Suzanne Shep­pard

A for­mer Na­tion­al Ca­lyp­so Monarch, an award-win­ning writer and his­to­ri­an, a re­spect­ed aca­d­e­m­ic and for­mer politi­cian and a busi­ness pi­o­neer were among the in­flu­en­tial T&T cit­i­zens who passed away dur­ing 2023.

Here’s a look back at the peo­ple we lost this year.

Po­lit­i­cal tran­si­tions

Jen­nifer John­son, for­mer Min­is­ter of Youth, Sport, Cul­ture and the Cre­ative Arts, and one of the par­lia­men­tar­i­ans held hostage in the Ju­ly 27, 1990 coup at­tempt, died at her home af­ter a short ill­ness on Feb­ru­ary 1. She would have cel­e­brat­ed her 77th birth­day on Feb­ru­ary 17.

John­son was elect­ed MP for Princes Town un­der the Na­tion­al Al­liance for Re­con­struc­tion (NAR) in 1986 and served one term in the Arthur NR Robin­son ad­min­is­tra­tion. She al­so con­test­ed the San Fer­nan­do East con­stituen­cy in 1976, but lost to late prime min­is­ter Patrick Man­ning.

Jar­rette Nar­ine, for­mer Arou­ca North MP, died on Feb­ru­ary 27.

He was first elect­ed in 1995 and was re-elect­ed in 2000, 2001 and 2002. Nar­ine served in sev­er­al min­is­te­r­i­al ca­pac­i­ties, in­clud­ing Min­is­ter of Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment and Min­is­ter of Agri­cul­ture, Land and Ma­rine Re­sources in Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) ad­min­is­tra­tions.

He was award­ed the Cha­co­nia Medal Sil­ver for his con­tri­bu­tions to pub­lic ser­vice.

Dr Jef­fer­son David­son, who suc­ceed­ed ANR Robin­son as chair­man of the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly (THA), passed away on June 10 at his home in Mt Grace, To­ba­go. He was 95.

David­son served for four years from 1986 af­ter Robin­son left the THA to be­come Prime Min­is­ter of T&T. How­ev­er, he did not com­plete the term in of­fice and was re­placed by Lennox De­noon.

Bri­an Stone, a con­tro­ver­sial fig­ure who was a Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) ac­tivist, busi­ness de­vel­op­ment con­sul­tant and for­mer chair­man of Caribbean News Me­dia Group Ltd (now TTT), died on Ju­ly 8 while play­ing ta­ble ten­nis at the Queen’s Park Oval in Port-of-Spain.

Last year, Stone raised some eye­brows when he an­nounced plans to go to Ukraine to fight in the coun­try’s war against Rus­sia. How­ev­er, he nev­er made the trip.

In No­vem­ber 2021, Stone was one of 30 peo­ple ar­rest­ed by po­lice dur­ing an an­ti-vac­cine protest at the Queen’s Park Sa­van­nah. He was nev­er charged.

In May 2020, he was or­dered to pay Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley more than $350,000 in a defama­tion suit for a 2017 Face­book post.

Dr Brins­ley Sama­roo, not­ed his­to­ri­an, re­tired uni­ver­si­ty lec­tur­er and past gov­ern­ment min­is­ter, died on Ju­ly 9 af­ter a brief ill­ness. He was 84.

Sama­roo was a Unit­ed Labour Front (ULF) op­po­si­tion sen­a­tor from 1981-1986 and was elect­ed Nar­i­va MP in 1991. He served in the NAR gov­ern­ment from 1987-1991 as Min­is­ter in the Of­fice of the Prime Min­is­ter, Min­is­ter of De­cen­tral­i­sa­tion and Min­is­ter of Food Pro­duc­tion and Ma­rine Ex­ploita­tion.

How­ev­er, it was in acad­e­mia that he made his most en­dur­ing con­tri­bu­tions. As the for­mer head of the His­to­ry De­part­ment at the Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies (UWI), St Au­gus­tine, Pro­fes­sor Sama­roo pi­o­neered re­search on the his­to­ry of the In­di­an di­as­po­ra.

