Carib Scope

标签： Trinidad and Tobago

特立尼达和多巴哥

  • PM TO LEADERS: refer TO CCJ

    PM TO LEADERS: refer TO CCJ

    As diplomatic cordialities played out on the sidelines of the 51st Caricom Heads of Government Conference in St. Lucia, a significant constitutional dispute has moved to the center of regional discussions, with Trinidad and Tobago Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar refusing to back down from her demand that Carla Barnett’s reappointment as Caricom Secretary-General be reviewed by the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ).

    Persad-Bissessar touched down in St. Lucia on Sunday to join the gathering of regional leaders, though logistical complications kept her from attending Barnett’s opening address to the conference. Footage from the event confirmed she participated in the official group photograph and held informal, polite discussions with both Barnett and fellow heads of government, including Mia Mottley, Prime Minister of Barbados. According to reporting from the Express, Persad-Bissessar planned to formally table her constitutional concerns during the closed-door leaders’ retreat held the following day.

    Weeks ahead of the summit, the Trinidad and Tobago Prime Minister circulated a 22-page formal letter dated July 3 to Caricom Chairman and St. Lucia Prime Minister Philip J Pierre, as well as every sitting head of government and head of state across the bloc. In the document, she laid out detailed claims of severe procedural and constitutional violations surrounding the process that led to Barnett’s purported second term, and put forward a slate of interim measures to govern the bloc while the CCJ evaluates the dispute.

    Central to Persad-Bissessar’s argument is that her objection is not a personal attack on Barnett, but a defense of foundational principles: the rule of law, constitutional governance, and the institutional integrity of the 15-member regional integration body. She reaffirmed Trinidad and Tobago’s unwavering commitment to Caricom and the broader project of regional unity, but stressed that unity cannot be built on “expediency and irregular practices masquerading as precedent.” Instead, she argued, all Caricom business must be rooted in strict adherence to the Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas, the bloc’s founding legal document.

    As a result of the procedural failures, Persad-Bissessar confirmed that Trinidad and Tobago does not recognize the legality of the process that led to Barnett’s reappointment, and cannot accept the validity of her second term. “This matter is advanced not in a spirit of disagreement, but in a spirit of constitutional responsibility,” she wrote in the letter, repeating that the dispute centers on process, not Barnett’s personal suitability for the role.

    Persad-Bissessar’s core proposal is that Caricom activate Article 212 of the Revised Treaty to formally request an authoritative advisory opinion from the CCJ. She argued that the regional supreme court is the only body with the mandate to deliver a binding, legitimate interpretation of the treaty clauses that govern the appointment and reappointment of the Secretary-General. She called on the Conference of Heads of Government to fast-track the referral to the CCJ, request an expedited hearing, and commit in advance to abiding by whatever ruling the court issues.

    Seeking judicial intervention, she added, is not an act of confrontation, but a demonstration of trust in Caricom’s own established legal institutions. “The framers of the Revised Treaty wisely recognised that disagreements concerning the interpretation of our constitutional instruments should be resolved by law, rather than by competing political interpretations,” the letter read.

    The letter also laid out a full chronological breakdown of the process that led to Barnett’s reappointment at a February 2026 retreat in Nevis, highlighting multiple alleged violations. Persad-Bissessar noted that the reappointment was never listed as an official agenda item in any provisional agenda, work program, or working paper circulated to member states ahead of the conference. She also claimed that three member states – Trinidad and Tobago, Antigua and Barbuda, and The Bahamas – were blocked from exercising their treaty-guaranteed right to participate through their properly designated representatives. Most notably, she argued that the Heads’ Retreat itself lacks any constitutional authority to appoint or reappoint a Secretary-General, a power reserved for the full plenary conference.

    Per Persad-Bissessar’s accounting, only 10 of Caricom’s 15 member states were able to participate in the vote: the three blocked states were shut out, while Haiti and Montserrat were absent from the gathering. She stated that this participation level falls far short of the minimum voting threshold required by the founding treaty. Even if preliminary discussions were held during the retreat, she added, no formal confirmation vote was held during the conference’s plenary session, and without plenary approval, the decision can never gain legal force.

    Persad-Bissessar also raised a conflict of interest concern, noting that Barnett, as the sitting Secretary-General, took part in administrative arrangements for her own reappointment process. While she acknowledged Barnett was not in the room during the actual deliberations on her term, she pointed out that Barnett issued the decision restricting attendance at the retreat to only sitting heads of government – the policy that blocked the designated representatives of three member states from participating. This, Persad-Bissessar argued, creates at minimum the appearance of improper conflict of interest, as Barnett was directly involved in setting the terms of a process that determined her own continued tenure.

    Pending a final ruling from the CCJ, Persad-Bissessar has called for both Barnett and Caricom’s General Counsel to recuse themselves from all aspects of the advisory opinion proceedings. She also proposed that independent officials appointed directly by the Conference of Heads of Government manage all logistics related to the CCJ referral. Additional temporary measures have been put forward to ensure administrative continuity within the Caricom Secretariat while protecting the legal standing of all parties involved in the dispute.

    The challenge has gained at least partial support from another major regional leader: Jamaica Prime Minister Andrew Holness submitted his own letter to the Caricom Chairman, noting that while Jamaica is not seeking to overturn the regional leaders’ decision to reappoint Barnett, it shares concerns that the current process has failed to resolve the dispute or uphold the core principles and goals of the Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas. “It has become clear that we were not all on the same page. Therefore, it is important that any concerns be addressed in a meaningful manner to restore cohesion, if not unity, which is indispensable to the effective functioning of Caricom,” Holness wrote.

