Stephon Nicholas

To­ba­go Cor­re­spon­dent

Ac­tivist Wen­dell Ever­s­ley be­lieves Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar and At­tor­ney Gen­er­al John Je­re­mie may have ques­tions to an­swer be­fore the In­ter­na­tion­al Crim­i­nal Court (ICC).

At a me­dia con­fer­ence yes­ter­day out­side the ANR Robin­son In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port, Ever­s­ley ques­tioned whether Trinidad and To­ba­go’s de­ci­sion to ab­stain from vot­ing on a re­cent Unit­ed Na­tions res­o­lu­tion con­cern­ing the ICC was linked to the coun­try’s role in the US forces’ cap­ture of Venezue­lan Pres­i­dent Nico­las Maduro and the bomb­ing of boats al­leged­ly car­ry­ing drugs in Caribbean wa­ters.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar has en­dorsed the bomb­ing of al­leged drug traf­fick­ers, urg­ing the US last year to “kill them all vi­o­lent­ly.” She has de­nied in­volve­ment in regime change in Venezuela, de­spite a US sen­a­tor thank­ing the gov­ern­ment for its as­sis­tance.

US Sec­re­tary of War Pe­te Hegseth is fac­ing im­peach­ment pro­ceed­ings in­volv­ing sev­er­al mat­ters, in­clud­ing Maduro’s cap­ture by US forces and lethal strikes on boats al­leged­ly car­ry­ing drugs.

For­mer prime min­is­ter ANR Robin­son played a piv­otal role in es­tab­lish­ing the ICC, which be­gan op­er­a­tions in 2002. The US has an­nounced plans to dis­man­tle the court, ac­cus­ing it of in­fring­ing on its sov­er­eign­ty.

“We can­not af­ford to let peo­ple from the out­side call the shots for us here in To­ba­go and in Trinidad,” Ever­s­ley said. “We have a Prime Min­is­ter who say­ing that when UNC wins, every­body wins, but she tak­ing ad­vice from some­body out­side of TT to dis­man­tle ANR Robin­son lega­cy.”

Ever­s­ley crit­i­cised Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine for his si­lence on the is­sue, adding that To­ba­go’s two MPs had al­so not ad­dressed it. He said To­ba­go was lack­ing lead­er­ship.

“We have peo­ple sit­ting in Par­lia­ment from To­ba­go West and East car­ry­ing out the wish­es of Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, and Far­ley is in­struct­ing them what to do, and Far­ley is tak­ing in­struc­tions from Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar.”

Ever­s­ley, who was in the pub­lic gallery in Par­lia­ment dur­ing the 1990 at­tempt­ed coup, said To­bag­o­ni­ans could not af­ford to re­main silent.

“Si­lence is giv­ing ap­proval to all the non­sense Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar is do­ing...

“Lis­ten to me, al­lyuh lis­ten to the charges? So is this one of the rea­sons Kam­la sup­port­ing (the US)? Does Kam­la have ques­tions to an­swer where the ICC is con­cerned?”

He ac­cused Per­sad-Bisses­sar of show­ing “fake love” for Robin­son, de­spite her po­lit­i­cal ca­reer be­gin­ning dur­ing Robin­son’s term as prime min­is­ter. Ever­s­ley said Trinidad and To­ba­go was cur­rent­ly with­out a for­eign pol­i­cy, claim­ing For­eign Min­is­ter Sean Sobers had been re­duced to a “yes man” by the prime min­is­ter.

He added that Au­gus­tine’s pic­ture at the ANR Robin­son In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port should be re­moved.

“If the Chief Sec­re­tary does not come out out­right and con­demn Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar that she can­not dis­man­tle ANR lega­cy, his pic­ture should be re­moved from the air­port. He would be a dis­grace and shame to To­bag­o­ni­ans.”

Ever­s­ley not­ed that sev­er­al Trinidad and To­ba­go cit­i­zens had fol­lowed Robin­son’s lega­cy at the ICC and con­tributed to up­hold­ing in­ter­na­tion­al law.

“A for­mer pres­i­dent (An­tho­ny Car­mona) sat at the ICC. Karl Hud­son-Phillips sat as a judge at the ICC. Jus­tice Gillian Lucky sat as a judge at the ICC. Are we gonna al­low some­one...to dis­man­tle ANR lega­cy?”

Ef­forts to con­tact Per­sad-Bisses­sar, Au­gus­tine, To­ba­go East MP David Thomas and To­ba­go West MP Joel Samp­son for com­ment were un­suc­cess­ful up to pub­li­ca­tion.