffing gap, the ministry plans to recruit and train around 300 new police officers annually. Other departments, including fire and correctional services, are also targeting workforce expansion and specialized professional training for existing staff.

    Monorath closed by stressing that strategic investments in personnel, equipment, digital infrastructure, and supplies are essential to lifting overall public safety outcomes and boosting the country’s ability to combat criminal activity. He made a direct appeal to the National Assembly to approve the requested budget expansion, noting, “Without these investments, we cannot effectively address the challenges that the ministry currently faces.”

  • OECS Forms Advisory Team as U.S. Seeks Regional Help with Third-Nation Deportees

    OECS Forms Advisory Team as U.S. Seeks Regional Help with Third-Nation Deportees

    Amid rising geopolitical tensions and growing global uncertainty, leaders from the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) have greenlit the creation of a specialized high-level advisory team to coordinate regional negotiations with the United States over Washington’s controversial request to accept third-country deportees. This landmark decision was unveiled during the official opening of the 78th OECS Authority Meeting, hosted at the Royalton Resort in Deep Bay, where outgoing OECS Chairman and Prime Minister Godwin Friday formally passed the leadership gavel to incoming chair Gaston Browne.

    In his opening remarks to the assembly of regional leaders, Friday framed the U.S. request as one of the most pressing policy challenges the Eastern Caribbean bloc has confronted in decades, emerging at a moment of unprecedented global instability that already strains the region’s critical systems. “We are navigating an era of profound geopolitical uncertainty, the most impactful our region has seen in a generation,” Friday told delegates. “Broader tensions across our hemisphere send ripples that touch every part of our collective life: our national security, energy security, household living costs, migration patterns, and diplomatic standing.”

    The U.S. proposal, first brought to OECS member states early this year, asks small Caribbean nations to take in migrants deported from the United States who do not hold citizenship in the receiving countries. Friday emphasized that the bloc has approached the request with extreme caution, as its potential ramifications cut to core national interests across the sub-region. To date, the matter remains under active review, with leaders flagging serious risks to public safety, strained limited national budgets, threats to long-term economic stability, and compromises to national sovereignty that could come from accepting additional non-citizen deportees.

    “We are still working through this issue with great care because it carries serious implications for our economy, the personal safety of our citizens, the allocation of already scarce public resources, and our sovereign autonomy,” Friday explained. In response to the complexity of the negotiations, regional leaders voted unanimously to form the cross-bloc advisory body, which will bring together technical experts and senior representatives from all OECS member states to coordinate unified negotiating positions, whether members engage with Washington individually or as a collective group.

    Beyond the immediate deportation issue, Friday used the platform to reaffirm the unique vulnerability of small island developing states to external global shocks. “What register as mere small tremors for large, powerful nations are felt as catastrophic earthquakes for us,” he noted. “As small island developing states, we end up bearing the worst, and longest-lasting, consequences of international events we had no hand in creating.”

    For Caribbean governments across the region, the challenge of third-country deportations has grown increasingly urgent in recent years. Leaders are forced to strike a precarious balance between upholding long-standing diplomatic ties and humanitarian obligations, and protecting their limited institutional capacity, national security frameworks, and sovereign right to control entry into their territories.

  • Bee scherpt aanpak spookambtenaren aan: salarissen sneller geblokkeerd

    Bee scherpt aanpak spookambtenaren aan: salarissen sneller geblokkeerd

    Suriname’s Minister of Internal Affairs, Marinus Bee, is launching an aggressive campaign to eliminate systemic waste in the country’s civil service, targeting so-called “ghost employees”, public workers who reside abroad while continuing to collect full government salaries, politically appointed unqualified staff, and idle civil servants who collect pay without reporting for work.

    Addressing lawmakers during budget deliberations, Bee emphasized that the government cannot sustain unlimited public spending on workers who contribute no labor to state institutions. “Public funds are meant to support services that benefit all Surinamese, not to line the pockets of people who do not hold up their end of the agreement,” the minister stated.

