2025 Year in Review

RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­[email protected]

May 1 is tra­di­tion­al­ly marked by the raised voic­es of the trade union move­ment—plac­ards held high, griev­ances aired, and de­mands for bet­ter wages and work­ing con­di­tions echo­ing through the streets in the an­nu­al May Day march.

This year, how­ev­er, the fa­mil­iar bel­low of dis­con­tent was re­placed by ap­plause, as Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar was sworn in for a sec­ond term as Prime Min­is­ter, once again buoyed by the sup­port of or­gan­ised labour.

For some cit­i­zens, the mo­ment felt like a breath of fresh po­lit­i­cal air, af­ter what they de­scribed as years of eco­nom­ic hard­ship, so­cial strain and cal­lous gov­er­nance un­der the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) ad­min­is­tra­tion led by Dr Kei­th Row­ley.

The cer­e­mo­ny car­ried with it the weight of ex­pec­ta­tion. An­a­lysts said T&T was not mere­ly wit­ness­ing a change in gov­ern­ment; it was in­vest­ing its hope in re­new­al. Yet, as the month un­fold­ed, it be­came clear that May would be­gin with pageantry and end with con­se­quences—some do­mes­tic, oth­ers re­gion­al—that would re­ver­ber­ate for months.

The first week of May was de­fined by the rit­u­als of the State. Oaths were sworn, min­is­te­r­i­al port­fo­lios as­signed, and Par­lia­ment con­vened. These for­mal­i­ties un­fold­ed against a back­drop of an­tic­i­pa­tion that out­weighed cel­e­bra­tion. The coun­try, still reel­ing from years of eco­nom­ic con­trac­tion and so­cial un­ease, watched close­ly for signs of di­rec­tion and re­solve.

The Cab­i­net was sworn in with­in days, and the mo­ment was his­toric in more ways than one. Dr Row­ley re­signed as po­lit­i­cal leader of the PNM, clear­ing the way for Pen­ne­lope Beck­les to be­come Op­po­si­tion Leader. The re­sult was un­prece­dent­ed. For the first time in Trinidad and To­ba­go’s his­to­ry, three women from south Trinidad si­mul­ta­ne­ous­ly oc­cu­pied the coun­try’s high­est con­sti­tu­tion­al of­fices—Pres­i­dent (Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo), Prime Min­is­ter, and Op­po­si­tion Leader.

On May 3, mo­ments af­ter her Cab­i­net took the oath of of­fice, Prime Min­is­ter Per­sad-Bisses­sar de­liv­ered her first ad­dress to the na­tion. It was not a vic­to­ry speech, but a call for in­clu­sion and ur­gency. She sig­nalled that the task ahead was not about tri­umph but trans­for­ma­tion.

“The first or­der of busi­ness is to get to work,” she de­clared. Af­ter years of eco­nom­ic strain and deep­en­ing so­cial frac­tures, she said, the coun­try de­mand­ed ac­tion. “What peo­ple want is de­liv­ery.”

Even as the new UNC ad­min­is­tra­tion set­tled in­to White­hall, mat­ters of re­gion­al se­cu­ri­ty were al­ready un­fold­ing. T&T con­tin­ued to re­ceive as­sis­tance from the Unit­ed States un­der a treaty signed by the pre­vi­ous ad­min­is­tra­tion. US Marines were on the ground dur­ing May as part of Ex­er­cise Tradewinds 2025, a multi­na­tion­al mil­i­tary ex­er­cise co-host­ed by the Trinidad and To­ba­go De­fence Force and US South­ern Com­mand.

The ex­er­cise, which ran from April 26 to May 8, in­volved more than 750 mil­i­tary and se­cu­ri­ty per­son­nel from 26 coun­tries. While framed as a train­ing and co­op­er­a­tion ef­fort, its pres­ence took on added sig­nif­i­cance with the emer­gence of ris­ing re­gion­al ten­sions and in­sta­bil­i­ty that would char­ac­terise the rest of the year.

