Speaker 1: 0:01

Welcome to Strictly Facts, a guide to Caribbean history and culture, hosted by me, alexandria Miller. Strictly Facts teaches the history, politics and activism of the Caribbean and connects these themes to contemporary music and popular culture. Hello, hello everyone. Welcome back to another episode of Strictly Facts, a guide to Caribbean history and culture, the show where Caribbean history really comes to life, and, in a sense, when I'm saying that, I mean it really as an integral part of who we are and who we're always becoming and evolving into right. I'm your host, alexandria Miller, and today we are diving into a part of the region's history that I think has particularly gotten overshadowed. It's an event that I certainly didn't know much about until an episode a while back, which I'll get into in a moment, but it really came to mind not only for the anniversary of this episode, but just in the fact of the way that we talk about rebellions in the Caribbean. They're usually associated, I think, with slave revolts oftentimes.

Speaker 1: 1:07

But what about coups, right? Coup d'etats, you know, tend to be very intense grabs for power that shake entire nations. They have been relatively rare, in the English-speaking Caribbean particularly, which is why I think this moment is really tremendous, and so in this episode, we spotlight one of the most striking and under-discussed coups or attempted coups, rather in the region's post-independence history the 1990 Jamaat al-Musaleen coup attempt in Trinidad and Tobago. 35 years ago, on a quiet July afternoon, the capital of Porto, spain, was thrown into chaos as an Islamic group stormed the Red House, which is held by the prime minister and parliament. Rather, they held the prime minister hostage and declared the government overthrown.

Speaker 1: 1:58

Today we revisit that moment, not just to recount what happened, but to ask what does the Muslimin coup tell us about the political discontent, state power and the silences that shape our collective memory? How has this event echoed through Trinidadian society and politics in the decades since? So, before we get too much into it, I want to, you know, introduce and give voice to our guest today, and so joining me is writer and Stony Brook University professor of fiction writing, esker David Johnson. Esker, it's so great to have you. Why don't you tell us a bit about yourself? Let our listeners know where you're hailing from which I'm sure they're not surprised by this point after the introduction but also what inspired sort of you know, your love for writing and what brought you to the work that you do today.

Speaker 2: 2:48

Hey, well, thank you very much for having me. I'll answer your questions in some order. I think I remember them all, so I'll try. So I am raised in Trinidad.

Speaker 2: 3:01

I was about to say born and raised, but this actually facts into the story a bit. I had actually been born in the UK where my parents were at that point in time 1988, in case anyone wants to date me in that sense. We lived until I was about age four. So age four on was really when I did all my growing in Trinidad and Tobago, up until about age 17 when I left for boarding school. But in that period of living in the US prior, I had gone down to Trinidad for a six-month vacation. I think the vacation was really for my parents for a six-month vacation. I think the vacation was really for my parents. They sent me down to my grandmother, as Caribbean parents do, for six months while they could get some peace and relaxation.

Speaker 2: 3:51

That was in 1990. That was, in fact, when the coup happened. So I have it over my parents' head that I was there for one of the more important moments in Trinidad's history. And they were not. I was like where were you when it was all going down? And yeah, um, so that's kind of like the rough details. Uh, love of writing, that pretty much from this period of speaking, or from age four onwards, it's really been, uh, something that you know was highly valued in my household books, books, reading, engagement with the arts and I just I took it more to heart than perhaps my parents might have intended and wanted to be one of the persons who could make the books as well. So here we are.

Speaker 1: 4:38

Definitely, and it's great to have you Speaking of your love of writing. You know we got connected based off your recent article Sisyphus in the Capital Crime Punishment and the Legacy of Trinidad and Tobago's Failed Coup, and so you know you're writing on this moment right and also, you know, in tandem with your lived experience, I think is really what brought us together. But before we sort of get into it a little bit, I definitely do want us to unpack the situation. As I had mentioned a little bit earlier, this coup was one that I hadn't actually even heard about until we had an episode a few years ago now with Dr Leah Kahn, and we were talking about religion within the Caribbean, and in her book Far From Mecca, there is a chapter that talks about Islam and the coup as well as part of Trinidad's history.

