Timeline Trinidad & Tobago
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CIA Factbook: http://www.odci.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/td.html
Emulate: http://www.emulateme.com/trinidad.htm
History: http://www.caribbeansupersite.com/trinidad/history.htm
Travel Docs: http://www.traveldocs.com/tt/index.htm
This two island nation has a population of
which 98% live on Trinidad, 7 miles from the coast of Venezuela.
This was where Calypso music started in the 19th cent. and where the
steel
drum was invented as a musical instrument in 1930s-'40s. This nation is
the world's second largest exporter of ammonia and will be the third
largest
exporter of methanol by the end of 1995. The capital is Port-of-Spain.
Tobago is a 26-mile island with 46,000 residents off the coast of
Venezuela.
(Hem., Dec. '95, p.29-30)(USA Today, 5/14/96, p.6D)
13,000-6,000BP Trinidad was once
part of the South American continent. The lowlands to the continent
flooded either after the melt of the last Ice Age or more recently from
erosion caused by the Orinoco River of Venezuela.
(SFEC, 2/16/96, p.T5)
1498 Jul 31, During his third
voyage to the Western Hemisphere, Christopher Columbus arrived at an
island he named Trinidad because of its 3 hills.
(AP, 7/31/98)(http://www1.minn.net/~keithp/v3.htm)
1776 The world’s oldest protected
rain forest on Tobago was set aside in 1776.
(USA Today, 5/14/96, p.6D)
1797 Feb 21, Trinidad, West Indies
surrendered to the British.
(HN, 2/21/98)
1889 J.J. Thomas (1840-1889)
authored “Froudacity,” an attack on the writings about the West Indies
of English historian J. Anthony Froude. The Trinidad-born,
self-educated black intellectual, wrote the work during a visit to
London where he died of TB.
{Trinidad&Tobago, Britain, Historian, West
Indies}
(WSJ, 10/4/05,
p.D8)(www.wwnorton.com/nael/victorian/topic_4/thomas.htm)
1920 Jun 11, Hazel Scott, singer,
pianist (Hazel Scott), was born in Trinidad.
(SC, 6/11/02)
1925 The goat races began in
Tobago as a working-class alternative to horse racing. In 20011 the
Buccoo Goat Race Festival, scheduled for April 25-26, sought support on
Facebook.
(AP, 4/16/11)
1932 Aug 17, V.S, Naipaul
(b.1932), English novelist (Middle Passage), was born in Chaguana,
Trinidad. He won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2001.
(SFC, 10/12/01, p.C1)(SC, 8/17/02)
1937 May 15, Trini Lopez, singer,
guitarist (If I Had a Hammer), was born in Trinidad.
(MC, 5/15/02)
1941 Mar 27, Britain leased
defense bases in Trinidad to the U.S. for a period of 99 years.
(HN, 3/27/98)
1941 Jun 29, Stokely Carmichael
(later Kwame Ture), African-American civil rights leader, was born in
Port-of-Spain and spent his first 11 years there.
(SFC, 11/16/98, p.A7)(HN, 6/29/98)
1944 Lord Kitchener composed the
1st calypso played by a steel drum orchestra: "The Beat of the
Steelband."
(SFC, 2/12/00, p.A21)
1960s The 1979 novel "The Dragon
Cant' Dance" by Earl Lovelace was set in this time at Calvary Hill in
Port of Spain.
(SFEC, 3/21/99, BR p.9)
1962 Aug 31, The Caribbean nation
of Trinidad and Tobago became independent within the British
Commonwealth. Eric Williams, a Marxist historian, led the country to
independence.
(SFC, 7/1/97, p.A9)(AP, 8/31/97)(Econ, 8/26/06, p.29)
1973 Jul 4, The Treaty of
Chaguaramas was signed in Trinidad and established the Caribbean
Community CARICOM - Caribbean Community & Common Market.
(www.axses.com/encyc/caricom/nt/faqs.cfm)
1973 Carnival was delayed due to
an outbreak of polio.