If the swear­ing-in cer­e­monies of­fered op­ti­mism, the fi­nan­cial dis­clo­sures that fol­lowed were sober­ing. By mid-May, the scale of the coun­try’s fis­cal chal­lenges came in­to sharp fo­cus. The Gov­ern­ment faced a sig­nif­i­cant deficit, es­ti­mat­ed at $4.42 bil­lion for May alone, forc­ing the State to ful­ly utilise its over­draft fa­cil­i­ty at the Cen­tral Bank.

By May 11, At­tor­ney Gen­er­al John Je­re­mie re­vealed that his min­istry was ef­fec­tive­ly with­out funds, bur­dened by tens of mil­lions of dol­lars’ worth of un­paid le­gal fees in­her­it­ed from the pre­vi­ous ad­min­is­tra­tion. Short­ly af­ter, Prime Min­is­ter Per­sad-Bisses­sar dis­closed an even grim­mer pic­ture: a mul­ti-bil­lion-dol­lar fis­cal short­fall and a pat­tern in which state en­ter­pris­es had re­peat­ed­ly failed to sub­mit au­dit­ed ac­counts.

Her re­sponse was firm and pub­lic. State en­ter­pris­es were warned that the era of lax over­sight had end­ed. Au­dits, she said, would no longer be op­tion­al, and ac­count­abil­i­ty would be en­forced. The mes­sage res­onat­ed with a pop­u­la­tion weary of hear­ing about waste, in­ef­fi­cien­cy and mis­man­age­ment with­out con­se­quences.

Yet, even as gov­ern­ment of­fi­cials spoke open­ly of emp­ty cof­fers, the ad­min­is­tra­tion moved swift­ly on an is­sue that has long car­ried emo­tion­al weight. On May 10, Per­sad-Bisses­sar an­nounced her first pol­i­cy ini­tia­tive: the ex­pan­sion of the Chil­dren’s Life Fund, a pro­gramme that helps crit­i­cal­ly ill chil­dren ac­cess med­ical treat­ment abroad when such care is un­avail­able lo­cal­ly.

On May 18, Dr Rad­i­ca Ma­hase, founder of Sup­port Autism TT, wel­comed the an­nounce­ment, not­ing that too many par­ents had spent years fundrais­ing in des­per­a­tion, on­ly to lose their chil­dren as time ran out. The de­ci­sion struck a chord with the pub­lic, of­fer­ing a re­minder that gov­er­nance was not on­ly about bal­anc­ing books but about pre­serv­ing lives.

As the month pro­gressed, the Gov­ern­ment be­gan mak­ing dif­fi­cult de­ci­sions aimed at cut­ting costs and re­struc­tur­ing state in­sti­tu­tions. In ear­ly May, sev­er­al mem­bers of the Wa­ter and Sew­er­age Au­thor­i­ty’s (WASA) board of com­mis­sion­ers re­signed, and by mid-May the ad­min­is­tra­tion for­mal­ly scrapped the pre­vi­ous gov­ern­ment’s con­tro­ver­sial trans­for­ma­tion plan for WASA.

Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter Bar­ry Padarath said the sav­ings would run in­to the tens of mil­lions of dol­lars. Re­ac­tion was mixed. Some wel­comed the move as long over­due, while oth­ers—par­tic­u­lar­ly work­ers—ex­pressed anx­i­ety about job se­cu­ri­ty. For­mer pub­lic util­i­ties min­is­ter Mar­vin Gon­za­les con­demned the de­ci­sion.

Be­yond pol­i­tics and pol­i­cy, May al­so marked the end of the dry sea­son. Heavy rains ar­rived ear­li­er than ex­pect­ed, trig­ger­ing fears of flood­ing in low-ly­ing ar­eas such as Wood­land and re­viv­ing con­cerns about a po­ten­tial­ly se­vere dengue sea­son.

Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Min­is­ter Khadi­jah Ameen launched an ag­gres­sive riv­er-clear­ing pro­gramme which spared sev­er­al com­mu­ni­ties in the South Oropouche Drainage Basin from se­ri­ous flood­ing. Still, the threat of dengue loomed. Health Min­is­ter Dr Lack­ram Bo­doe urged cit­i­zens to clear pri­vate drains, re­move stand­ing wa­ter and seek med­ical at­ten­tion at the first sign of symp­toms. The warn­ings car­ried weight. The pre­vi­ous year’s dengue out­break had claimed sev­er­al lives and strained an al­ready bur­dened health sys­tem.