    The crackdown is already underway, leveraging the mandatory national civil servant registry to conduct rigorous cross-checks of all active public employees. Any worker who fails to verify their employment status after repeated official notifications will have their salaries immediately halted or frozen. Authorities are also conducting a full audit of national payrolls to root out duplicate payments and unauthorized compensation, with Bee confirming that multiple cases of individuals collecting two or even three simultaneous government salaries have already been uncovered.

    In collaboration with the country’s Border Management System, authorities are also cross-referencing border exit data with active payroll records to identify public servants who have left Suriname permanently, failed to return from extended international stays, and remain on government payrolls. Bee estimates that roughly 2,000 civil servants currently fall into this category. Early progress has already been seen: a number of affected employees have voluntarily resigned after learning of the ministry’s ongoing investigation, the minister reported.

    Going forward, enforcement will be significantly tightened, Bee confirmed. The government will no longer conduct prolonged searches for employees who cannot be located or have provided false residential addresses. Salaries for unresponsive workers will be blocked much faster, forcing employees to come forward to formalize their employment status to restore pay. The ministry is also considering the launch of an anonymous tip line, allowing ordinary citizens to submit information about public servants who have lived abroad for years while still collecting government salaries.

    Bee framed the crackdown as a core part of a broader, long-overdue reform of Suriname’s entire civil service system. For decades, he explained, the public sector has been misused as a political tool, particularly during election cycles. Political parties have hired thousands of supporters to reward loyalty, with no actual vacant positions available and no requirement that hires meet basic job qualifications. After changes in government, ousted political appointees have often been sent home without work but continue to collect full salaries.

    “Let’s be honest: we do not need 51,000 civil servants,” Bee said. The end goal of reforms is to build a smaller, more efficient, performance-focused public sector, where workers are hired and retained based on professional competence rather than political loyalty.

    To ease the transition, the minister plans to reassign surplus public workers to other ministries and public entities that are facing staffing shortages where possible. He is also exploring the design of voluntary early retirement incentive packages to encourage workers to exit the public sector willingly. Most importantly, Bee noted that the savings generated by closing these costly payroll “leaks” will be redirected to raise compensation for active, hardworking civil servants – particularly underpaid strategic groups including teachers and healthcare workers.

  • Antigua and Barbuda Owes WIOC EC$6 Million as Fuel Subsidies Continue

    Antigua and Barbuda Owes WIOC EC$6 Million as Fuel Subsidies Continue

    Amid persistent volatility in the global energy market that has driven up international crude oil costs, the government of Antigua and Barbuda has accumulated more than 6 million Eastern Caribbean dollars in outstanding arrears to the West Indies Oil Company (WIOC). The unpaid balance stems from a deliberate policy implemented by the administration to shield everyday consumers and local businesses from skyrocketing retail fuel prices, according to Prime Minister Gaston Browne, who also holds the portfolio of Finance Minister.

    For months, Browne confirmed in public remarks, the government has been covering a fixed share of fuel costs to prevent dramatic jumps in the retail prices of both gasoline and diesel. Without this targeted intervention, he explained, motorists and commercial operators would be forced to pay far more per gallon at fuel pumps across the twin-island nation. Instead of passing the full weight of global price increases directly to households that are already grappling with broader cost-of-living pressures, the administration made the decision to absorb the additional expenses as part of a wider initiative to stabilize economic conditions.

    Browne characterized the policy as a people-first measure designed to benefit all Antigua and Barbudans, but acknowledged that the growing unpaid debt is creating significant financial strain for the government. “This is a very benevolent position taken by my administration to contain the price of diesel and gasoline for the benefit of the people, but it is hurting us financially,” he stated.

    Despite the mounting fiscal pressure, the Prime Minister pointed out that Antigua and Barbuda still boasts one of the lowest fuel price points in the entire Caribbean region. The core goals of the subsidy program extend beyond immediate relief for drivers: it is also intended to insulate the broader national economy from sudden, disruptive fuel price spikes and protect the purchasing power of local consumers, who would otherwise see their disposable incomes eroded by higher energy and transportation costs.

    Looking ahead, Browne issued a caution that the government’s ability to sustain this level of support could come under threat if international oil prices remain at elevated levels for a prolonged period. Sustained high global prices would continue to widen the gap between the subsidized retail price and the actual cost of fuel, increasing the government’s financial obligations and challenging the long-term viability of the current subsidy framework.

