PM, Defence Ministry say Independence Day parade still on

A Cab­i­net note which cir­cu­lat­ed on Mon­day night sparked spec­u­la­tion that this year’s In­de­pen­dence Day mil­i­tary pa­rade had been can­celled, but Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar and the Min­istry of De­fence have both con­firmed the event will pro­ceed.

The note, dat­ed June 11 and ti­tled Pro­pos­al for Host­ing of the Cer­e­mo­ni­al Mil­i­tary Pa­rade and Route March to Com­mem­o­rate the 64th An­niver­sary of the In­de­pen­dence of Trinidad and To­ba­go, stat­ed that Cab­i­net had grant­ed De­fence Min­is­ter Wayne Sturge leave to with­draw the note. It was signed by Cab­i­net Sec­re­tary C Hem­lee.

The ref­er­ence to the note be­ing “with­drawn” led some to con­clude the pa­rade had been scrapped, par­tic­u­lar­ly giv­en sim­i­lar­i­ties to last year when the coun­try was un­der a State of Emer­gency and Cab­i­net min­is­ters had re­port­ed re­ceiv­ing death threats.

How­ev­er, Per­sad-Bisses­sar dis­missed those claims yes­ter­day.

“The pro­pos­al is not with­drawn. Two mil­lion dol­lars al­ready ap­proved. An ear­li­er note was with­drawn and re­placed by an up­dat­ed note. The pa­rade is not can­celled and will go on,” the Prime Min­is­ter said.

The Min­istry of De­fence al­so is­sued a state­ment de­scrib­ing re­ports that the cel­e­bra­tions had been can­celled as “false and mis­lead­ing.”

“The In­de­pen­dence Day cel­e­bra­tions will pro­ceed as planned,” the min­istry said, adding that the pub­lic should re­ly on of­fi­cial Gov­ern­ment in­for­ma­tion and be cau­tious of un­ver­i­fied claims cir­cu­lat­ing on so­cial me­dia.

One source ex­plained that with­draw­ing a Cab­i­net note is part of the ad­min­is­tra­tive process used to make cor­rec­tions be­fore re­sub­mit­ting it. The source said Cab­i­net notes can­not sim­ply be amend­ed and must in­stead be with­drawn and re­filed.

The doc­u­ment is dat­ed June 11. On June 12, Sturge told the Stand­ing Fi­nance Com­mit­tee the Gov­ern­ment in­tend­ed to pro­ceed with In­de­pen­dence Day cel­e­bra­tions.

Dur­ing con­sid­er­a­tion of al­lo­ca­tions un­der sub-item 66 for host­ing con­fer­ences, sem­i­nars and oth­er func­tions, Arou­ca/Lopinot MP Mar­vin Gon­za­les ques­tioned an in­crease in fund­ing from $190,000 to about $2.49 mil­lion.

Sturge said the ad­di­tion­al al­lo­ca­tion was for In­de­pen­dence Day cel­e­bra­tions.

When Gon­za­les asked whether the Gov­ern­ment still in­tend­ed to hold the an­nu­al pa­rade, Sturge replied, “Yes.”

Asked whether the en­tire in­crease would be spent on In­de­pen­dence Day ac­tiv­i­ties, Sturge said, “It will be for the en­tire In­de­pen­dence Day cel­e­bra­tion.”

He added the cel­e­bra­tions would in­clude “the cock­tails and so on and the events at the Queen’s Park Sa­van­nah and every­thing con­nect­ed to it.”

Port-of-Spain North/St Ann’s West MP Stu­art Young lat­er ques­tioned those plans in light of the ex­ten­sion of the State of Emer­gency.

Pressed fur­ther, Sturge said the ad­di­tion­al $2.3 mil­lion al­lo­ca­tion would cov­er all In­de­pen­dence Day fes­tiv­i­ties, in­clud­ing the tra­di­tion­al mil­i­tary pa­rade.

Asked whether the pa­rade would still go ahead de­spite the ex­ten­sion of the State of Emer­gency, Sturge sim­ply replied: “Yes.”