    As of reporting, the leaders’ retreat continued late into the evening, with discussions on the constitutional dispute expected to dominate closed-door talks among regional heads.

  • Who is Jamir Nazir?

    Who is Jamir Nazir?

    In May 2026, 62-year-old Jamir Nazir, a little-known writer from Cunupia, Trinidad and Tobago, was named the Caribbean regional winner of the 2026 Commonwealth Short Story Prize. Almost immediately, the announcement sparked global online controversy when unsubstantiated claims emerged that his winning submission, *The Serpent in the Grove*, had been generated by artificial intelligence. Last Tuesday, the Commonwealth Foundation, which administers the prestigious annual competition, ended the speculation with an official ruling: after a thorough investigation, the organization confirmed that Nazir had not used AI to create his story, and formally named him the overall winner of the 2026 prize, selected from more than 7,800 entries across 56 Commonwealth nations.

    For the first time since the controversy erupted, Nazir opened up about the ordeal, his lifelong passion for writing, and the personal roots of his award-winning story in an exclusive interview with Trinidad’s *Sunday Express*, held at his family home in Cunupia last Friday.

    Nazir’s journey as a writer began far from the international literary spotlight. Born the eldest of three children to a working-class Indo-Trinidadian family, he grew up in a small rural sugarcane village along Reform Road in South Trinidad. His father, a field worker on the Reform Sugar Estate who has since passed away, and his 81-year-old mother never had the chance to attend secondary school, and they impressed on their son from a young age that education was the only path to upward mobility. Following his primary education at Reform Presbyterian Primary School and secondary schooling at San Fernando Government Secondary School, Nazir enrolled in agricultural studies at the University of the West Indies St. Augustine campus. He met his wife there at age 21, and the couple, who just celebrated their 42nd wedding anniversary, migrated to the United States a year later. There, Nazir completed a Bachelor of Science degree and an MBA in financial services before returning to Trinidad three years later. He launched a long career in the insurance industry, holding senior leadership roles at regional and local firms, before transitioning to public service, where he spent six and a half years as Head of Policy and Strategy, and later Director of Strategic Services, in Trinidad and Tobago’s Office of the Prime Minister. He retired from public service in 2017 due to declining health, though he continued to work as an independent consultant for private firms.

    Writing has been a constant, private passion for Nazir since he wrote his first poem at age 10. Over the decades, he published two volumes of poetry independently: *Night Moon Love* in 2017 and *One a Day* in 2019. He never sought the limelight of the literary world until he decided to enter the 2026 Commonwealth Short Story Prize, a competition he was confident he could win. “I said I could go and win this thing. I could write, I know I could write, so I said let me, and I started to think about what would be an appropriate story,” he explained.

    The allegations that he relied on AI to create *The Serpent in the Grove* have taken a significant toll on Nazir and his family, especially his elderly mother and wife. For months, the writer chose to stay silent amid the online vitriol, a decision he says was rooted in an agreement with the Commonwealth Foundation that regional winners would not comment publicly during the investigation to avoid inflaming tensions. “I saw people being very nasty to me, and I was really tempted, and then I stopped looking at any comments on Facebook and thing,” he recalled. “This demoralised me for a bit. So, this is the challenge now that all this that they’ve caused now has sort of shadowed the success.”

    In his first public response to the claims, Nazir flatly denied using generative AI to write his story, noting that the tools are far from capable of producing original, resonant work that meets competition standards. “I didn’t need to use it because I had no need… This story, I didn’t need to get it from nobody. This story can, as I say, write itself because it is my experiences,” he told the *Sunday Express*. He did acknowledge that he used his smartphone’s speech-to-text functionality to draft the story, a necessary accommodation for the chronic neuropathy he lives with, which makes typing impossible. “If I didn’t have that, I couldn’t do this,” he said. Because his phone only displays three lines of text at a time, Nazir explained he was able to polish each section of the story slowly and deliberately, line by line, resulting in a tightly crafted final text that some mistook for AI output. “When you put them together, everything polished now,” he said.

    A self-described commentator on artificial intelligence who often posts about the technology on LinkedIn, Nazir pushed back against claims that AI detectors, which flagged his work as AI-generated, are reliable tools. “I suspect they know nothing about AI because if they knew about AI, they wouldn’t be just taking things from other people and copying it, and they should know that AI detectors are notoriously unreliable. People make all kinds of claims that this AI detector is 100% reliable. Total crazy,” he said. Unlike the large language models at the center of today’s AI boom, Nazir said his interest in AI focuses on medical diagnostic applications, not creative writing: “What is really the AI I was interested in (is) not large language models; that is a piece of crap. I was thinking AI that will diagnose diseases and conditions.”

    Nazir’s health struggles have been a long-running part of his life: he was born with diabetes, which progressed to kidney failure in 2019 and required a kidney transplant in 2021. Just recently, he was diagnosed with cancer and continues to undergo chemotherapy. Even amid these challenges, he spent more than five months refining *The Serpent in the Grove*, drawing directly from his childhood memories growing up in a rural Trinidadian sugarcane village to craft the story. Though the narrative is fictional, all of its core characters and settings are drawn from real life, lightly modified to fit the plot. The story’s main character, Vishnu Mohammed, is shaped by Nazir’s childhood memories of walking home from school past three village rum shops, where sugarcane workers would spend their entire paychecks on alcohol, leaving their families to suffer. “We knew how bad alcohol and the scourge of it was and how it affected people’s lives and family. So, that stuck with me,” he said. One of the story’s supporting characters, Zoongie, who works at a local rum shop, was first conceived 25 years before Nazir completed the story. Every location in the narrative, except for a central well, is based on an actual place he knew growing up. He submitted multiple draft versions of the story to the Commonwealth Foundation during the investigation to prove his iterative writing process.

