Gail Alexan­der

Walk­ing off in­to the sun­set to the strains of Dif­fer­en­tol­ogy.It was to a De­fence Force band ren­di­tion of Bun­ji Gar­lin's We Ready for the Road, that out­go­ing Pres­i­dent George Maxwell Richards and his wife Jean head­ed home yes­ter­day af­ter the armed forces bid farewell to the com­man­der-in-chief.Richards had served as head of state for two con­sec­u­tive five-year terms of of­fice.He demit­ted of­fice yes­ter­day when his sec­ond term end­ed.

The in­au­gu­ra­tion of Richards' suc­ces­sor, pres­i­dent-elect An­tho­ny T A Car­mona, 60, as T&T's fifth head of state, takes place to­day at 5 pm at the Hase­ly Craw­ford Sta­di­um, Mu­cu­rapo. Ap­prox­i­mate­ly 10,000 guests, in­clud­ing 5,000 stu­dents are ex­pect­ed for the two-hour func­tion.Yes­ter­day's de­mis­sion func­tion by the armed forces was among events to bid farewell to Richards.

The De­fence Force event was held on the Queen's Park Sa­van­nah road­way out­side Knowsley which had been used for var­i­ous pres­i­den­tial func­tions in re­cent years. The road was closed to traf­fic to ac­com­mo­date the func­tion,Mem­bers of the De­fence Force stood at at­ten­tion in for­ma­tion fac­ing Knowsley as Richards and his wife ar­rived, es­cort­ed by mem­bers of the Mount­ed Branch.

The func­tion for Richards cre­at­ed a bit of De­fence Force his­to­ry since it was the first time a de­mis­sion cer­e­mo­ny and the troop­ing of colours (flags) in­volved four branch­es of the De­fence Force. Usu­al­ly there were three.Rep­re­sent­ed yes­ter­day, how­ev­er were the pres­i­dent's colours (red), the Reg­i­ment (green), the Coast Guard (white) and for the first time, the Air Guard (blue). The Air Guard was re­cent­ly added.

Max's pres­i­den­tial leav­ing cer­e­mo­ny

Richards, 82, took the salute and in­spect­ed the troops. In prayers for Richards on the com­ple­tion of his term as com­man­der-in-chief, mem­bers of the armed forces gave thanks for his "lead­er­ship, wise coun­sel and his warmth, car­ing at­trib­ut­es and his friend­ship and sim­plic­i­ty."

The De­fence Force farewell al­so fea­tured a sax­o­phone so­lo of Go­ing Home and pre­sen­ta­tions to both Richards and his wife.Chief of De­fence Staff Ma­jor Gen­er­al Ken­rick Ma­haraj pre­sent­ed Richards with sev­er­al gifts in­clud­ing a large framed pic­tor­i­cal com­pi­la­tion–col­lage style–of Richards' De­fence Force ap­pear­ances.

Richards thanked the armed forces for their gifts and con­sid­er­a­tion, wish­ing them all well.He in­spect­ed the troops a fi­nal time to the strains of Auld Lang Syne played by the De­fence Force band.At the end of the in­spec­tion, he was es­cort­ed again by the Mount­ed Branch as well as Ma­jor Gen­er­al Ma­haraj and oth­er top mil­i­tary of­fi­cials.

Richards, joined by his wife, then walked away from the troops and head­ed to their of­fi­cial car as the band struck up Bun­ji's 2013 an­them We Ready for the Road. As the cou­ple walked away, two mil­i­tary he­li­copters flew low over­head in salute for­ma­tion to bid farewell to their de­part­ing chief as he and his wife head­ed home.

More in­fo

Pro­fes­sor George Maxwell Richards, TC, CMTT, Ph.d, is a for­mer prin­ci­pal and pro vice chan­cel­lor of UWI.He took the oath of of­fice for a first five-year term as pres­i­dent on March 17, 2003. He was in­au­gu­rat­ed for a sec­ond term on March 17, 2008.

Richards is Pro­fes­sor Emer­i­tus in chem­i­cal en­gi­neer­ing at the de­part­ment of chem­i­cal En­gi­neer­ing, UWI. He is the re­cip­i­ent of the Trin­i­ty Cross, T&T's high­est na­tion­al award and the Cha­co­nia Medal Gold). He is mar­ried to Dr Jean Ramjohn, an anaes­the­si­ol­o­gist. They have two chil­dren, Max­ine and Mark.