Even in the face of dis­ci­pli­nary ac­tion by the Com­mu­ni­ty-based En­vi­ron­men­tal Pro­tec­tion and En­hance­ment Pro­gramme (CEPEP) for his re­cent ob­scene out­burst against a cit­i­zen last month, ca­lyp­son­ian We­st­on “Cro Cro” Rawl­ins stayed true to his in­domitable na­ture at the open­ing of his Icon’s Ca­lyp­so Tent on Fri­day night.

In his usu­al crude and ve­he­ment style of per­for­mance be­fore a full house at the Sander­son Her­itage Park in Fyz­abad, Cro Cro de­buted a song ti­tled Re­cur­ring Dec­i­mal, which spoke ex­plored the re­cent al­ter­ca­tion with the pas­sen­ger of a ve­hi­cle along a high­way.

A video of the in­ci­dent, which went vi­ral, showed Cro Cro, a re­gion­al co­or­di­na­tor at CEPEP, dri­ving a com­pa­ny ve­hi­cle when the pas­sen­ger chas­tised him for dri­ving while speak­ing on the phone.

The video did not show when Cro Cro was on the phone but when he pro­ceed­ed to curse the pas­sen­ger, ask­ing him if he was the po­lice. The video has brought heavy crit­i­cism against Cro Cro, with a call for his dis­missal by Princes Town MP Bar­ry Padarath. How­ev­er, CEPEP chair­man Ash­ton

Ford has so far de­fend­ed the com­pa­ny’s de­ci­sion to sus­pend Cro Cro while the mat­ter is be­ing in­ves­ti­gat­ed. Ford has al­so la­belled Cro Cro as a good work­er while the man who re­leased the video has not come for­ward.

But it has al­so been a source of com­e­dy for so­cial me­dia users, some who even agreed with him.

So pop­u­lar was the al­ter­ca­tion that it has been a source of memes that have made their way on­to T-Shirts that are cur­rent­ly for sale.

On Fri­day, Cro Cro en­tered the stage to a hearty wel­come from the au­di­ence and a smooth and swing­ing melody from the band. In his song, he said racism was ripe and that he was not “tak­ing no kind of racial talk from no­body in Trinidad.” Cro Cro said he knew how some peo­ple suf­fered and are still suf­fer­ing to­day. He then went about re­lat­ing his ac­count of the al­ter­ca­tion on the high­way.

“He call me a stu­pid n--ga

He raise my pres­sure,

He call me a stu­pid n--ga

Ag­o­nise meh anger

He call me a stu­pid n--ga

Then he dri­ve up fast

Ah meet him in de traf­fic,

wind down meh glass

and buss some cuss in he a--.”

He al­so sang that when Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar la­belled Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley as an Oreo, it was left to die eas­i­ly. And for his crit­ics Dale Enoch and Bar­ry Padarath, he sang: “So when Padarath and Dale mak­ing a big fuss, but the thing that they do­ing wuss.”

The CEPEP in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to Cro Cro’s con­duct was sup­posed to be com­plet­ed last week and a re­port sub­mit­ted to the com­pa­ny’s board of di­rec­tors.

Con­tact­ed yes­ter­day, Cro Cro said was not wor­ried about his per­for­mance in­flu­enc­ing the CEPEP probe. He said first­ly he was a ca­lyp­son­ian and ca­lyp­so was made to ex­press things that were hap­pen­ing in the coun­try.

“I think the in­ves­ti­ga­tor must want to hear my opin­ion of what hap­pened. The man made a video and put me up for the world to see. Now he doesn’t want to come for­ward so I’m telling my part of the sto­ry,” Cro Cro said.

“I dealt with Padarath and them who called for my dis­missal. I told them I am not a priest. I ain’t no beast, but I was not or­dained as a priest. What he told me was worse than that cuss be­cause he was tar­get­ing a whole race. I know the Lord and I pray. I feel I am one of the best so I had to an­swer back in song.”

The tent was not with­out its mishaps as af­ter an hour and a half, when Hay­den Joseph was about to per­form his Too Much Snacks there was a pow­er out­age in parts of Fyz­abad and San­ta Flo­ra. Dur­ing the 45-minute break, some pa­trons be­came rest­less and left.

“Tell Cro Cro to put on the lights on his 350 Benz,” one woman shout­ed out.

“We want back we mon­ey. We stay­ing here un­til 8 o’clock in the morn­ing,” an­oth­er hurled.

Vi­su­al­ly-im­paired ca­lyp­son­ian Joseph “Mighty Lin­go” La Place­liere en­ter­tained in the dark, telling the au­di­ence that he could not see and now they un­der­stand how it felt for him.

But once restart­ed, fans rev­elled in the mu­si­cal tales brought to the stage by ca­lyp­so­ni­ans such as Im­pulse, Dad­dy Chi­nee, Patch­es and oth­ers.