    The judging panel for the 2026 prize described *The Serpent in the Grove* as “an original, poetic and deeply moving story”, a rhythm that Nazir credits to his decades of experience writing poetry. “I had a good story there. You know why? It was from real life, and I thought it would resonate with people,” he said. “I felt it was real, that it would have been able to appeal to people. As one of the judges said, the rhythmic flow was almost musical, and that came because I used to write in poetry. So, it’s the same style, without even thinking.”

    Now officially exonerated and named the overall winner of one of the world’s most prestigious short fiction competitions, Nazir says the simple truth of his authorship speaks for itself: he never needed AI to create a story rooted in a lifetime of personal experience.

  • Boost for region

    Boost for region

    On a recent Friday in Port of Spain, top health and diplomatic officials gathered at the Federation Park headquarters of the Caribbean Public Health Agency (Carpha) to inaugurate a landmark Regional Emergency Operations Centre, a facility designed to unify the region’s response to growing cross-border public health risks.

    Addressing the official commissioning ceremony, Trinidad and Tobago’s Minister of Health Dr. Lackram Bodoe emphasized that no Caribbean nation, no matter how prosperous or resource-rich, can tackle the increasingly complex public health threats of the 21st century in isolation. The new facility, he noted, is tailored to strengthen coordinated preparedness, response, and recovery capacity across all 26 of Carpha’s member states, and reflects Trinidad and Tobago’s enduring commitment to regional collective action.

    “Health security cannot be achieved by any one country acting alone,” Bodoe told attendees. “Our greatest strength comes from partnership: open information sharing, mutual support, and collective action that puts the well-being of all Caribbean people first. This centre is far more than a physical building—it is a symbol of the solidarity that has always guided Carpha’s work, and that will carry us through whatever public health challenges lie ahead.”

    Carpha Executive Director Dr. Lisa Indar explained that as a region made up almost entirely of Small Island Developing States, the Caribbean’s interconnected economies, open borders, and tightly linked communities leave it uniquely vulnerable to rapid spread of public health emergencies. The new operations centre will directly address this gap by enabling early threat detection, unified regional coordination, and consistent protection of population health across the archipelago.

    European Union Ambassador to Trinidad and Tobago Cécile Tassin, whose organization provided full funding for the facility’s construction and outfitting through the 11th European Development Fund Programme for Communicable Disease Prevention and Control, echoed the call for collective action. Tassin noted that the centre stands as a testament to the Caribbean’s shared commitment to protecting its people through preparedness, solidarity, and pooled expertise.

    In an official news statement released following the inauguration, Carpha framed the launch of the operations centre as a transformative milestone for regional public health capacity. Built in full alignment with the World Health Organization’s Public Health Emergency Operations Centre Framework, the facility has earned classification as a Type C Emergency Operations Centre—the highest tier of operational capability recognized by the global health body. This classification means the hub is equipped to coordinate complex, multi-country public health emergencies while providing critical support to national emergency operations centres across the Caribbean.

    Powered by Carpha’s custom-built Regional Integrated Early Warning Surveillance and Response System (RIEWSS), designed specifically for Caribbean contexts, the centre will dramatically improve the region’s ability to spot emerging threats early, maintain real-time situational awareness, and roll out faster, evidence-based responses to crises. As the central regional coordination hub, it will deepen collaboration between national ministries of health, disaster management agencies, regional bodies, and international partners. Additional core functions include deploying specialized technical response teams, coordinating emergency logistics, facilitating consistent risk communication, and maintaining a unified shared operating picture during active public health emergencies.

    The development of the centre drew directly on hard-won lessons from recent regional crises, Carpha confirmed. Events including the global COVID-19 pandemic, recurring large-scale dengue outbreaks, Hurricanes Melissa and Beryl, and a growing number of climate-linked disasters have all underscored just how critical coordinated regional action is to limiting the damage of public health emergencies.

    The operations centre operates on a scalable activation model, allowing it to shift smoothly from routine daily surveillance and monitoring to full-scale regional emergency activation when needed. It will lead coordination for responses to a wide range of events, including infectious disease outbreaks, severe weather events that carry public health risks, environmental and chemical incidents, mass gatherings, and any other event with regional or international public health implications.

    Beyond emergency response, the new hub will also strengthen Caribbean countries’ implementation of the 2005 International Health Regulations by boosting regional surveillance capacity, streamlining information management, improving cross-border emergency coordination, and raising overall operational readiness. Carpha officials emphasized that the inauguration of the centre is just one part of the agency’s ongoing commitment to advancing regional health security, ensuring all Caribbean nations are better prepared to face both existing and emerging public health threats.