Speaker 1: 5:28

And so ultimately, on July 27th 1990, the Jamaat al-Muslim, a radical Islamic group led by Yassin Abu Bakr, stormed the Red House, as I had sort of said a little bit earlier, during a live broadcast on the evening news.

Speaker 1: 5:45

They took the Prime Minister, anr Robinson, and members of the cabinet hostage, while simultaneously seizing control over the state television station Trinidad and Tobago Television TTT, and you know, had demanded several things, including grievances about the sort of economic hardship at the time, social inequality, state oppression and several other things, and really sort of claiming that they were overthrowing the government to overcome these sort of challenges that they had deemed critical to the time period, but even sort of we're getting into the moment a little bit right, having especially been present I mean, you were only two at the time, but from you know being there, from hearing you know grandparents, as you had mentioned, and stuff beforehand, what were some of the things in your view that had really prompted maybe the discontent? We could take this on varying aspects right. There's, of course, a political discontent that's going on generally at the time, but of course also with the Muslims group as well.

Speaker 2: 6:56

Yeah, of course, and I think despite my quote-unquote, having been there, I do rely a little bit more on research and anecdotes beyond my experience to have written this essay and to tell the story. So you don't have to fear that you're taking a two year old's account for everything that happened. A lot of what you said is spot on and I'll I'll start on with a little bit more of the kind of objective facts of the matter and then maybe lean in with a little bit more of what a kind of subjective point of view might be, which is what the essay kind of goes into. Some more so Trinidad kind of from, let's just say, from the late 70s into the 80s and onwards, and on a little bit of an economic roller coaster we can say in that, the kind of presence and expansion of the oil industry in Trinidad and to be a little bit more specific, really natural gas, but oil as well, the presence of that began to really make itself known in those decades and there was a lot of economic expansion and a lot of like rapid increase of wealth in Trinidad in those years mentioned Only for by the mid to late 80s a momentary downturn then began to take shape.

Speaker 2: 8:18

The problem with having a monocrop economy, as it's called, oil not being a crop but still centered around one major point of industry as sure as that was and to some extent still is is that you're very much tied to the fate of this one commodity. If oil is up, things are great. If oil is down, things are not so good. That such was the case in the late 80s, and the economic downturn either caused or coincided with a lot of social unrest as well, wherein there were what I guess has to be considered an underserved Afro-Trinidadian population and spoils that were being, you know, boasted about and seen on, maybe on a national level, weren't really making the trickle down to affect regular people's lives on a day-to-day basis.

Speaker 2: 9:10

This is not an original story, you know. Pick your country throughout world history, and there have been instances of this throughout. This was just our version thereof. So a lot of unrest version thereof. So a lot of unrest, a lot of promises for change from politicians that one can imagine simply didn't go as far as many people felt it needed to go, and especially in the case where there was a newly elected government, where, I believe, came came into power in 1986 and, as most new parties do. They came into power with the promise of a lot of these major reforms, with kind of acknowledging what a lot of the struggle and pain of Trinidadians on the ground, uh, was at that point in time, and they were given enough, I guess, of a grace period in order to enact some of these promised changes. I myself, of course, was not there, but it's suffice to say that by 1990, this one particular group, the Jamat al-Muslimin and we could speak a little bit more about them they felt, and their leader felt, that enough was enough, not enough had been done.

Speaker 1: 10:36

And matters had to be taken into their own hands in order to make the change that was needed, feeling, I think he in some ways he sort of used that to his advantage and sort of recruiting the members of the organization right. Particularly from Dr Khan's book she sort of outlines that he sort of monopolized that moment to recruit members, particularly Black men, who she calls them not converts to Islam but returnees to Islam in a sense. And you know, if you guys check out her book, which I definitely recommend, she talks more about why she describes them as returnees. I think that sort of helps to contextualize the situation a little bit further, just because I think oftentimes, when we think of the Caribbean, islam is not even necessarily the first religion we think about right, and so to sort of just understand how this moment happens and has sort of been sparked by this sort of social unrest that has amassed not in just even Trinidad, as you said, right, but has definitely amassed throughout the 70s, even Trinidad, as you said, right, but has definitely amassed throughout the 70s.

Speaker 2: 11:44

Yeah, you bring up a great point and you know, to be fair to Yasin Abu Bakr as well as his organization, the Muslimin, they did spark a lot of positive change, that has to be said.