  • Manickchand’s jewellery gift to former US ambassador handed over to US gov’t

    Manickchand’s jewellery gift to former US ambassador handed over to US gov’t

    New disclosures from the U.S. State Department have brought to light a protocol-compliant transfer of an unsolicited high-value gift from a senior Guyanese political figure to a former top American diplomat stationed in the South American nation. According to official records, Sarah-Ann Lynch, who previously served as the United States Ambassador to Guyana, accepted a piece of jewelry valued at $1,198 U.S. dollars from Priya Manickchand, Guyana’s former Minister of Education, during a meeting held on September 12, 2023.

    The gift in question consists of two thin gold bangle bracelets paired with a pearl drop necklace, a set whose appraised value far exceeds the $525 U.S. dollar cap on personal gifts that U.S. government officials are permitted to retain under federal ethics guidelines. In line with longstanding U.S. federal gift rules for diplomatic personnel, Lynch turned the jewelry over to the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA), the federal agency tasked with managing and disposing of such unallowed gifts, for official handling.

    Officials note that this case follows a standard protocol applied to hundreds of similar scenarios involving diplomatic gifts to U.S. representatives across the globe. The official justification recorded for temporary acceptance of the gift before transfer aligns with common diplomatic practice: declining the present directly would have created unnecessary social embarrassment for both the donor and the United States government, undermining routine diplomatic courtesy. This procedural transfer underscores the strict ethics frameworks that govern gift acceptance for American diplomatic personnel, designed to avoid perceived or actual conflicts of interest while maintaining basic diplomatic decorum in international engagements.

  • DLP urges students, parents to stay focused after 11-Plus

    DLP urges students, parents to stay focused after 11-Plus

    As thousands of young students across Barbados wrap up the Common Entrance Examination and prepare to transition into secondary education, the island’s opposition Democratic Labour Party (DLP) has released a comprehensive message framing this milestone not as a final destination, but as the opening of a critical new educational journey. Quincy Jones, the DLP’s spokesperson on education, led the party’s outreach, starting with public recognition for the resilience young learners demonstrated throughout the stressful examination preparation and assessment period.

    Jones emphasized that the shift to secondary education marks the beginning of a transformative life chapter, packed with unique growth opportunities and formative new challenges, regardless of whether students earned a spot at their top-choice institution. “Whether you achieved your first choice or not, you should be proud of the hard work, dedication, and perseverance that brought you to this moment,” Jones stated in his address. “This examination is simply one step along the path of your education and personal growth. As you prepare to enter secondary school, a world of new possibilities awaits you. You will experience new schools, new opportunities, new subjects, new teachers, new friends and yes, new obstacles.”

    For incoming first-form students, Jones highlighted that the secondary school experience serves as a foundational platform to unearth hidden talents, refine core life skills, and build the capabilities needed for long-term success. He urged students to seize every opportunity available to them during their secondary education, from rigorous academic coursework to extracurricular engagement. “You will discover talents you never knew you had, develop skills that will shape your future, and build memories that will last a lifetime,” he added. “Secondary education is a chance to challenge yourself academically, participate in sports, culture, clubs, and community service, and develop the confidence that will help you become the leaders of tomorrow.”

    Turning his attention to parents, guardians and school communities across the country, Jones noted that parental responsibility grows significantly as students enter adolescence, crediting families for the sacrifices they have already made to support their children’s learning while stressing that ongoing, daily engagement remains non-negotiable through the secondary years. The DLP holds that consistent, intentional parental involvement is one of the most critical determinants of student success during secondary education, and has laid out a clear structured framework for families to follow. This includes regular participation in Parent-Teacher Association activities, attendance at scheduled parent-teacher conferences, and individual check-ins with form teachers and subject instructors at least twice per academic term.

    Jones also highlighted the importance of attending school orientation and year-level kickoff events, consistent monitoring of student homework completion and attendance, and ongoing reinforcement of positive behaviour, personal discipline and mutual respect at home. Beyond family action, the DLP is calling for deeper, more intentional collaboration between school administrations and household communities across Barbados, proposing a slate of targeted initiatives designed to strengthen the home-classroom partnership.

