On October 9, Washington imposed sanctions on the International Criminal Court that ANR Robinson, as Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago, spent fifteen years building. The country’s current Prime Minister, as she has done for months, said nothing.
Slinger Francisco, the Mighty Sparrow, died in New York on September 27. Grenada-born, Trinidad-raised, Brooklyn-based for most of his final decades, he spent seventy-seven years making the Caribbean listen to itself. The voice that would have known what to make of the past political week is gone.
The Special Operations Bill passed at 1:30 AM on Republic Day, on the Senate President's casting vote, against unanimous Independent and Opposition opposition. Later that day, President Kangaloo warned that "rights surrendered in anxious times are not always easily recovered."
Trinidad and Tobago has spent ten of the past fourteen months under emergency powers. The current State of Emergency ends tomorrow. The Government is bringing back the same ZOSO Bill that failed in the Senate in January. The Senate numbers have not changed. Neither has the pattern.
A Trinidadian scientist has spent seven years turning a Caribbean environmental crisis into fuel. The region has been quietly figuring this out together, without needing Washington's permission or foreign firms taking the value. Trinidad and Tobago now needs to get on board.
Chad Joseph and Rishi Samaroo were killed by a US missile on October 14, 2025, returning home to Las Cuevas from Venezuela. Their families are suing the US in a Boston federal court. Their Prime Minister has said there is no evidence Trinidadians were killed. This is what happened.
In ten days this month, BP has consolidated three major gas deals in Trinidad and Tobago, covering some 15 trillion cubic feet. Every one depends on OFAC in Washington continuing to permit it, and that permission has been withdrawn once already. The deals are real. The dependency is also fragile.
The Government has signed MOUs for up to 800MW of AI data centres with two US firms. The environmental critique is correct. It is also not the whole picture. The bigger question is what kind of economy the country is choosing to build, and whether it looks a lot like the one we already have.
The 39th Tobago Heritage Festival opened on Thursday. Fifteen days, eighteen villages, a wedding from 1798, a riot from 1876, cocoa dancing to a tambrin band. Small islands still tell their own stories, and it is worth celebrating that.
On Tuesday, Justice Frank Seepersad dismissed the Hadeeds' habeas corpus application. He also said, in the same ruling, that a State of Emergency cannot eclipse the rule of law. Both sentences now belong to the country, and both deserve careful reading.
On Thursday, the Law Association finally spoke. The same week, the country's most prominent businessman was arrested with no charges, no information, no transparency. The pattern this blog has been documenting now has both an institutional witness and a fresh example of it in motion.
On Thursday, the Government formally legislated the path back to a working Petrotrin refinery. The bill passed with no opposing votes. Whatever else is happening this month, this is a manifesto pledge becoming law. What the country needs to know now is what comes after the legislation.