Speaker 2: 12:03

They did clean up neighborhoods that were coming to fall under the sway of crime and increased drug presence, as Trinidad is just off the coast of Venezuela, therefore South America at large, and even to this day there is a bit of a transshipment of drugs through the region, which obviously f to see that the road that it would take a lot of the poor members of the population was not a good one and really was an organizing force.

Speaker 2: 12:55

In the essay I call him a community organizer with a bit of a tongue in cheek, but that's just me maybe being a bit coy. He did indeed organize communities and he did give a lot of young men, especially young Black men, young African men, a sense of purpose, a sense of belonging and a sense of pride in who they were and who they should be and the impact and effect that they could have, not only on their local communities but then, of course, our main theme to the nation at large, and there are many examples of this kind of positive impact that people to this day would argue that he did have on people's lives, and I think that needs to be said.

Speaker 1: 13:38

Certainly, I mean I definitely want to also, as we're exploring this moment, underscore the fact that like this just sort of didn't seem real until it seemed real right, like taking over the is this a joke? Sort of thing, but so much transpires over the course of six days. Really this was a six day coup and so sort of. Do you want to unpack some of these things for us in just sort of the like general moment and what transpired as a result?

Speaker 2: 14:18

I think you're exactly right in the sense of surreality. If there is one thing that I do recall and that I am able to speak on experientially was this sense of oh, things are feeling a little bit different, and that was just for me. At two years old, you know not to even speak of what's happening in the country at large timeline of events is that on July 27 in 1990, what would have happened for you as a regular Trinidadian watching one of our three TV channels at that point in time is that one of them, your programming, would have been interrupted and you would have seen Abubakar kind of in front of the camera speaking to the nation, saying that at 6 pm I believe earlier in the day, that the government had been overthrown and what had begun earlier that day is that I believe in two factions. They sent one down to the TV station and then another over to Parliament, but these groups of people from the Muslimin, they stormed in, they overtook the TV station from which the address was coming. They did also bomb the police headquarters, so that happened earlier in the day, and then they also stormed into Parliament, the Red House that you mentioned, which is where Parliament is housed and conducts their matters and you can see this video of ordinary parliamentary proceedings, interrupted by the sounds of commotion, of scuffling and shuffling and people running and scrambling for cover, ducking underneath desks. It was the arrival and the invasion of these militant groups, these young men with guns, really, and holding everyone there hostage until further notice. So it was really this coordinated strike effort happening with more or less simultaneously and that hit what they saw as the major pain points, or maybe the major points of command of a country.

Speaker 2: 16:32

You control a major media outlet, be it a tv or a radio station. You uh control parliament, where all of the politicians were I should mention the prime minister himself was also at Parliament, so he was held hostage then by default as well and you address the nation to let them know that we are now the ones in charge. I do go on into the essay to speak as to how this game plan, which has repeated itself throughout history and countries across history, is in some sense one doomed to folly. And uh, yeah, so we could speak as to how it did not work and how it seems to never work, for all of these would be, uh, I guess, dictator. Well, we, we don't even know if he would have been a dictator. He never even made it that far, but these would be leaders of coup.

Speaker 1: 17:24

And I definitely want to add that sort of you know, in addition to this moment. There are people who are shot. I believe the prime minister was also shot. Several others were shot. I believe around 20 to 30 lives were lost during the coup. There is also a loot out that results, as a part of the coup, causing sort of millions of dollars in damages, and so I think, in some ways, when we're contextualizing coups, it's obviously, like you know, on one hand, the organization, but there was clearly a spillout right that goes even beyond this, to to, I think, further contextualize the moment that we were talking about earlier of course, and one of one of the first things that abubakar says on his tv address.

Speaker 2: 18:10

Again, you can go watch this on youtube. He says at so-and-so time the government was overthrown, uh, the revolutionary forces are commanding the streets, and so on, you know, he says there shall be no looting, which was addressing the public at large, which you know. He probably knew what was coming, because there then followed a lot of looting. So I'm just going back to speaking to that sense of surreality For me. I just remember that I used to. I was staying with my grandmother, my aunt. We used to go for these walks every day around the neighborhood. Very lovely, one of the highlights of my day, walking with auntie Lovern holding her hand. Granny Sylvia would be home.