  • Bad road blamed in driver’s death

    Bad road blamed in driver’s death

    A tragic fatal collision on a deteriorating rural bridge in Central Trinidad has left a community grieving and demanding immediate infrastructure repairs, after a recently married man became the first fatality linked to years of decaying road conditions at the site. On Saturday morning, 42-year-old Jason Ramnanan, a resident of Lange Park, Chaguanas, lost his life at the scene near the Santa Phillipa bridge along Caparo Valley Brasso Road, when his panel van collided head-on with an oncoming truck. Ramnanan, who had just married three weeks prior and was returning home after visiting family in Caparo, left behind a young child. Local residents are convinced that unaddressed road hazards — including a large unpatched pothole dug by utility workers and an uncovered manhole — directly caused the fatal crash. One long-time local resident, who requested anonymity to speak freely to reporters, explained that Saturday’s tragedy was not the first serious incident at the site. Just two weeks earlier, another local driver totaled their car after swerving to avoid the large pothole, which was dug during maintenance work carried out by the Water and Sewerage Authority (WASA). In the two weeks following that work, WASA never returned to repair the uneven roadway, residents said. Opposite the unpatched pothole, the uncovered manhole has only been secured with makeshift wooden barriers and loose caution tape, a temporary fix that does little to alert oncoming drivers to the hazard. Residents argue that Ramnanan swerved off his expected path to avoid the uncovered manhole, pushing his vehicle directly into the lane of the approaching truck. A second resident confirmed this account, noting that both Ramnanan and the truck driver swerved to avoid separate potholes on their respective sides of the narrow bridge, leading to the fatal collision. First responders were unable to extract Ramnanan from the wreckage before he succumbed to his injuries. Family members at Ramnanan’s home described him as a loving, well-liked self-employed business owner and sales representative, but declined to speak further on the tragedy. Beyond the existing road hazards, the Santa Phillipa bridge itself is already in dangerous condition: it narrows to a single unprotected lane, with no barriers to separate opposing traffic, creating constant risk of head-on collisions. “That hole caused that boy to dead. Fix that hole and fix the bridge. They have to do something now,” the first resident stated. Public Utilities Minister Barry Padarath responded to the incident in an interview with reporters, noting that preliminary video evidence reviewed by WASA indicates Ramnanan passed the area of the authority’s prior works, and the collision occurred when both vehicles attempted to cross the narrow bridge at the same time. Padarath added that officials are awaiting the final police investigative report to confirm contributing factors, but confirmed WASA will begin full restoration works at the site starting next week. Ramnanan’s death marked the first of three road fatalities across Trinidad over the weekend. Less than 24 hours before the crash, an unidentifed homeless pedestrian was struck and killed by a vehicle while crossing the Uriah Butler Highway near the Munroe Road flyover. On Sunday morning, a teenage passenger from Moruga was killed when the vehicle he was riding in crashed into a utility pole along Edward Trace in Basse Terre, leaving the teen dead at the scene. The string of deaths has prompted renewed warnings from Trinidad and Tobago Police Service road safety officials, who note that road fatalities have risen 20% year-over-year, despite increased enforcement and public education campaigns. Sergeant Brent Batson, coordinator of the TTPS Strategic Road Safety Project, said reckless high-risk driving behaviors are the primary driver of the rising fatality rate. Initial investigations into Saturday’s collision indicate one of the drivers rushed to cross the narrow bridge, a decision that had deadly consequences. Batson emphasized that collisions between passenger vehicles and large heavy goods vehicles are almost always fatal for passenger vehicle occupants, making caution the most critical tool for preventing death. “This goes to show the consequence, especially when extra heavy vehicles are involved, you’re talking about a mass of steel that the driver of a car cannot survive an impact against that type of vehicle; the risk isn’t worth it,” Batson said. Batson added that road incidents create multiple victims: even drivers who are not physically injured often suffer long-term psychological trauma that can leave them unable to drive again. As the country enters the peak of the rainy season, which makes slippery roads and hidden hazards even more common, Batson urged all drivers to adopt higher safety standards: slowing down, yielding right of way, ensuring vehicles are properly maintained with functional brakes, tires and wipers, and maintaining safe following distances. Despite police efforts to enforce safety rules and educate the public, many drivers continue to ignore basic safety rules, from wearing seatbelts to using mobile phones behind the wheel, Batson said. “Drivers have to also engage with a higher level of caution, especially when using the roadways,” he added.

  • ‘Logistical issues’ as PM misses Caricom leaders line-up

    ‘Logistical issues’ as PM misses Caricom leaders line-up

    The 51st Regular Meeting of the Conference of Caribbean Community (Caricom) Heads of Government kicked off in St. Lucia on Sunday, but the event opened with an unexpected disruption: logistical complications delayed the arrival of Trinidad and Tobago Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar, forcing her to miss the official group photograph and stage line-up that has become a longstanding tradition for regional leaders at the summit’s opening.

    Minister in the Office of the Prime Minister Nicholas Morris, who is part of the Trinidad and Tobago delegation traveling to the summit, confirmed the delay to local outlet Express via a WhatsApp message from St. Lucia. Morris clarified that despite the late arrival, Persad-Bissessar made it to the opening ceremony before outgoing Caricom Chairman Dr. Terrance Drew, Prime Minister of St. Kitts and Nevis, delivered his keynote address to assembled delegates.

    After joining the summit proceedings, Persad-Bissessar shared photographic evidence of her participation on her official social media channels, showing her alongside other members of the Trinidad and Tobago delegation during meeting sessions. While the prime minister attends the summit in St. Lucia, Works and Infrastructure Minister Jearlean John has been tapped to serve as acting prime minister back in Port of Spain, a role she has filled previously during Persad-Bissessar’s travel. The Trinidad and Tobago delegation departed the country on Sunday with a roster of senior officials, including Foreign and Caricom Affairs Minister Sean Sobers, Cabinet Ministers Nicholas Morris and Darrell Allahar, and Head of the Foreign Service Randall Karim.

    The logistical hiccup comes amid preexisting tensions between the Persad-Bissessar administration and Caricom leadership, most notably over the planned reappointment of current Caricom Secretary-General Dr. Carla Barnett. Last week, Persad-Bissessar publicly reaffirmed Trinidad and Tobago’s long-held opposition to Barnett’s reappointment, stating that her government will refuse to recognize Barnett once her current term expires this August. The prime minister has repeatedly argued that the process used to approve Barnett’s reappointment violates the Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas and Caricom’s official governance protocols.