He wrote nu­mer­ous books and ar­ti­cles on a range of top­ics, in­clud­ing the Black Pow­er move­ment, the 1930s Labour up­ris­ings, with no­table pub­li­ca­tions such as The Art of Gar­net Ifill: Glimpses of the Sug­ar In­dus­try and The Price of Con­science: Howard Nankiv­ell and Labour Un­rest in the Caribbean in 1937 and 1938.

Mar­tin Ter­ry Ron­don, for­mer chair­man of the To­co/San­gre Grande Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion and long­stand­ing PNM lo­cal gov­ern­ment coun­cil­lor, died at his home on No­vem­ber 28. He had been ail­ing for some time.

Ron­don served in the re­gion­al cor­po­ra­tion for 29 years, in­clud­ing as rep­re­sen­ta­tive for Va­len­cia East/To­co. He had al­so served as chair­man for two terms.

Ron­don was award­ed the Hum­ming­bird Medal (Gold) in Sep­tem­ber 2022.

Mar­lene Mc­Don­ald, 64, whose tenures as a min­is­ter in the Dr Kei­th Row­ley-led Gov­ern­ment were cut short amid con­tro­ver­sies on three dif­fer­ent oc­ca­sions, died De­cem­ber 8 at the St Clair Med­ical Cen­tre, Port-of-Spain.

Mc­Don­ald be­gan her po­lit­i­cal ca­reer in 2007 un­der Patrick Man­ning but be­came a very strong and faith­ful sup­port­er of Dr Row­ley, who made her Op­po­si­tion Chief Whip dur­ing the 2010-2015 pe­ri­od.

In ad­di­tion to serv­ing as Port-of-Spain South MP, she al­so held var­i­ous min­is­te­r­i­al port­fo­lios in the Man­ning and Row­ley ad­min­is­tra­tions and was a PNM deputy po­lit­i­cal leader from 2010-2019.

Diptee Ram­nath, chair­man of the Pe­nal/Debe Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion and UNC lo­cal gov­ern­ment coun­cil­lor for Quinam/Morne Di­a­blo, died De­cem­ber 22 at the San Fer­nan­do Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal. He was 64 and had been ail­ing for some time.

In 2003, when the UNC re­ject­ed him as the can­di­date, Ram­nath left the par­ty and suc­cess­ful­ly won his seat for the PNM, be­com­ing the first coun­cil­lor from that par­ty to be part of the Pe­nal/ Debe Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion. In 2010, he again switched sides, re­turn­ing to the UNC.

Ho­choy Charles, To­ba­go’s first Chief Sec­re­tary, died at the Scar­bor­ough Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal on De­cem­ber 31 af­ter a lengthy ill­ness.

Charles, fond­ly known as “The Heavy Roller,” en­tered pol­i­tics in the ear­ly 1980s and quick­ly rose through the ranks, serv­ing as a Gov­ern­ment Sen­a­tor And Par­lia­men­tary Sec­re­tary dur­ing the 3rd Re­pub­li­can Par­lia­ment as a mem­ber of the Na­tion­al Al­liance for Re­con­struc­tion (NAR). In 1987, he made his­to­ry by be­com­ing To­ba­go’s first Chief Sec­re­tary, a po­si­tion he held for three con­sec­u­tive terms un­til 2001.

In his lat­er years, Charles found­ed The Plat­form of Truth (TPT), a po­lit­i­cal par­ty that un­suc­cess­ful­ly con­test­ed the THA elec­tions.

A staunch ad­vo­cate for To­ba­go au­ton­o­my, even af­ter step­ping away from ac­tive pol­i­tics, Charles re­mained out­spo­ken on is­sues re­lat­ed to the is­land and the op­er­a­tions of the THA.

A busi­ness loss

He­len Bhag­wans­ingh, a phil­an­thropist, Busi­ness Hall of Famer and ORTT re­cip­i­ent who was hailed as “Woman of the Mil­len­ni­um” by her peers, died at the age of 83 on Oc­to­ber 30.