Speaker 2: 18:52

And then I just remember, like one day it was just we can't go for a walk, and I was just so confused, I was so, you know, upset about it, and then the day after we couldn't go for it, and the day after, and I just remember this sense of like tension and you know, in your child's limited point of view, you're just aware that, oh, something is happening and there's a reason why everyone is worried and there's a reason why there isn't as much movements going about. People are kind of staying home, being guarded, and maybe I thought it might have been like an adventure, a game. You know it's nice to have everyone around. But I do remember perceiving the sense of something unusual is happening and it seems as if people aren't as happy as they ordinarily are. In the meantime, people were getting shot, losing their lives. The prime minister was shot in his life.

Speaker 1: 19:47

I also sort of want us to underscore. We talk about coups and the immediate impact, right, but also the sort of like general impact that you're getting at, right, that you know it sort of no longer felt safe in a way, Right, that you know it sort of no longer felt safe in a way not being able to go on these walks, Right. But also, I think, even beyond that, the state was sort of transformed, or even sort of social relationships amongst communities transformed. I'm sure you know we don't even think of Islamic extremist groups being something that's really coming out of the Caribbean, especially at that time, right. And so what for you, do you think really helped to to sort of underscore the aftermath of it, a nation's understanding of who they are?

Speaker 2: 20:50

Even in the instance, in the rare instances, that a coup is successful, then that is some sense a total rewriting of what your country now is, depending on who is in charge, what their plans for the country are. It's a very rapid and a very sudden, a very jarring reordering of priorities, of identity, of the definition of what it means to be a citizen of this country. So those are in the few that actually do succeed. The vast majority do fail. Nonetheless, it still does give that version of a shock wherein the kind of country you thought you were living in may be revealed to be another. I think, in the case of Trinidad, be revealed to be another. I think, in the case of Trinidad, that revelation happens in a few parts, in a few steps. First, as we have been saying, is the initial shock of that something like this could happen at all that there are living amongst us those who would take up arms and use violence as a means of achieving their ends in a nation that prided itself on the democratic tradition. That tradition has its own flaws. It continues to have flaws in all of its renditions today, trinidad included. But it was at least the destiny we had chosen for ourselves as to how to shape our political you know futures going back from 1962, the moment of independence onwards. So the fact that I could foment and take shape a large enough and a determined enough, a powerful enough and a well-supported enough of a group that they're willing to kind of make this affront to this national agreement that we have had, that is, and of itself, its own shock. You didn't know that. You lived in a country in which that would ever be on the table. Then the second shock and this doesn't always happen, but it did happen in the case for Trinidad and I make the argument it's happened in the case of the US. The second shock is the shock that can happen if nothing is done afterwards, if there are no consequences. That then results.

Speaker 2: 23:21

So, to give a little bit of a return to the history synopsis, this Attenda coup. It lasted for six days. While they had the prime minister hostage, they did get him to sign amnesty agreements saying that you know they were clear in the eyes of the law. This is while you know, again, he's a hostage. They shot him in the leg and they're like hey, sign this. Of course he signs it. One would expect that this would not stand the rigor, the testing, a court of law. They would get thrown out post-haste but, as Trinidad would go on to find out in the months that followed, it did in fact stand the test of the courts. It was held up. These men were in fact granted amnesty and were ultimately, maybe after a few months, were free to go and return to their lives as regular citizens in Trinidad and Tobago.

Speaker 2: 24:18

Abu Bakr himself, you know, died of old age not too long ago. You know constantly speaking out against the government during his time. Maybe some of that was fair, maybe some of that was not, but the fact of the matter is that he was out here amongst us. So, going back, so that is a second kind of shock, and I think it's the kind of shock that is extremely rare. Well, it's rare enough to have a coup, so, amongst coups, their failure is not rare.

Speaker 2: 24:47

But what is rare after that is the lack of consequence, and that, I think, is the shock that, for Trinidadians, kind of became like a longer running, a slower burning. It's this recalibration of who you were, it's a recalibration of the country you thought that you were living in. It's one thing to have your laws written on a piece of paper, few are the moments in which they are tested in this drastic of a manner, rare are those moments and, because of their rarity, extremely consequential are these moments. So to fail this test of standing by your laws, standing by the order that you wish for yourselves, for the safety of those you love and for the future of your country, to fail that test, I think, brings about consequences that are long running, slow burning, but that, I would argue, continue to reverberate today and puts you on a different path of national identity than you probably otherwise would have been, one somewhat more compromised, one that you know has failed in a major way.