    These proposals include peer parent mentorship programs that allow adults to share professional expertise and life lessons with students, structured parent learning circles to collaboratively address common educational challenges, and family-focused literacy and reading nights to build a stronger culture of continuous learning in the home. The party also suggested expanding parent volunteer networks to support school sports and arts programming, leveraging modern digital communication platforms to keep parents updated on school activities and student progress in real time, and hosting regular appreciation events to recognize the valuable contributions parents make to school life.

    Closing his address, Jones expressed the DLP’s collective pride in Barbados’ young generation, reiterating that the island’s youth are the core of the nation’s long-term development. He encouraged incoming secondary students to approach this new chapter with confidence, curiosity, and a commitment to excellence. “Embrace this next chapter with confidence, curiosity, and determination,” Jones said. “Believe in yourselves, work hard, treat others with kindness, and never stop striving for excellence. The future of Barbados is sitting in classrooms across this nation today. We are proud of you, we believe in you, and we look forward to witnessing all that you will achieve.”

  • Guyana requests formal relationship with Meta/Facebook

    Guyana requests formal relationship with Meta/Facebook

    Guyana’s top law enforcement official, Attorney General Anil Nandlall, has confirmed he has submitted an official correspondence to Meta Platforms, the parent company of global social media giant Facebook, calling for the establishment of a dedicated formal institutional arrangement between the Guyanese government and the tech firm. While Nandlall has not released specific details about the terms of the requested partnership, he openly signaled that authorities in Guyana have growing discomfort with harmful content circulating on the platform.

    In public remarks, Nandlall emphasized the urgent need for closer, ongoing collaboration with major social media platforms, pointing to the rapid speed at which damaging content can spread online. “You need to have a constant engagement with a platform like Facebook. I mean, all of us here are, we are activists of Facebook and you see the destruction that it includes in one post. And by the time you get that post removed, the damage is already done. It’s already done,” he said.

    This push for a formal arrangement aligns with the Guyanese government’s recent crackdown on anti-government voices hosted on Meta’s platforms. Nandlall himself has already filed multiple defamation lawsuits against anti-government activists based outside of Guyana, and has pushed to extradite at least one of these critics back to the country to face criminal prosecution.

    Currently, the only formal tie between Guyana’s state apparatus and Meta is limited to a portal accessed by the Guyana Police Force via Interpol, Nandlall confirmed. While the company already operates a global portal that allows governments to submit formal requests for content removal and user data disclosure, Guyana has no dedicated government-wide relationship with the firm.

    Meta has not yet publicly responded to Nandlall’s new request, nor has it released aggregated data on government requests from Guyana for the full 2025 calendar year to date. The company’s most recent published data covers the first six months of 2025, during which the Guyanese government submitted three formal legal process requests and 13 emergency disclosure requests, targeting information on 13 separate user accounts.

    Looking back at prior years, the volume of government requests from Guyana has shifted significantly. In 2024, authorities submitted five emergency disclosure requests, three legal process requests, and sought data on nine user accounts. In 2023, the government submitted 32 legal process requests and 36 requests for user account data, totaling 68 requests that year.

    In response to queries about its processing of government requests, Meta has stated that it evaluates all incoming demands for user data and content removal in line with both local applicable laws and the company’s internal terms of service. “Each and every request we receive is carefully reviewed for legal sufficiency, and the company rejects or requires greater specificity on requests that appear overly broad or vague,” a Meta spokesperson said in a previous statement on its government request practices.

  • Mark ‘hand-picked’ in 2024 although London was best candidate – Shallow

    Mark ‘hand-picked’ in 2024 although London was best candidate – Shallow

    In a striking disclosure that lifts the curtain on opaque political appointment practices in St. Vincent and the Grenadines’ tourism sector, new Tourism Minister Kishore Shallow has confirmed that the previous chief executive of the St. Vincent and the Grenadines Tourism Authority (SVGTA), Annette Mark, was handpicked for the role two years ago, overriding the outcome of a formal recruitment process that named Shafia London as the top candidate.