As flood­wa­ters rose in some dis­tricts, re­ports of fire emerged in oth­ers. In Hill­side Gar­dens, Buen In­ten­to, a fire­fight­er’s home was de­stroyed in a blaze that ex­posed long-stand­ing gaps in emer­gency re­sponse. The now-de­funct Princes Town Fire Sta­tion was just min­utes away, but it was un­avail­able when the blaze broke out.

The sta­tion had been closed in Ju­ly 2024 af­ter fire­fight­ers walked off the job over de­te­ri­o­rat­ing con­di­tions and rat in­fes­ta­tions. Since then, Princes Town had re­lied on sta­tions in Rio Claro and Pe­nal. Res­i­dents spoke open­ly of loss that might have been pre­vent­ed, and Princes Town MP Dr Aiy­na Ali vowed to push for im­prove­ments.

Amid mount­ing pres­sures, the na­tion­al mood dark­ened fur­ther as crime con­tin­ued un­abat­ed. May end­ed with 23 re­port­ed mur­ders, along­side re­ports of home in­va­sions, armed rob­beries and shoot­ings.

Among those who died were Da­cian John, a mem­ber of the Trinidad and To­ba­go De­fence Force who was shot and killed in his ve­hi­cle in Point Fortin on May 2; Emilio Di­az O’Con­nor Es­pinoza, a Laven­tille res­i­dent who died in a fiery sin­gle-ve­hi­cle ac­ci­dent in Point Fortin on May 12; and Zachari­ah Gil, a 25-year-old po­lice of­fi­cer at­tached to the Port-of-Spain Guard Unit who was killed in a road traf­fic ac­ci­dent on the Solomon Ho­choy High­way on May 19. Al­so found dead was Kr­ish Pil­lay, who was re­port­ed­ly mur­dered on May 21.

The killings reignit­ed na­tion­al de­bate about crime pol­i­cy. When talk emerged of pos­si­ble “stand-your-ground” leg­is­la­tion—sim­i­lar to laws in parts of the Unit­ed States—some cit­i­zens ex­pressed sup­port. Le­gal ex­perts, how­ev­er, urged cau­tion. For­mer at­tor­ney gen­er­al Ramesh Lawrence Ma­haraj warned that in a coun­try al­ready tense and heav­i­ly armed, such mea­sures could fur­ther in­flame vi­o­lence rather than de­ter it.

Amid po­lit­i­cal tur­bu­lence and so­cial anx­i­ety, T&T al­so mourned a cul­tur­al gi­ant. Wendy Kalicha­ran, Car­ni­val icon and co-founder of Kalicha­ran Mas, passed away peace­ful­ly at her San Fer­nan­do home on May 8 at the age of 76. Trib­utes poured in from band­lead­ers, de­sign­ers and rev­ellers who cred­it­ed her with shap­ing gen­er­a­tions of mas­quer­ade.

Her pass­ing was a poignant re­minder that while pol­i­tics dom­i­nates head­lines, cul­ture re­mains the coun­try’s emo­tion­al an­chor—and its loss­es are deeply felt.

By the fi­nal days of May, it was clear that if the new Gov­ern­ment had en­joyed any hon­ey­moon pe­ri­od, it had been fleet­ing. The ad­min­is­tra­tion in­her­it­ed de­plet­ed fi­nances, in­sti­tu­tion­al weak­ness­es and a pub­lic de­mand­ing trans­paren­cy, safe­ty and de­liv­ery.

As the month closed, cit­i­zens re­mained hope­ful yet im­pa­tient; scep­ti­cal yet in­vest­ed. The ap­plause of May 1 had giv­en way to scruti­ny. And as re­gion­al and na­tion­al ten­sions be­gan to sur­face, T&T stood at a cross­roads—aware that the months ahead would test not on­ly its lead­ers but al­so its uni­ty and re­silience as a na­tion.