In Au­gust 2011, Bhag­wans­ingh was one of four out­stand­ing cit­i­zens who re­ceived the Or­der of the Re­pub­lic of Trinidad and To­ba­go (ORTT. Al­so in 2011, The Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies con­ferred up­on her the ti­tle of Doc­tor of Law and a year ear­li­er, she was in­duct­ed in­to the Busi­ness Hall of Fame by the T&T Cham­ber of In­dus­try and Com­merce.

Bhag­wans­ingh was born in San Fer­nan­do in 1940 and at age 11, she left school to run her fam­i­ly’s bi­cy­cle re­pair shop. She mar­ried Hu­bert Bhag­wans­ingh in 1959.

In 1969, Bhag­wans­ingh pur­chased the Kay Don­na Dri­ve-In cin­e­ma in Val­sayn, which she ran suc­cess­ful­ly un­til sell­ing it in 1977. She and her hus­band lat­er bought a small branch of Ra­moutars­ingh’s Hard­ware in Sea Lots and trans­formed it in­to a boom­ing busi­ness, Bhag­wans­ingh’s Hard­ware. In 1996, Bhag­wans­ingh’s ac­quired Dansteel and in 1998 Cen­trin, turn­ing Bhag­wans­ingh’s in­to an em­pire that to­day em­ploys more than 1,200 peo­ple.

Cul­tur­al fra­ter­ni­ty mourns

Rawle “Axe­back” Ti­tus, 80, died on Jan­u­ary 2 at the Scar­bor­ough Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal.

He was a cul­tur­al per­former, ca­lyp­son­ian and ac­tivist who served in sev­er­al ca­pac­i­ties, in­clud­ing the teach­ing pro­fes­sion, Gov­ern­ment Sen­a­tor and Vice-Pres­i­dent of the Sen­ate.

Ti­tus served as vice chair­man of the To­ba­go Her­itage Fes­ti­val Com­mit­tee in 2001 and chair­man in 2002-2003.

He was chair­man of the To­ba­go Car­ni­val De­vel­op­ment Com­mit­tee 2002-2003, a six-time To­ba­go Ca­lyp­so Monarch and 19-time na­tion­al ca­lyp­so se­mi-fi­nal­ist. He was al­so vice chair­man of the To­ba­go Fes­ti­vals Com­mis­sion 2010-2012.

Anil Bheem, a pop­u­lar en­ter­tain­er and ra­dio per­son­al­i­ty, died on Feb­ru­ary 4, hours af­ter per­form­ing at pre-Car­ni­val events in La Ro­main and Ch­agua­nas.

Bheem, leader of BM­RZ Band, had been in­volved in the lo­cal In­do-mu­sic in­dus­try from child­hood, per­form­ing Bol­ly­wood and chut­ney songs lo­cal­ly and abroad in a ca­reer span­ning sev­er­al decades.

Patrick Arnold, who served as Pan Trin­ba­go pres­i­dent for 12 years from 1996 to 2009, died on May 10. He was 84.

Arnold, who was from Scar­bor­ough, To­ba­go, was the founder and man­ag­er of the con­ven­tion­al steel­band, Our Boys.

Denyse Plum­mer, a for­mer pop singer who switched to ca­lyp­so and lat­er gospel in a mu­si­cal ca­reer that spanned more than five decades, died on Au­gust 27 at age 69. She had been ail­ing for sev­er­al months af­ter be­ing di­ag­nosed with can­cer.

Plum­mer was best known for the hos­tile re­cep­tion she re­ceived from a jeer­ing, toi­let-pa­per-wield­ing Skin­ner Park crowd when she made her ca­lyp­so de­but there in 1986. Her break­through year was 1988, when a Len “Boogsie” Sharpe com­po­si­tion, Woman Is Boss, pro­pelled her in­to the Na­tion­al Ca­lyp­so Monarch fi­nals and her first Ca­lyp­so Queen crown.

Plum­mer won the Ca­lyp­so Queen ti­tle a to­tal of six times and placed sec­ond in that com­pe­ti­tion three times.