(SFC, 2/12/00, p.A21)
1974 Garfield Blackman (d.2000 at
59), aka Lord Shorty and Ras Shorty I, composed his 1st soca song
“Endless Vibrations.” He fused calypso and the up-tempo soca beat.
(SFC, 7/14/00, p.D6)
1976 Aug 1, Trinidad & Tobago
became a republic.
(http://library2.nalis.gov.tt/Default.aspx?PageContentMode=1&tabid=79)
1979 Jul 19, Two supertankers
collided off Tobago and spilled 260,000 tons of oil. It was the worst
oil spill to date with 88 million gallons spewed.
(WSJ, 1/11/99,
p.R49)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_oil_spills)
1981 Trinidad and Tobago opened a
stock exchange.
(WSJ, 1/11/99, p.R42)
1982 Earl Lovelace published his
novel "The Wine of Astonishment."
(SFEC, 3/21/99, BR p.9)
1989 Trinidad and Tobago appealed
for an Int’l. World Court to help it and other small countries fight
int’l. drug trafficking.
(SFEC, 12/1/96, p.A16)
1990 Jul 27, In Trinidad Yasin Abu
Bakr and 114 rebels set off a car bomb that gutted the police station
in front of Parliament. They then stormed into the legislature,
spraying bullets, and took the prime minister and his Cabinet hostage
in a rebellion that killed 24 people.
(AP, 10/21/10)
1990 Aug 1, In Trinidad, dozens of
Muslim militants surrendered and freed 42 hostages they had seized six
days earlier in a failed bid to overthrow the government. Jamaat al
Muslimeen, a Trinidadian radical Muslim group led by Yasin Abu Bakr
(formerly Lennox Phillip), launched the unsuccessful rebellion that
left 24 dead.
(AP, 8/1/00)(AP, 6/3/07)(Econ, 6/9/07, p.44)
1991 Feb 4, In Cumuto, Trinidad,
Indravani Pamela Ramjattan (28), a victim of repeated beatings, was
again beaten unconscious by her husband, Alexander Jordan (47). A week
later she got 2 men, one of them her lover, to murder Jordan. Ramjattan
was convicted of murder in a 1995 trial and sentenced to death.
(SFC, 1/29/99, p.A14)
1993 The London-based Privy
Council ruled that executions cannot take place move than 5 years after
sentencing. For Trinidad and Tobago to overrule this required a
constitutional amendment, which in turn required a three-quarters
majority in parliament.
(Econ, 2/12/11, p.46)
1994 Dole Chadee, a drug lord, set
up the murder of a family of four over a drug dispute. Chadee and 2
henchmen were executed in 1999.
(SFC, 6/5/99, p.A10)
1995-2001 Basdeo Panday served as the prime minister
of Trinidad & Tobago. In Sep, 2002, he was charged with failing to
include a London bank account in a statutory declaration of his assets.
(Econ, 1/28/06, p.37)
1996 Apr 16, An American was shot
and killed in the Toco area of Port of Spain.
(SFC, 5/5/96, p.T-9)
1996 Jun, Ground breaking
ceremonies were held for a new LNG plant at Point Fortin. It was owned
by Amoco, British Gas, Cabot and the Trinidad government.
(WSJ, 3/13/00, p.A1)
1997 Apr 22, A 6.5 earthquake hit
Tobago. There were no reported injuries.
(SFC, 4/23/97, p.A4)
1997 Earl Lovelace won the
Commonwealth Writer's Prize for his novel "Salt."
(SFEC, 3/21/99, BR p.9)
1998 May 20, In Trinidad Ishmael
Sammy, a 22-year-old mechanic, was dragged out of his home by masked
men and shot. In 2010 the director of public prosecutions said the
state did not have the evidence to proceed with a murder charge against
Yasin Abu Bakr and Brent Miller, members of the Jamaat al Muslimeen
group, in the slaying of Sammy. Bakr, a former police officer who
converted to Islam in the 1970s, has been charged with various crimes
over the years but never convicted.