    Shallow made the revelation during a press briefing in Villa on Monday, where he formally announced London’s appointment as the new SVGTA CEO, effective July 1. London will serve an initial three-year term in the role, and Shallow framed her appointment as a deliberate step to rebuild public trust and reinstate transparency and merit-based hiring for senior public sector positions.

    Recounting the irregularities of the 2023 recruitment process, Shallow explained that the previous Unity Labour Party (ULP) government launched what was billed as a robust, comprehensive search for the SVGTA CEO role, led by an independent external recruitment panel that included experts from Trinidad. After evaluating all applicants, the panel unanimously ranked London as the leading candidate for the position. However, just days before a formal employment agreement was set to be finalized, the entire process was circumvented, and Mark was personally appointed to the role instead.

    Shallow told reporters, “Just before an agreement was reached, the process was, should I say, circumvented — was circumvented — and someone else was hand-picked. That’s the reality. I say it as is. I understand that the agency then, who I had a very lengthy discussion with, … did not favour the then selectee.” The minister did not name the specific officials who intervened to derail the process, nor did he elaborate on the reasoning behind the last-minute change. Political observers have pointed out that London was passed over at a time when her husband, Grenville Williams, served as Attorney General in the ULP administration, and later ran as a ULP candidate in the November 2025 general election.

    Mark, who previously served as Executive Director of Invest SVG — St. Vincent and the Grenadines’ foreign direct investment attraction agency — was appointed SVGTA CEO on August 12, 2024, when the ULP was still in power and Carlos James held the tourism minister portfolio. Her appointment was part of a high-profile leadership swap between two major state agencies: she replaced Glen Beache, a 10-year veteran SVGTA CEO and former ULP tourism minister, who took over Mark’s role at Invest SVG amid reported tensions between Beache and James.

    Following the November 2025 general election, which saw Shallow’s New Democratic Party (NDP) take power and Shallow personally defeat James in the North Leeward parliamentary constituency, Mark submitted her resignation from the SVGTA CEO post. Sources familiar with the situation confirm that Mark later attempted to withdraw her resignation, stating she was willing to work with the new minister, but the administration allowed her resignation to take effect without responding to her request to reverse it.

    When the SVGTA CEO position became vacant in December, Shallow said he moved quickly to revisit the results of the 2023 recruitment, reaching out to London to confirm if she was still interested in the role. “I engaged Ms London, ascertaining her availability and willingness, interest still in becoming the CEO. I will just say she responded favourably,” Shallow said, adding that London’s original ranking as the top candidate in the aborted process was a major factor in her selection. Even so, Shallow emphasized that London’s appointment went through an additional full round of vetting, consultations, and approvals to eliminate any hint of political favoritism, including reviews by the Attorney General Louise Mitchell, the SVGTA board chair Shelly Ann Fraser, and final approval from Prime Minister Dr. Godwin Friday, who gave the appointment his full backing.

    London brings an exceptional range of academic and professional credentials to the role. A 2003 national scholar, she is currently completing a doctorate in business administration, and holds a first-class honours bachelor’s degree from the University of the West Indies St. Augustine, a Master of Science in biochemical engineering from University College London, and a Master of Business Administration with distinction from UWI Cave Hill.

    Her career spans decades of leadership across private and public sector organizations in the Caribbean. She began her career as Executive Director of the SVG Chamber of Industry and Commerce, building expertise in local economic development, before moving into the private sector as marketing manager at St. Vincent Brewery Ltd. She rose through the ranks of regional beverage giant Banks Holdings Limited Group in Barbados, holding successive roles as group marketing manager, group commercial manager, and country head. As country head for AB InBev, the world’s largest brewer, she oversaw multi-market operations across Barbados, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, and Dominica, delivering consistent revenue growth and market expansion, a performance that earned her the title of Top ABI Business Leader in the Caribbean and Latin America in 2022. Most recently, she served as general manager with the SLU Group of Companies, and held leadership roles as first vice president of the Barbados Manufacturing Association and SVG’s technical representative to the Caribbean Private Sector Organization.