Her most suc­cess­ful year in ca­lyp­so was 2001, when she won the Na­tion­al Ca­lyp­so Monarch ti­tle with He­roes and Nah Leav­ing.

She made an­oth­er ca­reer-chang­ing move in 2015, be­com­ing a born-again Chris­t­ian and join­ing World Out­reach Min­istries Church in Pe­tit Val­ley.

Un­til ill health forced her to stop per­form­ing, Plum­mer had been ac­tive on the gospel cir­cuit and her re­leas­es in that genre in­clud­ed High­est Praise and Safe on The In­side, a col­lab­o­ra­tion with Michelle Sylvester, Christo­pher “Tam­bu” Her­bert and Lu­ta (Morel Pe­ters). In 2019, she remixed her 2001 ca­lyp­so hit Nah Leav­ing in­to a praise and wor­ship num­ber, Cyah Leave Him, reaf­firm­ing her com­mit­ment to the Gospel.

Ren­nie Ram­nar­ine, a mem­ber of the Dil-E-Nadan fam­i­ly and broth­er of singer Ray­mond Ram­nar­ine, died on Sep­tem­ber 4. He was 31

The fa­ther of three, the bass gui­tarist in the band, died af­ter a long bat­tle with re­nal fail­ure,

Ram­nar­ine be­gan his mu­si­cal jour­ney as a child when he joined his fa­ther’s band, then known as ACME Dil-E-Nadan. He start­ed off play­ing per­cus­sion in­stru­ments, then moved on to play­ing the gui­tar and even did some singing.

In the ear­ly 1990s, he and his broth­er Ray­mond reached the fi­nals of Mas­tana Ba­har. He did ex­ten­sive tours with Dil-E-Nadan, show­cas­ing his mu­si­cal prowess in Eu­rope, the Unit­ed States and Cana­da.

So­ca star Ri­car­do Drue died sud­den­ly on De­cem­ber 12 in An­tigua. He was pro­nounced dead at Sir Lester Bird Med­ical Cen­tre af­ter be­ing found un­re­spon­sive.

The 38-year-old An­tiguan, who was en­gaged to Tri­ni so­ca star Patrice Roberts, was known for hits such as Vagabond and Pro­fes­sion­al. He was al­so a front­line singer with the A Team band.

Drue, who spent his child­hood in Co­coyea, San Fer­nan­do, Trinidad, was due to mar­ry Roberts next year af­ter propos­ing to her on stage in An­tigua last Ju­ly. They have a five-year-old daugh­ter, Lily.

Boodram Ho­lass, known as the “Chatham Li­on,” died on De­cem­ber 15 at the San Fer­nan­do Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal (SFGH), where he was be­ing treat­ed for di­a­betes and oth­er com­pli­ca­tions. He was just a few days shy of his 70th birth­day.

Ho­lass, who was born and raised in Ce­dros, was one of the pi­o­neers of the lo­cal chut­ney mu­sic in­dus­try.

He record­ed his first chut­ney song at age 14 and in his ear­ly years, was called on to per­form in Suri­name, Guyana, Cana­da, USA, Flori­da, Mau­ri­tius and In­dia.

Ho­lass, who was flu­ent in Bho­jpuri, record­ed more than 250 songs.

Me­dia de­par­tures

Nali­nee See­lal, who made a name for her­self as a crime re­porter, died on Jan­u­ary 9 at her Cunu­pia home. She was 53 years old.

See­lal got her start in jour­nal­ism at the now-de­funct AVM Tele­vi­sion Chan­nel Four. She joined the News­day in 1994 and was the win­ner of the Jour­nal­ist of the Year in the Roy­al Bank Me­dia Awards in 1998.

Among her most fa­mous sto­ries was an in­ter­view with no­to­ri­ous drug baron Dole Chadee.

Sureash Cholai, a pho­tog­ra­ph­er, who had worked over the years at News­day, the Ex­press News­pa­per, the T&T Mir­ror and Sun­day Punch, died sud­den­ly on Jan­u­ary 29 at 58.

