If Au­gust 31 is the day that marks the birth of our ful­ly in­de­pen­dent na­tion, then Re­pub­lic Day, which is be­ing cel­e­brat­ed to­day, marks our com­ing of age.

To­day’s com­mem­o­ra­tions, tak­ing place with­out pomp or cer­e­mo­ny be­cause of the COVID-19 re­stric­tions that are still in place, come ex­act­ly 45 years af­ter T&T took the ma­jor step of abol­ish­ing the monar­chy to be­come a re­pub­lic with­in the Com­mon­wealth.

Al­though the new Re­pub­li­can Con­sti­tu­tion was pro­mul­gat­ed on Au­gust 1, 1976, the cel­e­bra­tions take place on Sep­tem­ber 24 be­cause that was the date on which the first Par­lia­ment met un­der the new Re­pub­li­can Con­sti­tu­tion.

For cit­i­zens of this coun­try, hav­ing two na­tion­al events of such sig­nif­i­cance in less than a month pro­vides op­por­tu­ni­ties for pa­tri­ot­ic com­mem­o­ra­tions and re­flec­tion on our evo­lu­tion as a na­tion.

Sep­tem­ber is now des­ig­nat­ed as Pa­tri­o­tism Month, a pe­ri­od when build­ings and ma­jor land­marks across the coun­try are draped in the na­tion­al colours and ac­tiv­i­ties are held that put the spot­light on T&T’s his­to­ry, he­roes and na­tion­al achieve­ments.

Un­for­tu­nate­ly, the sig­nif­i­cance of our re­pub­li­can sta­tus and the re­spon­si­bil­i­ties vest­ed in all of us as cit­i­zens are of­ten over­looked.

The word re­pub­lic comes from the Latin word rēs pūbli­ca, which means “pub­lic thing,” char­ac­ter­is­ing that this is a state that is run by its peo­ple. We are in con­trol of our des­tiny, no longer un­der the rule of a Eu­ro­pean monarch but with an in­dige­nous head of state and lead­ers in the Sen­ate and House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives that we elect.

How­ev­er, the ex­tent to which we have ful­ly em­braced this re­al­i­ty and our state of ma­tu­ri­ty can still be ques­tioned.

This coun­try has changed since 1976, but whether T&T is now in the place where it should be, de­vel­op­men­tal­ly and oth­er­wise, is a mat­ter for de­bate.

In 1976, his­tor­i­cal­ly the year of this na­tion’s com­ing of age, the count­down to Re­pub­lic Day was just one of the ma­jor events tak­ing place.

In Ju­ly, at the Sum­mer Olympics in Mon­tre­al, Cana­da, Hase­ly Craw­ford brought pride and joy to the coun­try by win­ning T&T’s first-ever gold medal at those in­ter­na­tion­al games. It was al­so an elec­tion year with at least ten op­po­si­tion par­ties lined up against the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) for the Sep­tem­ber 13 polls.

The PNM, then led by its founder Dr Er­ic Williams, won 24 of the 36 seats con­test­ed with the Unit­ed Labour Front (ULF), the fore­run­ner to the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) and led by Bas­deo Pan­day, form­ing the op­po­si­tion af­ter win­ning ten seats.

This was a na­tion just six years past the Black Pow­er up­ris­ings of the 1970s, just 14 years old as an in­de­pen­dent na­tion but en­joy­ing eco­nom­ic pros­per­i­ty as an oil-rich na­tion.

For bet­ter or worse, these and oth­er events have de­fined the na­tion that we are to­day, a coun­try no longer flush with petrodol­lars, with no vic­to­ries to cel­e­brate from the re­cent Olympic Games and strug­gling with the ef­fects of the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic.

In this 45th year as a re­pub­lic, with events with­in and with­out that test the very fab­ric of our ex­is­tence, the chal­lenge is for T&T to live up to the state of ma­tu­ri­ty that we should have achieved by now.

Is T&T liv­ing up to its full po­ten­tial? An is­sue to pon­der deeply on this Re­pub­lic Day.