    Despite the standoff, Barnett opened the summit on Sunday evening by outlining the bloc’s key priorities for the coming days. She told regional leaders that core discussions would center on advancing the Caribbean Single Market and Economy (CSME), including a planned rollout of full free movement of people across four member states set to launch in October 2025. Additional key agenda items include expanding regional food security frameworks, building collective climate resilience across vulnerable island nations, and expanding governance and stability support for crisis-stricken Haiti. Barnett also used her opening remarks to announce two major expansions of the bloc: Martinique has officially joined the summit as an associate member, while French Guiana is expected to formalize its own accession agreement during the course of the summit.

    This is not the first time Persad-Bissessar has publicly clashed with Caricom leadership. During the 50th Regular Meeting of Caricom Heads of Government held in St. Kitts and Nevis this past February, then-opposition leader Persad-Bissessar delivered a speech that openly criticized the Caricom Secretariat for its failure to respond to the 2022 abduction of Trinidad and Tobago national Brent Thomas from Barbados, calling the incident deeply unsettling and noting that she had never received a response to a formal letter she sent to the Secretariat requesting answers. Barnett was in the audience for the critical remarks.

    Last year, Persad-Bissessara again broke with the bloc when she openly voiced support for United States lethal airstrikes targeting alleged drug traffickers operating in the Caribbean, a position that directly contradicted Caricom’s longstanding formal commitment to preserving the region as a Zone of Peace. She also previously accused Caricom of being an unreliable partner after the bloc remained silent when the former Maduro administration in Venezuela issued territorial threats against Trinidad and Tobago.

  • Ghost boat comes ashore in Trinidad

    Ghost boat comes ashore in Trinidad

    Along the isolated southern coast of Trinidad, a stretch of shoreline leading to Icacos Point has long been a dumping ground for both natural debris and human-caused detritus. Just off Galfa Point, discarded rocket boosters jettisoned from launches at French Guiana’s space center jut from the ocean like alien monoliths. Pyrite crystals, colloquially called fool’s gold, wash up from offshore mud volcano eruptions, and further inland, visitors can find evidence of human movement: stray cattle from Venezuela, the remains of campfires in mangrove thickets left by migrants hiding before traffickers or relatives pick them up, and a constant flow of debris carried by the Orinoco River from its delta communities — from broken indigenous Warao dugout canoes to plastic waste and Styrofoam.

    A few weeks ago, the Atlantic Ocean delivered one more haunting artifact to this shore: an abandoned 30-foot fiberglass fishing vessel, carried by currents and left stranded by the outgoing tide. It drifted ashore undetected by local radar, and to this day, police have no record of its arrival. Cedros, the district where the boat was found, is a community bound by secrets, so locating the vessel took two days and four hours of searching after local residents declined to help.

    The boat had no engine, no fishing gear, no registration documents, and no immediate clues to its owners or how long it had drifted across the Atlantic. But subtle clues scattered across its hull and interior point to its likely origins in West Africa, tied to the deadly migrant route toward Spain’s Canary Islands.

    Its narrow, high-bowed design matches pirogues commonly used by fishermen and migrant smugglers in Mauritania and Senegal. Built with fiberglass over a timber frame, its hull is layered with peeling faded paint in white, teal, blue, gray and red — a wear pattern consistent with months of exposure to salt water and tropical sun. The green and red paint on the hull mirrors the national flag of Mauritania, and one side bears a faded stenciled marking: a clear “2”, a partial “6”, and fragmented lines that likely form “97”.

    Inside, the ocean has swept away nearly everything personal. One interior compartment is still lined with shredded blue-white-red striped tarpaulin backed by thick black plastic, standard material for protecting passengers from wind and spray. Two weathered foam fishing floats hang from the gunwale, one deeply carved with an “A”, the other with an “H” — a common practice among West African fishermen to mark ownership if gear drifts away. A tattered cloth with yellow polka dots and a bright orange underside is tied to the floats, and the bow bears a faded green painted symbol, likely a “protective eye” surrounding a religious inscription.

    The only intact personal item left behind is a tightly wrapped dark brown leather pouch tied securely to the bow. Regional experts have identified it as a grigri, also called a taweez — a protective amulet common among fishermen and migrants across Cabo Verde, Senegal, Guinea-Bissau and Mauritania. These pouches typically hold handwritten Quranic verses, prayers or blessed herbs prepared by religious leaders, carried to protect travelers and guarantee safe passage across the sea.

    Whoever carried this amulet never completed their intended journey. There is no trace of passengers: no clothing, no food containers, no identification, no human remains. Only the boat remains, and every high tide buries its hull a little deeper into the sand, with the ocean slowly erasing the last evidence of its voyage.

    Oceanographers explain that boats caught in the Canary Current before shifting into the North Equatorial Current can drift across the Atlantic to the southern Caribbean in as little as two months, with most voyages taking three to four months depending on seasonal wind patterns. This mystery boat is just the latest in a string of “ghost boats” carrying the remains of African migrants that have washed up across the Caribbean region in recent years.

    The most high-profile case dates back five years to May 28, 2021, when Tobago fishermen working off Belle Garden on the island’s windward coast made a gruesome discovery. Inside a Mauritanian fishing vessel marked AG 231 were 14 sets of skeletal remains, decomposed after months adrift. Investigators quickly confirmed the boat had originated on West Africa’s Atlantic coast, the primary departure point for migrants attempting the dangerous crossing to the Canary Islands, Spain’s southernmost Atlantic territory. Additional clues found on board left no doubt of the vessel’s purpose: West African CFA francs, euros, mobile phones, clothing, weatherproof jackets and Muslim prayer beads.