Speaker 1: 26:03

And even the Muslimin, right, I think, as you're saying, right, we oftentimes think of coups and when they're over, they're over, you know, groups disbanded et cetera, but Muslimin goes on to continue and of course, you know, is, in sort of the my reading still obviously viewed with suspicion and you know that has carried forward since 1990. Um, but just the sort of rarity of this moment, I think, is sort of has very multiple things that we're not used to seeing, right, let alone back then in 1990 agreed and just very quickly the the reason why this story was even became of initial interest to me just growing up in Trinidad.

Speaker 2: 26:46

So you know, it's sad to say, but crime in Trinidad is not great, by which I mean it's quite bad, and growing up it would always just be like like a casual talking point amongst people, people like I remember I just met like an old soldier one time who who was saying, like you know, the moment that we really went off course was after the coup, when nothing happened to these men and there was a sense of, well, anything is anything, anyone can do anything. There's no real ultimate consequences to your actions and or, in this case, your crimes. Whether or not that is true, I think, is always going to be open for debate. But it was the question, it was the sentiment that I wanted to kind of explore further in the piece, especially because it was just such a piece of kind of common colloquial knowledge my entire time growing up.

Speaker 1: 27:46

That point also leads me to my next question, because the common knowledge of it it obviously you know we're talking about Trinidad, so it's going to show up in a calypso right. It's going to show up as part of our culture, our music culture particularly that has so tremendously historicized our experiences right Throughout the course of Strictly Facts. We have always connected the ways that these moments or these figures in our history have showed up in our popular culture, not just in a sense to sing about right, but to sort of memorialize or, you know, ensure that the understanding of these moments carry on into the future generations. And so for you, what are sort of some of your favorite examples of how this history and this moment shows up in Trinidadian popular culture?

Speaker 2: 28:35

You know, and it's so curious that you say that I'm going to confess off the bat that it's a bit difficult for me to think of a lot of examples. Only one really comes to mind and you know, I like want to say maybe that has something to say about our collective amnesia, et cetera, et cetera. But I would err on the personal fault side. Maybe it's just my own shortcoming and not being as savvy as to what the various appearances in arts and media are. The main thing that comes to mind is a song by David Rudder, 1990, one of our great Calypsonians, 1990, of course, being the year in which this event took place For everyone listening. I do encourage you to go and look up the song itself.

Speaker 2: 29:23

I do not remember the words, but there is a refrain during the chorus. It says 1990, please make a liar of me. And what the song talks about. It's the sense of 1990. It's the beginning of a new decade. You're looking forward to the future, almost the end of the century, and there would have been at that point in time a sense of you know again all that Trinidad could be, all that the region could be, trinidad and Tobago could be, and in some sense, how that spirit of optimism would have been compromised by the end of 1990. So he has. This refrain says 1990, please make a liar of me. So the speaker of the song himself, I think, has probably imbued a little bit of this negative outlook as a result, and he's asking of the air please make a liar of me, please, please, don't let this be the destiny that we have actually been set on. That's again. That's my loose memory of what the song is about. I do remember that line. I should go and look this up a little bit.

Speaker 1: 30:41

I think it's Jose right. Is that the song?

Speaker 2: 30:44

No, the song is called 1990.

Speaker 1: 30:48

Oh, okay, I think there's a few of them that I think Rudder talks about. So 1990s is one, Jose I believe is another one. I also know. Cro-cro has a song Say a Prayer for Abu Bakr yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.

Speaker 2: 31:06

Okay, great, so going back to everything I was saying. I am pinning this down to my own. Like I need to just re-familiarize myself some more. I'm taking that blame 100%. All these are songs that as soon as I hear them, I know them. But to bring them up independently is where I'm struggling. But yes, sorry, and if you have more, I would love for you to go on.

Speaker 1: 31:28

Those are the songs that come to mind, but I definitely also wanted to uphold another podcast that had, in the past, done a little bit more of an investigation of this, done a little bit more of an investigation of this and, I think, very in tune to things that I love in terms of history, captures, some of the audio of certain broadcast or people who were, you know, sort of caught up in this moment.