Orig­i­nal­ly from Cedar Hill, Princes Town, he joined the me­dia di­rect­ly from school at AS­JA Col­lege, San Fer­nan­do, as a pho­tog­ra­ph­er at the T&T Mir­ror and Sun­day Punch. He lat­er worked at the Ex­press, be­fore join­ing News­day.

Gren­fell Kissoon, for­mer Guardian Me­dia Lim­it­ed (GML) man­ag­ing di­rec­tor and chair­man, died peace­ful­ly at his Ch­agua­nas home on Au­gust 23, just one week be­fore his 80th birth­day.

Fond­ly re­mem­bered for his em­ploy­ee-cen­tred man­age­r­i­al style, Kissoon over­saw the merg­er of Trinidad Broad­cast­ing Com­pa­ny (TBC) and Trinidad Pub­lish­ing Com­pa­ny Ltd, the then par­ent com­pa­ny of the T&T Guardian, in the 1990s.

He was con­sid­ered a gi­ant in the lo­cal me­dia in­dus­try, hav­ing al­so served as TTT’s Gen­er­al Man­ag­er dur­ing the 1990 at­tempt­ed coup.

In 2005, he al­so spear­head­ed the cre­ation of CNC3.

Of his 35 years of man­age­ment ex­pe­ri­ence, 28 years were spent at ANSA McAL.

Kissoon first joined the group in 1993 as gen­er­al man­ag­er of TBC, which had been ex­pe­ri­enc­ing fi­nan­cial loss­es for two years pre­vi­ous­ly, and was able to turn around the for­tunes of the com­pa­ny and re­alise a prof­it in his first year at the helm.

In 1994, he was asked to over­see the op­er­a­tions of Trinidad Pub­lish­ing Lim­it­ed in ad­di­tion to his port­fo­lio as man­ag­ing di­rec­tor of TBC

He re­tired from GML in 2016, af­ter serv­ing in sev­er­al roles and ca­pac­i­ties.

Last year, he pub­lished a book, The Peo­ple Fac­tor in En­ter­prise Man­age­ment Prac­tices and Be­hav­iours for Cre­at­ing an In­spired and Mo­ti­vat­ed Work­force – Get­ting the Best from Peo­ple.

Basil Car­los Pires, bet­ter known as BC Pires, died af­ter a long bat­tle with can­cer of the oe­soph­a­gus on Oc­to­ber 22 at age 65

The pop­u­lar Guyana-born writer, and cul­tur­al com­men­ta­tor, grew up in T&T and be­came a lawyer af­ter grad­u­at­ing from the Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies’ Cave Hill cam­pus. How­ev­er, by 1988, he had piv­ot­ed to a life of jour­nal­ism, con­tribut­ing to the Ex­press and oth­er lo­cal pub­li­ca­tions, as well as the Lon­don Sun­day Ob­serv­er and the Lon­don & Man­ches­ter Guardian.

He was best known for his flag­ship col­umn, ‘Thank God It’s Fri­day’.

Oth­er no­table deaths

Bernard Beck­les, well-known florist and own­er of the La Trop­i­cale Flower Shop in St James, died on May 3 of a brain aneurysm. He had been in flo­ral de­sign for over 30 years.

At the time of his death, Beck­les was prepar­ing for the 2023 stag­ing of the Roy­al Hor­ti­cul­tur­al So­ci­ety Chelsea Flower Show in Lon­don.

He helped T&T gain glob­al recog­ni­tion at the 2019 Chelsea Flower Show, where the dis­play, Rhythms of Our Peo­ple, re­ceived a gold medal.

In 2013, at his very first show, Beck­les and the team re­ceived a gold medal for a dis­play based on the work of artist Michel Jean Caz­abon, Through the Eyes of Caz­abon.

Gérard An­tho­ny Besson, a his­to­ri­an and pub­lish­er, died on Ju­ly 25 at age 81 af­ter a pro­longed ill­ness.

He was the founder of Paria Pub­lish­ing Com­pa­ny Lim­it­ed in 1981 and Cre­ative Ad­ver­tis­ing in 1972, where he served as an ad­ver­tis­ing ex­ec­u­tive.

