Rhon­da Krys­tal Ram­bal­ly

In 1969, sev­en years af­ter T&T gained its in­de­pen­dence from Great Britain, a na­tion­al awards cer­e­mo­ny was held for the first time to ho­n­our cit­i­zens who had ex­celled in their fields. Re­ceiv­ing the Trin­i­ty Cross that year were Sir El­lis Clarke for his role in draft­ing the Con­sti­tu­tion; Sir Hugh Wood­ing for his ser­vice to the ju­di­cia­ry; Rudranath Capildeo in the field of sci­ence; Count Fin­bar Ryan for his con­tri­bu­tion to re­li­gion and for­mer Gov­er­nor-Gen­er­al of T&T Sir Solomon Ho­choy, ex of­fi­cio.

The fol­low­ing year, trade union­ist Tubal Uri­ah "Buzz" But­ler; George Richards, fa­ther of Pres­i­dent of T&T George Maxwell Richards, and diplo­mat Don­ald Grana­do were in re­ceipt of the coun­try's high­est award in the sphere of pub­lic ser­vice. Some 40 years lat­er, the Trin­i­ty Cross would be no more and de­serv­ing cit­i­zens would re­ceive The Or­der of the Re­pub­lic of Trinidad and To­ba­go.

In 2008, Pro­fes­sor Bri­an Copeland, steel­pan in­no­va­tors Bertram "Bertie" Lloyd Mar­shall and An­tho­ny Williams were the first to be pre­sent­ed with The Or­der. The last per­son to re­ceive the Trin­i­ty Cross was Ed­win Wilber­force Car­ring­ton for na­tion­al/re­gion­al de­vel­op­ment in 2005. From 1969 to 2007, there were 68 re­cip­i­ents of the Trin­i­ty Cross and from 2007 to 2011, there were 12 re­cip­i­ents of The Or­der.

In 1975, 1983, 1984, 1986, 1990, 1992, 2001, 2004, 2006 and 2007, no per­son or group re­ceived the high­est na­tion­al award. One year af­ter the 1990 at­tempt­ed coup, the T&T Reg­i­ment and the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice were pre­sent­ed with the high­est ho­n­our while in 2002, the coun­try's first prime min­is­ter Dr Er­ic Williams re­ceived the Trin­i­ty Cross posthu­mous­ly for out­stand­ing and dis­tin­guished ser­vice to Trinidad and To­ba­go and in recog­ni­tion of the 40th an­niver­sary of the in­de­pen­dence.

Past pres­i­dents Noor Has­sanali and Arthur NR Robin­son have re­ceived the high­est award as well as cur­rent pres­i­dent George Maxwell Richards. Dis­tin­guished cit­i­zens such as Aubrey Adams, Samuel Selvon, Mol­ly Ahye, Ran­dolph Bur­roughs, Ny­ron As­gar­ali, Simb­hoonath Capildeo, Katharine In­gelfield, Roy Mootoo, Han­nah Janoura, Sir Vidia Naipaul, Bri­an Mac­Far­lane and Clau­dia Pe­gus were re­cip­i­ents of na­tion­al awards.

Pri­or to gain­ing in­de­pen­dence, there was the Com­mon­wealth Awards sys­tem which was con­fered by the Queen. On Au­gust 31, 1962, Sir Solomon Ho­choy was in­stalled as the first Gov­er­nor-Gen­er­al and Pre­mier Dr Er­ic Williams be­came the Prime Min­is­ter. To com­mem­o­rate In­de­pen­dence 50 years ago, there were ac­tiv­i­ties and events for a week. This year, for the coun­try's ju­bilee an­niver­sary, the Gov­ern­ment has in­vest­ed ap­prox­i­mate­ly $35 mil­lion to­wards cel­e­bra­tions which of­fi­cial­ly kicked off in April.

This was re­vealed by Min­is­ter of Plan­ning and Sus­tain­able De­vel­op­ment Dr Bhoen­dra­datt Tewarie in Ju­ly in an in­ter­view with the Sun­day Guardian. Tra­di­tion­al­ly, the na­tion­als awards cer­e­mo­ny took place at the Pres­i­dent's House, how­ev­er, when part of it col­lapsed in May 2010, the venue was changed to the Queen's Hall at St Ann's. It is an­tic­i­pat­ed it will once again be held there on Fri­day.