(www.ttgapers.com/News/2010/9/30/abu-bakr-arrested-for-murder-again/)(AP,
10/21/10)
1998 May, Trinidad and Tobago
withdrew from the American Convention on Human Rights and planned the
execution of 5 prisoners in June.
(SFC, 6/19/98, p.B4)
1998 Jul 2, Barbados, Trinidad and
Tobago, Guyana and Jamaica reported plans to establish the Caribbean
Court of Justice in 1999 and planned to change their constitutions to
free themselves of the British Privy Council. The effort was pushed to
establish the death penalty.
(SFC, 7/4/98, p.A10)
1999 Apr 20, Lt. Col. Noel Pelco
was shot and killed outside the residence of Prime Minister Basdeo
Panday, the country’s 1st Hindu leader, in Port of Spain by Lance
Corporal Anthony Caesar, who then killed himself.
(SFC, 4/20/99, p.A11)
1999 Apr, Trinidad made its 1st
LNG shipment.
(WSJ, 3/13/00, p.A1)
1999 Jun 4, Dole Chadee and 2
henchmen were hanged. Six more executions were schedule to follow
within days. These were the first execution in 5 years.
(SFC, 6/5/99, p.A10)
1999 Trinidad and Tobago suffered
93 killings this year. 10 men were hanged in the country, 9 of them
were members of the Dole Chadee drug mob.
(Econ, 2/12/11, p.46)
2000 Feb 11, Lord Kitchener (born
as Aldwyn Roberts), the "Grand Master" of Calypso singing, died at age
77.
(SFC, 2/12/00, p.A21)
2000 Dec 11, Prime Minister Basdeo
Panday, head of the United National Congress, announced victory for 19
parliamentary seats vs. 16 for the black-dominated People’s National
Movement.
(SFC, 12/12/00, p.B3)
2002 Jul 6, Trinidad and Tobago
announced plans to run an undersea natural gas pipeline throughout the
Caribbean, saying the project would open new markets in the region.
(AP, 7/6/02)
2002 Oct 7, Elections in Trinidad
and Tobago were won by Prime Minister Patrick Manning's black-dominated
party with 20 of the 36 parliamentary seats.
(AP, 10/8/02)
2002 Nov 20, In Port-of-Spain,
Trinidad, Phillip Seerattan (17) opened fire with a pistol at a school
for foreign students, wounding a security guard before being shot to
death by police.
(AP, 11/21/02)
2002 Dec 26, In Trinidad police
reported that 4 people were slain over the Christmas holidays, bringing
the number of killings to a record 164 this year.
(AP, 12/26/02)
2003 Feb 14, Trinidad and Tobago
legislators elected Maxwell Richards, a former university dean who
claims he is "not in anyone's back pocket" to be the new president.
(AP, 2/14/03)
2003 Nov 20, The London Privy
Council ruled that Trinidad's mandatory death penalty for murder
convictions was unconstitutional, forcing the country to begin giving
discretion to judges when handing out sentences.
(AP, 11/21/03)
2003 Trinidad closed its
state-owned sugar company.
(Econ, 9/24/05, p.45)
2004 May 24, It was reported that
Alcoa planned to build a $1 billion aluminum smelter on the island of
Trinidad and another in Iceland.
(WSJ, 5/24/04, p.A1)
2004 Sep 13, In Trinidad and
Tobago a pregnant woman was killed in Tobago when a tree fell on her
from Hurricane Ivan. Roofs blew off some 30 buildings, including homes
and schools.
(AP, 9/14/04)
2004 In Trinidad construction
began on a drilling platform being built for BP Trinidad and Tobago
LLC, the Trinidad branch of London-based BP Amoco PLC. It was scheduled
to be completed in March, 2005, and be fully operational in January
2006.