    These migrants never intended to reach the Caribbean. They never made it to Europe. After their engine failed, currents and trade winds carried them thousands of miles off course.

    Former state pathologist Dr. Eastlyn McDonald-Burris carefully documented every recovered item to preserve evidence for identification, and former assistant police commissioner William Nurse launched an investigation intended to be shared through Interpol, the International Committee of the Red Cross and diplomatic channels. But like many tragedies in Trinidad and Tobago, the case faded from public priority as new events captured attention.

    It took the persistent work of Associated Press investigative journalist Renata Brito to revive the investigation. Traveling across Trinidad and Tobago, France and Mauritania, Brito pieced together the full story of the doomed voyage. Her reporting confirmed 43 migrants boarded the boat in the Mauritanian port of Nouadhibou between January 12 and 13, 2021, hoping to reach the Canary Islands roughly 800 kilometers off the Mauritanian coast. Within days, their engine failed, leaving the boat at the mercy of currents. What happened over the 136 days the boat drifted before reaching Tobago may never be fully known, but survivor accounts of similar voyages paint a brutal picture: food runs out within days, followed by fresh water. Passengers drift under a relentless tropical sun, and many turn to drinking seawater to survive. The weak die first, and eventually the remaining survivors are too weak to cast bodies overboard.

    Thanks to Brito’s work, one family finally received answers. After she tracked down relatives in Mali, coordinated DNA testing identified one victim as 31-year-old Alassane Sow. Dr. McDonald-Burris’ autopsy listed his cause of death as undetermined, with hypothermia and dehydration from being lost at sea as the most likely causes. Sow’s remains were buried according to Islamic rites at Chaguanas Public Cemetery on March 3, 2023, with local community members gathering to pray and mourn a stranger who would not be left forgotten.

    Thirteen other victims remain unidentified. The Trinidad Express has continued to press for progress on the case, lobbying former National Security Minister Fitzgerald Hinds to prioritize diplomatic outreach and DNA matching to identify the remaining dead, but no action was taken. The responsibility now falls to current Homeland Security Minister Roger Alexander to advance the work. Families across West African villages continue to wait for news of missing loved ones, many ready to provide DNA samples to help identify their relatives.

    As for the new mystery boat washed up on southern Trinidad, it holds only questions. Perhaps somewhere in West Africa, one or more families still wonder what happened to the boat that never returned. Maybe someone will recognize the carved initials on the floats, the faded hull markings, or the leather amulet carried by a traveler who trusted it to protect them from the unforgiving Atlantic. But before any answer can come, the tide will likely reclaim the boat entirely, erasing its clues forever.

  • NIBTT owes $50m to vendor for Empower tech upgrade

    NIBTT owes $50m to vendor for Empower tech upgrade

    Trinidad and Tobago’s National Insurance Board (NIBTT) is confronting growing parliamentary scrutiny after confirming it holds more than $50 million in outstanding payments to a digital service vendor working on its flagship Empower digitization initiative, a project designed to overhaul the agency’s outdated service delivery and revenue collection systems.

    The details of the unpaid liability were brought to light during a Friday sitting of the Joint Select Committee (JSC) on Finance and Legal Affairs, a parliamentary panel currently conducting a review of NIBTT’s public accessibility, responsiveness, and overall service performance. Committee members have raised pointed questions about the financial sustainability of the $300 million-plus project, which is funded entirely through NIBTT’s existing contribution collections and investment returns, at a time when the agency already faces a gap between incoming contributions and outgoing benefit payouts.

    NIBTT leadership has defended the multi-phase transformation effort, arguing that the deep digitization push is non-negotiable for the agency’s long-term functionality. For decades, NIBTT has relied on slow, paper-based and manual processing systems to handle its massive annual workload: roughly 40,000 new claims and 480,000 employer submissions each year. Executive Director Niala Persad-Poliah explained that existing legislation, the NIBTT Act, prohibits the agency from using bond financing to fund capital projects like Empower, forcing the organization to draw on its operating revenue. The first two phases of the project, which launched in 2022 and wrapped up implementation in August 2024, delivered a new human capital management system and an integrated financial platform, laying the groundwork for full operational overhaul.

    Persad-Poliah also clarified the discrepancy between the original $164 million project budget and the much higher total spending to date. She noted that the initial budget only covered core hardware and software costs, excluding critical supporting expenses including consultant fees, marketing outreach, and third-party project management services. To date, $143 million in solution implementation costs plus $10.3 million in value-added tax have been paid, with ongoing annual maintenance costs set at $18 million for existing systems, rising to $50 million annually once the full project is complete. The $50.9 million outstanding payment to the lead vendor will be settled once the final phase of work is delivered, and NIBTT management has already submitted a request to its board for additional funding to cover outstanding obligations.

    The final phase of the Empower project will focus on rolling out customer-facing digital tools, including an online portal that allows claimants to track their applications in real time and access services remotely, addressing longstanding public complaints about extended processing delays. So far, roughly 1,400 employers have registered for the new portal, and Persad-Poliah has urged more businesses to adopt the digital system to speed up processing. Agency technology leaders report that user acceptance testing (UAT) for the full system is 96% complete, with final end-to-end testing now underway to verify the entire workflow from claim submission to payment disbursement.

    Despite the progress, NIBTT acknowledges that thousands of claims remain backlogged, and the full public benefits of the project have yet to take effect. Human Resources Executive Director Isha Khan told the committee that the agency has reassigned existing staff full-time to backlog reduction over the past two years, used acting arrangements to fill vacant roles, and brought on external contract workers to support entry-level operations. Even with these adjustments, staff remain overburdened by the high volume of claims.