The au­thor of Folk­lore & Leg­ends of Trinidad and To­ba­go, Beck­les was known for his quirky knack for words and pas­sion for com­mer­cial art.

In the ear­ly 1980s, Besson was part of a cir­cle of writ­ers and his­to­ri­ans around Ol­ga Mavro­gorda­to, in­clud­ing An­tho­ny de Ver­teuil and Michael An­tho­ny, ded­i­cat­ed to pub­lish­ing works about the his­to­ry and cul­tur­al tra­di­tions of T&T.

Paria Pub­lish­ing was ini­tial­ly fo­cussed on re­pub­lish­ing out-of-print works on the his­to­ry of T&T but over 35 years, Besson al­so pro­duced and pub­lished more than 130 books, many of which were non-fic­tion books by Trinida­di­an his­to­ri­ans.

He was the re­cip­i­ent of a Hum­ming­bird Medal Gold in 2007 and an Hon­orary Doc­tor­ate from the Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies in 2015.

Li­nus Phillip, 62, pres­i­dent of the Route 2 Maxi Taxi As­so­ci­a­tion, died on Au­gust 17. He col­lapsed at City Gate and was tak­en to the Port-of-Spain Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal where he died.

Phillip had been the pres­i­dent of the as­so­ci­a­tion for over 20 years.

Michael An­tho­ny, renowned au­thor and his­to­ri­an, died at the age of 91 on Au­gust 23.

Born in Ma­yaro, An­tho­ny left Trinidad in the mid-1950s to live in Eng­land, where he worked at the Reuters News Agency and be­gan his ca­reer as a writer.

His first nov­el was The Games Were Com­ing (1963). This was fol­lowed by The Year in San Fer­nan­do (1965) and Green Days by the Riv­er (1967).

Be­fore re­turn­ing to Trinidad in 1970, An­tho­ny spent two years in Brazil, where he set his fifth nov­el, King of the Mas­quer­ade (1974). His lat­er nov­els in­clud­ed Streets of Con­flict (1976), All That Glit­ters (1981), In the Heat of the Day (1996), High Tide of In­trigue (2001), and The Sound of March­ing Feet (2020).

Among his col­lec­tions of short fic­tion are Michael An­tho­ny’s Tales for Young and Old (1967), Crick­et in the Road (1973), San­dra Street and Oth­er Sto­ries (1973), Folk Tales and Fan­tasies (1976), and The Chief­tain’s Car­ni­val and Oth­er Sto­ries (1993). He al­so wrote sev­er­al his­to­ries and trav­el books on Trinidad. Among these is the His­tor­i­cal Dic­tio­nary of Trinidad & To­ba­go (1997).

Gladys Mi­ra­hai Gafoor died on Au­gust 25. She was 90.

Gafoor was among the first fe­males ap­point­ed mag­is­trate and se­nior mag­is­trate, serv­ing from 1966 to 1983. She al­so served as Deputy So­lic­i­tor-Gen­er­al at the Of­fice of the At­tor­ney Gen­er­al be­tween 1983 to 1987 and was ap­point­ed Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions in the Of­fice of the At­tor­ney Gen­er­al from 1987 to 1989.

She chaired the Com­mis­sion of En­quiry in­to the Pub­lic Health Sec­tor be­tween 2005 and 2007 and was award­ed the Pub­lic Ser­vice Medal of Mer­it (Gold) in 2011.

Gafoor al­so served as chair­man of the Es­sen­tial Ser­vices Di­vi­sion of the In­dus­tri­al Court, then Vice-Pres­i­dent and Act­ing Pres­i­dent of the In­dus­tri­al Court.

Some of her oth­er port­fo­lios in­clud­ed be­ing among the first fe­males ap­point­ed Course Di­rec­tor of Crim­i­nal Prac­tice and Pro­ce­dure and Fam­i­ly Law at the Hugh Wood­ing Law School, mem­ber of the Me­di­a­tion Board of T&T and the first fe­male Di­rec­tor of Le­gal Ser­vices of the Le­gal Aid Au­thor­i­ty.