GEISHA KOW­LESSAR-ALON­ZO

Trib­utes con­tin­ue to pour in for for­mer Na­tion­al Gas Com­pa­ny (NGC) pres­i­dent Mark Lo­quan who has been hailed for his pos­i­tive and tremen­dous im­pact on this coun­try's en­er­gy sec­tor.

Out­go­ing Pres­i­dent of the T&T Man­u­fac­tur­ers As­so­ci­a­tion (TTMA) Roger Roach de­scribed Lo­quan as hav­ing a piv­otal role over the last eight years in the re­or­gan­i­sa­tion of the sec­tor, es­pe­cial­ly in the gas are­na.

"It was very pleas­ing to us in the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty when he re­turned to Trinidad and To­ba­go to con­tribute na­tion­al­ly in that way and we're al­so hap­py that be­fore his pass­ing, he was able to re­ceive the na­tion's high­est award, the Or­der of Trinidad and To­ba­go.

"Per­son­al­ly, I think Mark did ex­cep­tion­al­ly well for the coun­try, both on the busi­ness side and on the cul­tur­al side. He was very in­volved in com­po­si­tion for steel­pans and at this time, the on­ly thing the TTMA would like to do is to pay homage to him for his con­tri­bu­tion and to ex­tend our deep­est con­do­lences to his fam­i­ly and his loved ones," Roach told Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day.

Mean­while, the En­er­gy Cham­ber of T&T al­so termed Lo­quan as a dis­tin­guished leader of the na­tion­al and glob­al en­er­gy in­dus­try.

In a state­ment yes­ter­day it not­ed Lo­quan's ca­reer spanned over three decades in the en­er­gy and petro­chem­i­cal in­dus­try, marked by lead­er­ship roles in sev­er­al coun­tries, in­clud­ing T&T, USA, Eu­rope, Africa, and Aus­tralia and cul­mi­nat­ing in his role as pres­i­dent of the Na­tion­al Gas Com­pa­ny of T&T from 2016 un­til 2024. The cham­ber al­so not­ed Lo­quan's ex­per­tise and ded­i­ca­tion to the en­er­gy in­dus­try was in­valu­able to both the com­pa­nies he led.

Fur­ther, the cham­ber said Lo­quan had a deep and abid­ing com­mit­ment to the peo­ple of this coun­try.

"His lead­er­ship of in­dus­try ini­tia­tives led to the cre­ation of a strong in­dus­try-wide safe­ty cul­ture in Trinidad and To­ba­go and to sig­nif­i­cant new ap­pre­ci­a­tion and com­mit­ment to de­car­bon­i­sa­tion and the cre­ation of a more sus­tain­able en­er­gy in­dus­try.

"Dur­ing some dif­fi­cult years, he helped cre­ate a sense of com­mon pur­pose across the en­er­gy val­ue chain, from up­stream op­er­a­tors through the petro­chem­i­cal pro­duc­ers, and through­out the sup­ply chain. He cham­pi­oned the de­vel­op­ment of skills, con­cerns for the en­vi­ron­ment, the ex­port of en­er­gy ser­vices and the recog­ni­tion of the im­por­tance of com­mu­ni­ty en­gage­ment. His in­dus­try col­leagues were al­ways in awe of his abil­i­ty to do all of this whilst al­so com­pos­ing and pro­duc­ing mu­sic, in par­tic­u­lar for his beloved steel pan," the cham­ber added.

It stat­ed that when Lo­quan an­nounced he was re­tir­ing from the in­dus­try to pur­sue his love of mu­sic and cul­ture, his in­dus­try col­leagues were all look­ing for­ward to many years of his con­tin­ued con­tri­bu­tion to na­tion­al de­vel­op­ment. Sad­ly, this was short­lived.