The Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) cel­e­brat­ed an­oth­er mile­stone yes­ter­day with the pro­mo­tion of 257 of­fi­cers from the rank of Cor­po­ral to Sergeant.

One of­fi­cer was al­so pro­mot­ed from Sergeant to In­spec­tor.

The cer­e­mo­ny, which was one of the largest pro­mo­tion ex­er­cis­es at the TTPS since 2016 was held at the Po­lice Acad­e­my in St. James.

It was an un­der­tak­ing long in com­ing but one the Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice (Ag.) Mc Don­ald Ja­cob and the TTPS Ex­ec­u­tive worked as­sid­u­ous­ly at achiev­ing. The process in­volved a re­view of the pro­mo­tion sys­tem to meet the or­gan­i­sa­tion’s strate­gic pri­or­i­ty of de­vel­op­ing ef­fec­tive lead­ers. Ja­cob, in his ad­dress, not­ed the sig­nif­i­cance of the pro­mo­tions and said that it would au­gur well in mo­ti­vat­ing and build­ing the morale of not on­ly the new­ly pro­mot­ed of­fi­cers but oth­ers in the or­gan­i­sa­tion as well.

He of­fered the new sergeants a poignant re­minder, “You are the fu­ture of the Ser­vice.”

He went on to state that as such, they must take a stand when the or­gan­i­sa­tion’s foun­da­tion is be­ing at­tacked.

He stat­ed that this would send a pos­i­tive mes­sage to the pub­lic as well as ju­nior of­fi­cers who will al­so one day be at the helm.

He al­so en­cour­aged them to con­tin­ue ad­vis­ing and men­tor­ing the of­fi­cers in their charge.

DCP (Ag.) Er­la Christo­pher, in her re­marks, ex­pressed her plea­sure and ho­n­our to be able to wit­ness the mem­o­rable oc­ca­sion and cel­e­brate with them.

TTPS Promotes 258 Officers

TTPS

She al­so ac­knowl­edged their hard work, long hours, and the time sac­ri­ficed away from fam­i­ly dur­ing their jour­ney to be­com­ing a sergeant.

She urged them, “don’t al­low cur­rent is­sues af­fect your ser­vice” and in­stead com­mit to pro­vid­ing “pro­fes­sion­al and ex­cep­tion­al polic­ing ser­vice.”

She high­light­ed the fact that they were now well-equipped with the knowl­edge and re­sources they need to do their jobs ef­fec­tive­ly.

The of­fi­cers’ ef­forts were al­so not­ed by In­sp. Wayne Stan­ley an ob­serv­er of the pro­mo­tion process. He urged them to find ways to sup­port younger of­fi­cers but stressed that, “If you nev­er learn to fol­low, you’ll nev­er learn to lead.”

He re­mind­ed them that the “job is a vo­ca­tion – a call­ing to serve and help peo­ple,” and that they should be pre­pared to do this de­spite the hur­dles and naysay­ers they will in­evitably en­counter.

The cer­e­mo­ny cul­mi­nat­ed with of­fi­cers re­ceiv­ing their let­ters of pro­mo­tion and well-de­served con­grat­u­la­tions from mem­bers of the Ex­ec­u­tive in­clud­ing CoP (Ag.) Ja­cob, Act­ing DCPs Er­la Christo­pher and Wen­dell Williams, Act­ing ACPs Col­lis Hazel, Joseph Chan­dool, Andy Bel­fon, Dru­cil­la Jack­man, and William Nurse, and Pres­i­dent of the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice So­cial and Wel­fare As­so­ci­a­tion (TTPSS­WA), ASP (Ag.) Gideon Ray­on Dick­son.

Al­so in at­ten­dance were Provost of the Po­lice Acad­e­my, Si­mon Alex­is, Head of the Hu­man Re­source Branch, Snr Supt (Ag.) Sher­ma May­nard­Wil­son, and spe­cial­ly in­vit­ed guests in­clud­ing mem­bers of the Pro­mo­tion Ad­vi­so­ry Board.

TTPS Promotes 258 Officers

TTPS

TTPS Promotes 258 Officers

TTPS