(AP, 10/18/04)
2005 Feb 19, In Trinidad security
chiefs from 34 countries in the Americas outlined broad strategies for
fighting money laundering, passport fraud and drug smuggling, warning
that Islamic terrorists could exploit lawlessness in the region to
raise money and slip through borders.
(AP, 2/19/05)
2005 Apr 6, In Trinidad gunmen
snatched Balram Maharaj (62), a US citizen, from a bar and held him for
ransom. The body of the Vietnam War veteran were found in a forest in
January 2006. 7 men were convicted in a US trial in 2009.
(http://washingtondc.fbi.gov/dojpressrel/pressrel09/wfo041509.htm)(AP,
3/23/11)
2005 Apr 16, Caribbean leaders in
Trinidad inaugurated a court that will serve as the highest judicial
body for much of the region, a step toward shedding their 170-year-old
dependence on Britain's Privy Council that many have resented as a
vestige of colonialism.
(AP, 4/16/05)(Econ, 4/16/05, p.34)
2005 May 31, Trinidad police
arrested Basdeo Panday, former prime minister (1995-2001) and
opposition leader, and 3 others on corruption charges connected to an
airport construction contract.
(AP, 5/31/05)
2005 Jun 22, An explosion blasted
through an oil tanker moored for repairs off Trinidad's west coast,
killing two people and leaving two missing.
(AP, 6/23/05)
2005 Jul 1, On the island of
Tobago Kitty Nichole Pepe (14) of Keene, N.Y., was stabbed to death in
the village of Charlottville. On July 4 police arrested a 22-year-old
man in connection with her death. Pepe was the 5th homicide victim on
the island of 55,000 people this year. In April, 2011, Sean Antoine
(28) was convicted of manslaughter. In May he was sentenced to 19 years
at hard labor.
(AP, 7/3/05)(AP, 7/5/05)(AP, 5/16/11)
2005 Jul 11, In Trinidad a bomb
exploded in a trash bin in downtown Port-of-Spain on Monday, injuring
14 people.
(AP, 7/11/05)
2005 Sep 7, In Trinidad Jason
Raymond-Guillen, the 19-year-old son of a newspaper editor, was seized
outside his home by kidnappers who demanded a $2 million ransom.
(AP, 9/9/05)
2005 Nov 7, Police in Trinidad
arrested Yasin Abu Bakr (64), an Islamic leader formerly known as
Lennox Phillip. His group Jamaat al Mulsimeen group stormed
Parliament 15 years ago and took the prime minister and his Cabinet
hostage.
(AP, 11/11/05)(Econ, 11/19/05, p.42)
2005 Dec 17, In Trinidad Randy
Depoo, a former political officer at the US Embassy in Trinidad, paid
$1,000 for the release of his kidnapped son. The kidnappers originally
sought nearly $32,000 but released the youth within hours of the
abduction for the lower amount.
(AP, 12/24/05)
2005 Trinidad, with a population
of 1.3 million, counted 390 murders this year.
(Econ, 8/26/06, p.29)
2006 Apr, Basdeo Panday, former
Trinidad prime minister, was sentenced to 2 years in prison for
corruption.
(Econ, 7/22/06, p.40)
2006 Jul 14, In Trinidad a
high-court judge convened a special hearing that stayed an arrest
order against Satnarine Sharma, the chief justice of Trinidad, who was
charged with attempting to pervert the course of justice by helping
former PM Basdeo Panday.
(Econ, 7/22/06, p.40)
2006 Nov 8, In Barbados the new
Trinidad-based Caribbean Court of Justice, in its first death penalty
ruling, dismissed an appeal by the Barbados government that sought to
restore execution orders for two convicted murderers.
(AP, 11/8/06)
2007 Jun 2, Four Muslim men were
arrested and in connection to a plan to set off explosives in a jet
fuel line that feeds John F. Kennedy International Airport and runs
through residential neighborhoods. Two men allegedly involved in a plot
to attack New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport were in
custody in Trinidad and Tobago and the police commissioner said
authorities were scouring the Caribbean country for a third suspect
still at large. In 2011 Kareem Ibrahim (65) of Trinidad was found
guilty of convincing plotters to seek aid from Iran.