Speaker 1: 31:53

I believe, like one of them was one of the police who were involved, etc. And soibbean investigative journalism network podcast has a few episodes that really explore this moment, um, and they go on to in other episodes also sort of talk about the impact of the coup, not just from the standpoint of the coup itself, but also, um, the sort of like global threat of terrorism that obviously occurs as a result as well. When we think of terrorism, it's sort of thought of that thing that happens over in the Middle East, sort of way. Right, but to some extent and if listeners are interested and want to learn more about this, the Muslim mean sort of becomes a pathway for those in the caribbean, um, who might be targeted. I don't know if that's the word, but you know, sort of um, yeah, sort of moving towards more um extremist leanings, and so for those who want to check that out, I definitely um recommend that podcast as well.

Speaker 2: 33:03

Yeah, of course. And then you know, when ISIS was dominating a little bit more of the cultural imagination, five, six, seven years ago, there were multiple stories of Trinidadians who made their way over to the Middle East in order to join and be recruited, be radicalized, if you will, I believe on a per capita basis, which sometimes per capita as a metric I find is a bit specious, but on a per capita basis I believe we had one of the higher recruitment rates in the Western Hemisphere before ISIS. Mind you, our population is 1.3 million. So you know, I'm sure if there are like four people who went, then that would put you quite high up there, but it is worth saying.

Speaker 1: 33:52

Yeah, and something that, as well, the same podcast, caribbean Investigative Journalism Network, really expands upon. I want to end on a particular note, because I think, as we've talked about it thus far, the inception of the coup has caused a bit of confusion. In some sense, it could be and as we sort of explored it's been one of the lesser known coups in the region, and so we're now at the point where it's 35 years later, right, I think, especially for at least my generation it can be very easy to think, oh, these things happened hundreds of years ago, right, but this is not one of those events. And so how do you think the memory of the coup, or sort of the lack thereof, has really impacted who we are as a people, or what the state of Trinidad and Tobago eventually evolved or has since evolved into, and what can we do better regarding that sort of memory?

Speaker 2: 35:25

One of the great joys and one of the unignorable frustrations of being that our region has been able to have on the world and that trinidadians at large are able to step beyond our borders or beyond our boundaries. And do you find trinidadians everywhere, in all places, doing all manner of things. And we're such curious people, multifaceted people, and I think it's something to be said of that history, of how complicated, at times brutal, and then also, you know, at the same time, enriching, of a history. It can be where you it's like this, natural, human experiments, you know wherein, maybe not so natural, not everyone, you know, just there, by chance, right, but you know there are just so many ingredients into what it takes to be Caribbean in the first place, ingredients into what it takes to be Caribbean in the first place, be that Africa, be that Europe, be that India, be that within those continents, those subgroups, from the Portuguese, the French, west African to East African, and, as a result, I think that there's such like a richness of thought, that there's such like a richness of thought, there's such a curiosity about like life and, for me, about language. I think the the type of english we speak, the type of language we speak, has been particularly enriching and empowering for me as a writer per se. I think it lends me a lens, that I feel that I have an advantage, um, as a result, over some of my you know, maybe less exposed peers.

Speaker 2: 37:04

Anyway, that's just in that one example, but you could expand that to sports, economics, to politics, what have you? And you grow up so just very aware of just how talented people around you are, especially as a kid, when you're there in school. And then once you hit kind of like the 20s or 30s, where I am now, something happens and that raw pool of talent you feel as if has begun to fizzle around you and now your attention just trains itself and it's okay. Well, what the next generation is going to do, we may or may not have that same experience. So we have so much potential, but then what happened generation is going to do, who may or may not have that same experience. So they're all like we're.

Speaker 2: 37:42

You know, we have so much potential, but then like what happened, so that I think just speaks to kind of like the fate of the country at large, there were, like there were such these key, pivotal moments where it felt as if we could have been something else. One of them that I mentioned in the essay and this speaks to the region at large is in the 1950s, 10 Caribbean nations, spearheaded by Jamaica and Trinidad, English-speaking countries nearly came together and made a federation, and that is something that would have had our own currency, free travel between borders and form an economic block by which some of the predatory arrangements that organizations like the IMF and the World Bank later enacted upon the region. It is easier to imagine us being more resilient against those and using the shared sense of pool, resources and access and ability to take that next step as the second half of the 20th century unfolded. Sorry for this very long answer, um, but um, one country pulled out jamaica and you guys followed, so no matter what, is that right?