    JSC Chair Dr. Marlene Attzs, an Independent Senator, echoed committee members’ concerns, pressing NIBTT leadership for clarity on when vulnerable populations, who rely most heavily on NIBTT benefits, will see tangible improvements to service speed and accessibility. NIBTT officials reaffirmed that once fully implemented, the Empower system will dramatically expand access for people with special needs and other vulnerable groups by eliminating the need for in-person visits and reducing processing wait times.

  • ‘Petty politics’ over funding

    ‘Petty politics’ over funding

    A high-profile public dispute over delayed public servant salaries has broken out in Trinidad and Tobago, with Rural Development and Local Government Minister Khadijah Ameen accusing the Port of Spain City Corporation and its mayor of prioritizing petty political gain over worker stability.

    The conflict began last week, when Port of Spain Mayor Chinua Alleyne publicly raised alarm over delayed June paychecks for the city’s monthly-paid municipal employees. Alleyne claimed the central Local Government Ministry had dragged its feet on approving June payroll funding, warning that no financial provision had even been made for salary payments beyond the month of June. He added that City Hall had repeatedly alerted national government officials that the corporation would be unable to meet its payroll obligations, but those warnings were ignored. Just one day after his initial statement, however, Alleyne updated the public via his official Facebook page that the corporation had received a funding cheque — though he clarified the sum still did not cover payroll obligations past June.

    Minister Ameen pushed back against Alleyne’s narrative while speaking to reporters at a Venezuela earthquake relief donation drive in Woodbrook earlier this week, laying full blame for the delay at the feet of the city corporation. She explained that following a mandated public service salary increase, ministry officials required updated documentation from all municipal corporations to properly recalculate and audit payroll allocations. Meetings were held with Port of Spain representatives in March and again in April to outline these requirements, but the city failed to submit the necessary paperwork on time.

    According to Ameen, the situation moved toward resolution only after the city finally submitted its first set of documents the previous Friday. Ministry staff worked through the weekend to process the submission, but a second round of documents turned in on Sunday contained errors. City officials finalized corrections on Monday, clearing the way for full funding to be disbursed.

    Ameen confirmed that the cheque the corporation received covers all salary obligations from the mid-year budget review through the end of the current financial year, meaning all affected monthly-paid workers under the Public Services Association have now received their pay. She noted that daily-paid and contract municipal workers were never impacted by the administrative backlog.

    The minister went a step further, accusing Alleyne of seeking cheap political mileage by going public with the dispute before the issue could be resolved internally. She argued that the premature publicity caused unnecessary harm to workers, sharing that one employee contacted her in tears after a local credit union halted approval on her long-awaited loan over unfounded concerns about her job security.

    Ameen also pointed to broader administrative frictions with municipal corporations controlled by the opposition People’s National Movement (PNM), claiming petty political posturing often leads PNM-led bodies to avoid routine outreach that would prevent processing delays. She emphasized that she has maintained close coordination with public service unions to protect worker interests, and stressed that no politics will be allowed to jeopardize employee pay or job security. She issued a public assurance to all municipal workers across the country that their salaries are fully secure and all outstanding administrative issues have been resolved.

  • No legal requirement

    No legal requirement

    For more than two months, Trinidad and Tobago has not held a formal post-Cabinet media briefing, sparking widespread debate over government communication practices and transparency standards. The final such briefing was held on May 7, when cabinet ministers addressed reporters on a broad spectrum of pressing public issues, from the high-profile triple homicide in Belmont’s Rifle Hill to regional security coordination following the Shield of the Americas summit, the country’s UN Security Council non-permanent seat bid, new UK visa requirements for Trinidad and Tobago citizens, and bilateral relations with neighboring Venezuela. That session was chaired by Wilfred Nicholas Morris, Minister in the Office of the Prime Minister.

    In recent interviews, two leading Trinidadian political scientists have offered divergent perspectives on the ongoing hiatus, while agreeing on a core legal point: there is no binding legal mandate requiring the government to host these formal press briefings.

    Dr. Bishnu Ragoonath, a prominent political scientist, explained that longstanding constitutional and procedural traditions frame Cabinet deliberations as inherently confidential. Cabinet meeting minutes and discussion notes are legally protected from public disclosure, he noted, and no constitutional clause or statutory law requires ministers to update the public immediately following every Cabinet gathering. Ragoonath added that post-Cabinet briefings emerged in recent decades as a voluntary practice for governments seeking to signal greater openness and align with modern good governance standards, not as a legally required obligation.

    While affirming the lack of a legal requirement, Ragoonath emphasized that transparency remains a foundational pillar of legitimate democratic governance. “I have always been one for accountability and transparency. Ethics is dependent upon integrity and accountability and transparency,” he stated. That said, he harshly criticized the current government’s broader communication strategy, arguing it is structurally inadequate and frequently fails to provide necessary context for major policy changes.

    Pointing to the recent suspension of the Military-Led Academic Training (MILAT) Programme as a key example, Ragoonath said officials only announced the termination of the program without offering any public explanation for the decision. He later learned through unconfirmed secondary sources that the program carried a price tag of roughly $135,000 per trainee, a cost that reportedly prompted the review. “If those were the facts which caused the review of the programme, come out and say it. Without giving context and without adequate background, one wonders whether or not there is a hidden agenda,” Ragoonath said.

    Dr. Indira Rampersad, another respected political scientist, shared Ragoonath’s conclusion that no legal obligation exists for post-Cabinet briefings, but pushed back on the framing that the current government is failing to communicate with the public. She argued that Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar and her cabinet have maintained consistent public outreach through alternative channels, making announcements and responding to reporter questions on all major policy topics. These include the mid-year budget review, national crime reduction initiatives, regional diplomatic affairs, and the country’s successful campaign for a UN Security Council non-permanent seat.

