Sto­ries by KAY-MARIE FLETCH­ER

Se­nior Re­porter

kay-marie.fletch­er@guardian.co.tt

Re­tired po­lice of­fi­cer Arthur Bar­ring­ton has been ap­point­ed the new head of the Strate­gic Ser­vices Agency (SSA).

The ap­point­ment, an­nounced yes­ter­day by Prime Min­is­ter Stu­art Young, is ef­fec­tive April 1. At the post-Cab­i­net meet­ing at White­hall, Young called Bar­ring­ton “a very ap­pro­pri­ate di­rec­tor.”

“This im­me­di­ate­ly would pro­vide a lev­el of sta­bil­i­ty that is need­ed go­ing for­ward af­ter what has tak­en place at the SSA. Mr Bar­ring­ton has a wealth of ex­pe­ri­ence, not on­ly on the polic­ing side, but as a for­mer head of Spe­cial Branch and In­tel­li­gence, un­der­stands op­er­a­tions, etc, so I be­lieve, and the Cab­i­net be­lieves, he will be a very ap­pro­pri­ate di­rec­tor.”

Bar­ring­ton is a for­mer act­ing As­sis­tant Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice. He re­tired from the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) as a Se­nior Su­per­in­ten­dent.

He will take over from SSA’s in­ter­im di­rec­tor Am­bas­sador An­tho­ny Phillip-Spencer who has been lead­ing the spe­cial agency since March 2024.

Phillip-Spencer was called up­on at short no­tice to lead the SSA af­ter for­mer prime min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley re­moved then-SSA head Roger Best from the agency. Best was even­tu­al­ly fired and oth­er em­ploy­ees, in­clud­ing Pas­tor Ian Brown—who told the po­lice he was a spy—were charged with mis­be­hav­iour in pub­lic of­fice.

More than 100 SSA em­ploy­ees al­so lost their jobs and were asked to reap­ply for their po­si­tions.

Bar­ring­ton de­clined to com­ment on his ap­point­ment yes­ter­day and ef­forts to con­tact Best and Brown were fu­tile.

How­ev­er, a for­mer act­ing po­lice com­mis­sion­er and a re­gion­al se­cu­ri­ty ex­pert wel­comed Bar­ring­ton’s ap­point­ment.

For­mer act­ing po­lice com­mis­sion­er Stephen Williams said he was hap­py for Bar­ring­ton and re­gion­al se­cu­ri­ty ex­pert Garvin Heer­ah said he had worked with Bar­ring­ton in the past and can at­test to his strong in­ves­tiga­tive acu­men, strate­gic think­ing, and the deep re­spect with which he is re­gard­ed with­in the law en­force­ment and in­tel­li­gence com­mu­ni­ty.

“The ap­point­ment of re­tired Se­nior Su­per­in­ten­dent Arthur Bar­ring­ton as the new head of the SSA comes at a piv­otal mo­ment for na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty in Trinidad and To­ba­go. With an ex­ten­sive back­ground in op­er­a­tional lead­er­ship, in­tel­li­gence, and com­bat­ing transna­tion­al or­gan­ised crime, Mr Bar­ring­ton brings a wealth of ex­pe­ri­ence that will be in­stru­men­tal in re­build­ing and restor­ing the agency’s in­tegri­ty, ef­fec­tive­ness, and brand,” Heer­ah said.

He added, “His lead­er­ship will be cru­cial in nav­i­gat­ing the evolv­ing se­cu­ri­ty land­scape, par­tic­u­lar­ly in strength­en­ing in­tel­li­gence-dri­ven polic­ing, counter-nar­cotics ef­forts, and transna­tion­al crime in­ter­dic­tion.

“To en­sure suc­cess, Mr Bar­ring­ton must as­sem­ble a com­pe­tent and trust­ed team, fo­cused on mod­ernising in­tel­li­gence op­er­a­tions, en­hanc­ing in­ter-agency col­lab­o­ra­tion, and restor­ing pub­lic and in­sti­tu­tion­al con­fi­dence in the SSA. Giv­en his fa­mil­iar­i­ty with the in­dus­try, he is well-po­si­tioned to im­ple­ment strate­gic re­forms, dri­ve ac­count­abil­i­ty, and re­in­force the SSA’s role as a pre­mier in­tel­li­gence agency. I ex­tend my full sup­port and best wish­es to Mr Bar­ring­ton as he em­barks on this crit­i­cal mis­sion. His ap­point­ment sig­nals an op­por­tu­ni­ty for re­newed fo­cus, strong lead­er­ship, and an in­tel­li­gence-dri­ven ap­proach to na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty. The chal­lenges are sig­nif­i­cant, but with the right team and strat­e­gy, the SSA can be trans­formed in­to a more ef­fec­tive and re­silient agency in the fight against or­gan­ised crime and se­cu­ri­ty threats.”

How­ev­er, for­mer po­lice com­mis­sion­er Gary Grif­fith called the ap­point­ment “a re­ward” for Bar­ring­ton’s role in top­pling the Bliss Seep­er­sad-led Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion fol­low­ing his re­port in­to the is­suance of firearm users’ li­cens­es. He said it is worse than the ap­point­ment of Resh­mi Ram­nar­ine, a ju­nior tech­ni­cian who was ap­point­ed head of the Se­cu­ri­ty In­tel­li­gence Agency in 2011.

“More dam­aged is the fact that his last ma­jor is­sue was he wrote a re­port on his own, much to the dis­gust of the Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion, where he put a re­port, sub­mit­ted it, the prime min­is­ter re­ceived it, and the prime min­is­ter prob­a­bly right­ly so, said, “look, I’ve got this, let me give it to Bliss Seep­er­sad”. That trig­gered an ef­fect that caused a mer­it list to be with­drawn, a po­lice com­mis­sion­er not to have his con­tract re­newed, em­bar­rassed the po­lice ser­vice, and caused the whole po­lice ser­vice com­mis­sion to re­sign in dis­gust.”