From Black Power to Facebook: The changing face of protests in T&T

Eliz­a­beth Gon­za­les

Se­nior Re­porter

eliz­a­beth.gon­za­[email protected]

In the dig­i­tal space, an in­di­vid­ual with a large fol­low­ing can in­cite thought, anger, res­o­nance or in­spire.

So­cial me­dia has trans­formed how peo­ple en­gage with pub­lic is­sues.

In 1970, tens of thou­sands of peo­ple filled the streets dur­ing the Black Pow­er Rev­o­lu­tion.

In 2005, an es­ti­mat­ed 12,000 to 15,000 peo­ple marched through Port-of-Spain de­mand­ing ac­tion on crime.

To­day, protests con­tin­ue across Trinidad and To­ba­go. Nurs­es have marched. Trade unions have demon­strat­ed. Over the years, cit­i­zens have protest­ed over po­lice shoot­ings.

But protests have ebbed.

Cit­i­zens can now ex­press sup­port, crit­i­cism and out­rage on­line with­out leav­ing home.

One of the most vis­i­ble ex­am­ples has been the re­sponse to the case in­volv­ing Joshua Sama­roo and Ka­ia Sealy, which start­ed with calls for jus­tice on so­cial me­dia.

Joshua Sama­roo was killed in a po­lice-in­volved shoot­ing on Jan­u­ary 20 in St Au­gus­tine. Ka­ia Sealy, his part­ner, was al­so shot in the same in­ci­dent.

Sealy’s friend, Alyssa Phillip, be­came one of the most vis­i­ble or­gan­is­ers of sev­er­al in­tense protests that fol­lowed over the past month.

Start­ing on so­cial me­dia, Phillip helped mo­bilise demon­stra­tions linked to the case, in­clud­ing a se­ries of ac­tions re­ferred to by sup­port­ers as “19 protests for 19 bul­lets,” call­ing for ac­count­abil­i­ty and trans­paren­cy. Phillip, her moth­er and an­oth­er pro­test­er were ar­rest­ed dur­ing one of the demon­stra­tions in Port-of-Spain and re­leased on bail.

His­to­ri­an, for­mer sol­dier and trade union­ist Raf­fique Shah ques­tioned whether that shift has re­duced the in­cen­tive for phys­i­cal par­tic­i­pa­tion.

“Peo­ple will won­der why do they have to go and sub­ject them­selves to all the el­e­ments, the weath­er, traf­fic, day work and things like that, when they could stay from their homes.”

For­mer politi­cian Stephen Cadiz al­so drew a dis­tinc­tion be­tween on­line ac­tivism and pub­lic demon­stra­tions.

“Go on the ground, go on a street cor­ner, and do the same thing.”

The com­ments come as sev­er­al re­cent protests have gen­er­at­ed sig­nif­i­cant pub­lic dis­cus­sion but rel­a­tive­ly mod­est phys­i­cal turnout.

Cadiz be­lieves an­oth­er fac­tor may be in­flu­enc­ing par­tic­i­pa­tion.

He said some cit­i­zens may hes­i­tate to at­tend demon­stra­tions if they fear con­se­quences.

“An or­di­nary per­son would say, ‘Let me just back off from that,’ be­cause next thing you know, I’m go­ing to find my­self in jail.”

Still, nei­ther man be­lieves protest is dis­ap­pear­ing.

“Once you have hu­man be­ings, you’re go­ing to have protests,” Cadiz said.

And for Shah, the les­son of 1970 is not sim­ply that protests can work. It is that suc­cess­ful move­ments are built on cred­i­bil­i­ty and pub­lic trust, and that is why some pick­et ac­tions flop.

“The im­por­tant thing is that to re­main valid, and to re­main alive and kick­ing, they must be true, based on the truth.”

What hap­pened to the mass mo­bil­i­sa­tion that once brought thou­sands of peo­ple on­to the streets?

Shah does not be­lieve the protests tak­ing place to­day can be com­pared to the move­ment that emerged in 1970.

“No, not yet,” Shah said when asked whether he saw par­al­lels be­tween the Black Pow­er Move­ment and more re­cent protests.

The Black Pow­er Rev­o­lu­tion re­mains one of the most sig­nif­i­cant protest move­ments in the coun­try’s his­to­ry. The move­ment emerged amid calls for greater eco­nom­ic op­por­tu­ni­ty, racial em­pow­er­ment and po­lit­i­cal change. Demon­stra­tions at­tract­ed thou­sands of peo­ple and be­came a defin­ing mo­ment in post-In­de­pen­dence Trinidad and To­ba­go.

Shah be­lieves the move­ment suc­ceed­ed be­cause it was dri­ven by some­thing larg­er than the demon­stra­tions them­selves.

“The idea would have been the main dri­ver, I think, but the protest was im­por­tant.”

Ac­cord­ing to Shah, protest has his­tor­i­cal­ly been one of the most im­por­tant tools avail­able to or­di­nary cit­i­zens.

“I think that protest has al­ways been, through­out his­to­ry, it has been a tool that the poor­er class­es could use.”

He said demon­stra­tions gave peo­ple the op­por­tu­ni­ty to voice con­cerns, chal­lenge au­thor­i­ty and push for change.

“It has worked in many in­stances.”

But Shah said large-scale mo­bil­i­sa­tion de­pends on sev­er­al fac­tors.

“A lot has to do with what the is­sue is, and what the peo­ple who are lead­ing it, their ca­pa­bil­i­ties as lead­ers, and how they ma­noeu­vre them­selves and pro­mote the is­sues.”

Those same themes emerged in the ex­pe­ri­ence of Cadiz.

Cadiz be­came a lead­ing pub­lic voice against crime af­ter the mur­der of his em­ploy­ee and friend, Kei­th Noel, in 2005.

The killing led to the for­ma­tion of the Kei­th Noel 136 Com­mit­tee, which or­gan­ised a na­tion­al pe­ti­tion cam­paign and lat­er the Death March through Port-of-Spain.

Cadiz said the com­mit­tee col­lect­ed more than 127,000 sig­na­tures. The march it­self drew be­tween 12,000 and 15,000 par­tic­i­pants.

“We got up­wards of 12,000 peo­ple on the streets of Port-of-Spain. And that was un­heard of.”

At the time, vi­o­lent crime had be­come a ma­jor na­tion­al con­cern.

Cadiz said peo­ple joined be­cause they be­lieved they could make a dif­fer­ence.

“Peo­ple bought in­to the whole idea that you don’t have to sit and com­plain and stay home and com­plain.”

For him, pub­lic par­tic­i­pa­tion re­mains one of the clear­est ways cit­i­zens can send a mes­sage to those in pow­er.

“One thing that scares any ad­min­is­tra­tion, boots on the ground.”

“When a politi­cian sees boots on the ground and sees peo­ple ac­tu­al­ly tak­ing a stand, it sends a very, very clear mes­sage.”

“Did it (crime) stop? The an­swer to that is no.”

But he be­lieves the mes­sage was sent.