    Rampersad noted that the government’s approach is flexible: officials share information when they have updates to deliver, through whatever format works best, rather than adhering to a rigid requirement for a formal post-Cabinet briefing every time. She also pointed to practical logistical reasons that may explain the current hiatus, noting that Cabinet meetings often run well over schedule due to crowded policy agendas, leaving little time for an immediate press briefing.

    Further, Rampersad said the public has not been left uninformed, and ministers remain accessible to journalists for questions and comments. She also reminded observers that some matters, including ongoing criminal investigations and sensitive national security issues, cannot reasonably be discussed publicly by cabinet ministers for legal and public safety reasons.

  • MY HEART STILL HURTS

    MY HEART STILL HURTS

    For Nicole Richards, a matriarch from Beetham Gardens, four years have passed without the justice she has grieved and fought for. On a recent evening, she gathered roughly 20 supporters near the Republic Bank at the intersection of Chacon Street and Independence Square, where her 21-year-old son Fabien Richards was killed by Trinidad and Tobago police on July 2, 2022. Attendees lit white candles in memory of Fabien and his two companions, 24-year-old Isaiah Roberts and 17-year-old Leonardo Williams, who also lost their lives in the shooting.

    The tragedy unfolded in the early hours of that July Saturday, when Western Division police officers responded to a report of stolen motor vehicle and attempted to stop a white Toyota Aqua carrying six young people in Port of Spain. A high-speed chase ensued, ending when the vehicle crashed into an exterior wall of the Republic Bank on Independence Square. According to official police accounts, officers from the Guard and Emergency Branch who had joined the pursuit claimed they came under gunfire from people inside the vehicle, and returned fire at the car. Three of the occupants — Fabien, Roberts, and Williams — were killed instantly. A fourth teen was rushed to Port of Spain General Hospital for treatment of injuries, while the remaining two passengers were detained unhurt. Investigators later said they recovered a Smith & Wesson pistol from the crashed vehicle. The three detained passengers were eventually released pending further inquiry, and lead investigator Senior Superintendent Neil Brandon-John recorded statements from all three before his passing, which left the investigation stalled.

    For the Richards family, the pain of their loss remains as raw as the day they received the news of the shooting. In an interview with the *Sunday Express*, Nicole Richards, a mother of four, shared that the investigation went cold immediately after Brandon-John died, and authorities have not provided any updates to the family in the years since. “It’s painful because we are not getting the justice we want,” she said. “We will not stop until we get justice for all three boys. I want justice for my son Fabien.”

    Fabien never got the chance to hold or meet his own daughter, Soria John, who is now three years old. That unfulfilled future haunts Nicole every day. “His baby is three. A little sweetheart. She knows her daddy died, that he’s in heaven,” Nicole said. “When I look at her, I keep pleading for justice.”

    This is not the first devastating loss Nicole has endured: her son Garth Richards was killed after being hit by a bus in 2014. She says she draws her strength to keep fighting from her two daughters, Nicola and Isoma, and her faith in God. Remembering Fabien, she painted a picture of a playful, loving young man who would sneak up behind her, cling to her calf, and pretend to be a dog chasing her to make her laugh. He loved corned beef served over rice or pasta, and enjoyed making YouTube videos in his free time.

    Fabien had been on his way home with his friends from a farewell party held in Diego Martin when the shooting happened, Nicole explained. Today, he would have turned 25. Refuting the police’s claim that the young men were armed, Nicole described her son’s death as an execution: he was shot ten times in the head. “The children were on their way home. Fabien was talking to his cousin on the way home,” she said. “We want justice. They need to get rid of the corrupt ones who hold high office. It’s not right. It can’t be right in the eyes of God and man.”

    Amid a rising tide of violent crime and police-involved deaths across the country, Nicole is calling for sweeping leadership changes. She is demanding the immediate resignation of Director of Public Prosecutions Roger Gaspard, as well as Homeland Security Minister Roger Alexander and Defence Minister Wayne Sturge. “A state of emergency is not stopping crime,” she said. “I don’t dabble in politics. But it’s almost every day you are hearing an innocent person died. When I hear somebody died at the hands of the police, I wonder who is next.”

    Nicole Richards, Fabien’s older sister, echoed her mother’s call for justice, saying she has mourned her younger brother like he was her own son. Fabien lived with Nicola at her El Socorro home from primary school onward, growing up alongside her son Nicholai. “My heart still hurts. The pain is still fresh,” she told the *Sunday Express*. “Every day you hear horror stories: people being killed, children murdered, teenagers missing. You see his scenario being replayed in your head over and over. It’s not easy.”

    She cherishes the memory of her last birthday with Fabien, in November 2021, when the family held a lively games night. The two of them were the final pair left standing in a game of musical chairs, sharing a moment of joy that she still holds close. Today, the family shares their love with Fabien’s daughter Soria, who spends every weekend with them and is described by Nicola as “a darling.”

    “Only God can give justice because he sees and knows everything,” Nicola said. “He would have seen what unfolded in the car. He would have heard their cries.”

    The vigil drew solidarity from other families who have also lost loved ones to police-involved violence and been left without answers. Among the attendees was Alyssa Phillip, who has organized multiple protests demanding clarity for her friend Kaia Sealy. Sealy is currently facing charges connected to the January police shooting death of her husband Joshua Samaroo, and Phillip and the Richards family say their shared grief has forged a bond of mutual support in the fight for accountability.