An­na-Lisa Paul

Se­nior Re­porter

an­na-lisa.paul@guardian.co.tt

Cana­di­an YouTube blog­ger Christo­pher Hugh­es, al­so called Chris Must List, who has been charged with mak­ing a sedi­tious pub­li­ca­tion here in T&T, has re­ject­ed the lat­est of­fer to plead guilty de­spite an as­sur­ance that he will be al­lowed to walk free.

In a 30-minute record­ing post­ed to his Chris Must List RAW YouTube Chan­nel yes­ter­day, Hugh­es ac­cused the pros­e­cu­tor of fail­ing to pre­pare and not do­ing due dili­gence. He said he was in agree­ment with his at­tor­ney Criston J Williams not to en­ter such a plea.

Fol­low­ing a vir­tu­al hear­ing last Thurs­day, as he has been banned from re­turn­ing to T&T, Hugh­es claimed the new­ly ap­point­ed judge de­scribed the mat­ter as a “dis­grace­ful mess”.

Hugh­es, who re­mains out on $100,000 bail, dis­missed the lat­est of­fer by lo­cal of­fi­cials to work it out be­fore go­ing to tri­al.

He said, “The on­ly of­fer I got is that if I plead guilty to some­thing I am not guilty of, I am not guilty of, they will drop all charges. I will have no crim­i­nal record, but all I have to do is plead guilty.”

Un­der­scor­ing that sedi­tion was a very se­ri­ous charge, Hugh­es said he has been ac­cused of us­ing his in­flu­ence to “top­ple” and “over­throw” the for­mer gov­ern­ment, and while the on­go­ing mat­ter has re­mained a thorn in his side, he would not ad­mit to any such thing.

And with­out call­ing names, Hugh­es sent a sub­tle mes­sage to cer­tain Cab­i­net min­is­ters to re­mind them of an ear­li­er promise to work with him to pro­mote the tourism sec­tor.

He specif­i­cal­ly called on the Tourism Board as he said, “Bring me back. I am ready to work.”

In­di­cat­ing he had no re­spect for the past gov­ern­ment, which he be­lieved had been em­bar­rassed fol­low­ing his abil­i­ty to pen­e­trate well-known hot spots and speak open­ly with gang lead­ers and mem­bers in the “hoods”, Hugh­es said, “Trinidad has one of the high­est mur­der rates in the world.”

Claim­ing it had re­mained that way even af­ter a year fol­low­ing his ar­rest in May 2024, he said, “The vi­o­lence wasn’t just young men. It wasn’t just gang mem­bers. It was home in­va­sions. It was girls be­cause they dat­ed a guy that migh­ta been in a gang. It was grand­mas be­ing at­tacked, and it was chil­dren be­ing killed in dri­ve-bys.”