(AP, 6/2/07)(AP, 6/3/07)(AP, 6/2/08)(SFC, 5/27/11,
p.A6)
2007 Jun 5, Abdel Nur, a Guyanese
national and the fourth suspect in an alleged plot to attack New York's
John F. Kennedy Airport, surrendered in Trinidad.
(AP, 6/5/07)
2007 Aug 7, A judge in Trinidad
ordered three men extradited to the US to face charges in an alleged
plot to attack New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport, and a
confidential US document said they planned to seek help from Iran.
(AP, 8/7/07)
2008 Mar 26, Trinidad’s RBTT, the
largest regionally owned bank, agreed to accept a takeover by the Royal
Bank of Canada.
(Econ, 3/29/08, p.50)
2008 Oct 9, In Tobago Anna
Sundsval (62) and Oke Olsoon (73) of Sweden were slashed to death at
their home in the Bon Accord area. A suspect was arrested the next day.
(AP, 10/11/08)
2009 Feb 5, Jennifer Figge (56)
arrived in Trinidad, exhilarated and exhausted as she touched land this
week for the first time in almost a month, becoming the first woman on
record to allegedly swim across the Atlantic Ocean. Figge actually swam
only a fraction of the 2,100-mile journey. The rest of the time, she
rested on her crew's westward-sailing catamaran.
(AP, 2/8/09)(AP, 2/10/09)
2009 Apr 18, The 34-nation weekend
Summit of the Americas opened in Trinidad. Cuba, as the region's only
non-democracy, was not invited. Pres. Obama signaled he was ready to
accept Cuban President Raul Castro's proposal of talks on issues once
off-limits for Havana, including the scores of political prisoners held
by the communist government.
(AP, 4/18/09)
2009 Apr 19, In Trinidad a Western
Hemisphere summit wrapped up with President Barack Obama hopeful he'd
boosted the image of the US among its friends in the region and perhaps
even made some new ones. Caribbean leaders asked the US to expand a
$1.4 billion program to help Mexico and Central America fight drug
trafficking and organized crime to include aid for their island
nations. The final declaration of the Summit of Americas, which Hugo
Chavez of Venezuela and his leftist bloc refused to sign, turned out to
have just one signatory. It was PM Patrick Manning, host of the
34-nation summit.
(AP, 4/19/09)
2009 May 2, In Trinidad 4 police
officers allegedly hijacked a smuggling boat from Venezuela and stole
1,000 endangered birds and monkeys along with 400 pounds of wild animal
meat. Investigators acting on a tip found birds and monkeys in people's
homes, in pet shops and even along roads in Port-of-Spain.
(AP, 5/5/09)
2009 Nov 27, The 53 members of the
Commonwealth gathered in Trinidad for a summit.
(Econ, 11/28/09, p.67)
2009 Nov 29, Rwanda was admitted
to the Commonwealth as its 54th member during a summit in Trinidad.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8384930.stm)
2010 May 24, In Trinidad and
Tobago attorney Kamla Persad-Bissessar (59) was elected as the first
female prime minister. Preliminary elections results indicated that
Persad-Bissessar and her five-party People's Partnership coalition won
29 of 41 seats in parliament.
(AP, 5/25/10)
2010 Nov 23, In Trinidad Sgt.
Simeon Roderique (38), a US Army soldier vacationing on the Caribbean
island, was killed when gunmen rammed his car from behind in a rough
slum and then opened fire. He was shot shortly after dropping a woman
off at her home in Laventille, a gang-plagued community just east of
Trinidad's capital. The woman's brother was also killed.
(AP, 11/24/10)
2010 Trinidad and Tobago suffered
472 killings this year, close to 5% of all deaths.
(Econ, 2/12/11, p.46)
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