    Shallow praised London as a highly capable, sharp-minded Vincentian business and civic leader, noting that her deep expertise in administration, marketing, and regional business strategy will be an invaluable asset as SVG works to grow its tourism sector in an increasingly competitive global market. “I know some are going to want to know how we were able to land such a high-value professional, right? And that’s why I keep saying we are fortunate,” Shallow said, adding that London’s appointment corrects a longstanding injustice and delivers the outcome that a fair, merit-based process produced nearly two years ago.

  • Joshua’s father held

    Joshua’s father held

    A grieving Trinidadian father, Christopher Samaroo, whose son Joshua was killed in a police-involved shooting earlier this year, has been taken into custody under national emergency regulations after voluntarily contacting police to clear up misrepresented comments he made in a public radio interview.

    Joshua Samaroo died on January 20 following a confrontation with law enforcement officers in St Augustine. Following his death, Joshua’s common-law wife Kaia Sealy has been hit with multiple criminal charges, including manslaughter, three counts of shooting with intent to cause grievous bodily harm, and additional related offenses. On Father’s Day, Christopher Samaroo joined an i95.5FM radio program to talk about his months-long experience of grief after losing his son. The discussion also included Ronald “Crab” Cabrera, who was still mourning the murder of his 12-year-old daughter Mercedez Layne.

    During the emotional interview, Samaroo opened up about his frustration with the circumstances of his son’s shooting and shared that he had little confidence that the ongoing legal process would deliver a fair outcome. Some of his critical remarks directed at law enforcement were clipped and shared widely across social media, cutting out key surrounding context from the full conversation. The radio program’s host intervened shortly after Samaroo made the comments in question, and only the truncated segment was circulated online.

    Sensing growing concern over the misrepresented clips, Samaroo chose to voluntarily meet with police to clarify what he actually said, accompanied by his defense attorney Aaron Lewis. According to Lewis, the pair first arrived at Port of Spain’s Central Police Station around 5:30 p.m. on the day of the arrest, where Samaroo spent 40 minutes answering officers’ questions about the circulating statements. Lewis said Central Police Station officers told the pair they had no reports filed against Samaroo connected to the comments and no existing investigation into his remarks.

    After leaving Central Police Station, Samaroo and Lewis received word from family members that a specialized police unit had visited the family’s Maraval home to look for Samaroo. The pair then traveled to Maraval Police Station to follow up, but officers there claimed to have no information about any warrant for Samaroo or any visit to his residence. They then moved on to St Clair Police Station, where officers from the Criminal Investigations Department approached Samaroo and informed him he was officially the target of an investigation.

    Samaroo was formally cautioned and detained under Regulation 11 of the country’s Emergency Powers Regulations, the legal provision outlined in Legal Notice No 40. This regulation bans any action intended to sway public opinion in a way that could harm public safety, as well as any possession of materials or actions that support such an effort.

    Lewis decried the arrest as a deeply unfair and unfortunate outcome, emphasizing that his client’s full remarks had been deliberately twisted and stripped of context online. “His words were twisted in the manner in which they were presented. He made a report concerning what he actually said, and what was circulated was cut short and does not reflect the entirety of his statement,” Lewis told local outlet the Express just minutes after Samaroo was taken into custody.

    The attorney added that the arrest has worsened the severe emotional distress Samaroo has already endured since his son’s death. “To be cautioned and arrested for something like that, taking into consideration what he is going through with the loss of his son, is traumatic,” Lewis said. He noted that while Samaroo had braced for the possibility of police action, the actual experience of being taken into custody was far more overwhelming, particularly amid the ongoing state of emergency that grants authorities expanded power. “It is a serious matter,” Lewis added.

    As of the night of the arrest, law enforcement officials had not released any public details about the specific allegations against Samaroo or the full scope of the investigation. Before he was detained, Samaroo himself had pushed back against the misrepresented clips, confirming that the online version cut off key portions of his full remarks. “That is not totally what I said. They caught me halfway through. The whole thing was missing parts,” he said, adding that the circulating snippets failed to capture the full context of his comments about his son’s death and his grief.