The To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly in­tends to ho­n­our the is­land’s he­roes start­ing next month, Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine said yes­ter­day.

Speak­ing with the me­dia fol­low­ing a wreath-lay­ing cer­e­mo­ny in re­mem­brance of the Ju­ly 27, 1990 at­tempt­ed coup, Au­gus­tine said sev­er­al peo­ple, in­clud­ing politi­cians, so­cial and cul­tur­al ac­tivists such as ANR Robin­son, Ca­lyp­so Rose, Lord Nel­son and the Mighty Shad­ow, are due to be ho­n­oured.

He said a com­mit­tee is al­ready in place work­ing out the de­tails for the To­ba­go Day cel­e­bra­tion in 2023, where these in­di­vid­u­als will be ho­n­oured.

Au­gus­tine said build­ings and streets will al­so be re­named to ho­n­our lo­cal he­roes. He said fish­ing de­pots are al­ready be­ing re­named af­ter the lo­cal fish­er­men who have made “no­table con­tri­bu­tions” to their com­mu­ni­ties.

He said the street nam­ing process will be­gin in Au­gust, adding sug­ges­tions can be made in writ­ing to the of­fice of the Chief Sec­re­tary.

“We have a lot of streets named af­ter our colo­nial mas­ters and I think it’s about time we re­named them af­ter our own he­roes, he­roes that did not op­press peo­ple, he­roes that did not mur­der peo­ple all for their own eco­nom­ic ex­ploits,” he said.

The Chief Sec­re­tary said this is all part of a broad­er de­ci­sion to help teach To­bag­o­ni­ans to re­spect who they are and their her­itage.

He said the time has come to ho­n­our he­roes while they were liv­ing.

“It’s about time To­ba­go start­ed cel­e­brat­ing our own peo­ple and our own achieve­ments.”

He said the at­tempt­ed coup was a bid to over­throw the then-gov­ern­ment by un­de­mo­c­ra­t­ic means. Au­gus­tine said the sto­ry of Trinidad and To­ba­go could have been dif­fer­ent, where peo­ple could have “got­ten up to live in a coun­try where mil­i­tants were in charge.”

He said the democ­ra­cy in the twin is­land is very ro­bust but must not be tak­en for grant­ed.

Mean­while, wreaths were al­so laid by THA Pre­sid­ing Of­fi­cer Ab­by Tay­lor, THA Chief Ad­min­is­tra­tor Eth­lyn John, for­mer MP Pamela Nichol­son and As­sis­tant Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice, To­ba­go, Daniel Moore.