Speaker 2: 39:02

continue right at home, prime minister made a very like, a little cool point. Yeah, he says one from ten leaves zero, which is not accurate math, but it is, you know, like a nice little visual quip, right. So and so that moment we like lost and and who knows what would have happened. And I already mentioned what goes on to happen with the IMF and the World Bank and the presence of the CIA in the region. We don't have to get into all that, but these are the kinds of fates that we were then subjected to by making ourselves weaker than we otherwise would have been have been.

Speaker 2: 39:46

So too, I would argue, is the case with, not the coup per se, but in that period of time, in like the 80s, into the, the like 90s, where our wealth as a country was just coming into being.

Speaker 2: 39:53

Yes, there were moments of downturn, but there was still this the sense of abundance, the sense of wealth, the sense of possibility, going back into the 70s onwards, and what might the country had been had those resources, had those opportunities been harnessed in a way that was truly altruistic, that was truly taken into account the fate of a country and the people, as opposed to the welfare of a smaller controlling class.

Speaker 2: 40:26

The coup kind of resulted as a response to that, and I think the secondary consequence of the coup is that the fact that nothing was done meant that not only were you a joking country when it came to ensuring the fate of your people, you're also joking country when it came to kind of enforcing your laws and to being a country of principle, anyway.

Speaker 2: 40:47

So I might have lost the thread in your question itself, but this is something that you know I can get quite riled up about. I just guess I spent a lot of time just imagining the Trinidad we could have been, the Caribbean we could have been. I will also say that I don't mention all this just to remain pessimistic, but for us to kind of be aware of what our fate so far has been and what we can and hopefully should continue to shape it to be and learn from some of these lessons. I read a great quote from Cicero today that said not to know what happened before one was born is always to be a child, and it stuck with me. So I don't want us to continue to be children in the global stage.

Speaker 1: 41:40

That's beautifully said and I appreciate you for bringing up that point Because, again, the point of even strictly facts, it's not just merely to know the things that happened you know, everybody could just read the book and or whatever Google facts and carry on about our lives more or less but really ultimately, having us understand who we've been, what we've gone through, where we're coming from, to really understand how we continue to grow and evolve.

Speaker 2: 42:12

So I like. The thing is I say this in the piece as well the problem is that the governments do need change. Trinidad does need drastic change, I'm sure Jamaica does need drastic change, and what the powers that be and what the people at large kind of like need to realize is that if we don't start to make that change in a way that's like healthy and that's respectful and that honors like who we are, then the alternatives become these moments of madness, of intensity, of harm and destruction and ruin that still don't change anything, but that's the consequence there.

Speaker 1: 42:51

I fully agree and I think you know, for our listeners who want to further check out your work, I'll link you know several of your other pieces in our show notes and on our Sturley Facts syllabus, but I think you know your piece Sisyphus in the Capitol Crime Punishment and the Legacy of Trinidad and Tobago's Failed Coup really underscores a lot of what we're saying, right, not just about the moment itself but really how we come to understand the aftermath. So I thank you for joining us for this episode, for sharing you know, both from a personal lens about your experiences, but also having this conversation with me and how we come to even understand these situations today.

Speaker 1: 43:35

Thank you for having me Of course you know it's a family thing, so we're all I will tell them. So with that, everyone I hope you appreciated and you know really enjoyed this episode. Be sure to check out our Strictly Facts syllabus for more links to you know things we've referenced and several other pieces where you can learn about the coup and in several other moments, just you know, around the 80s and 90s in trinidad as well I want to give a big shout out to qrc, to hk and to the glorious bastards.

Speaker 1: 44:10

Boom, boom of course you have to big up, we have to big up, which is right, um, and so till next time, everyone look more. All right, thanks for tuning in to strictly facts. Visit strictly facts podcastcom for more information from each episode. Follow us at strictly facts pod on instagram and facebook and at strictly facts pd on twitter.