Caption: Kamla Persad-Bissessar
Summary
- PM Kamla Persad-Bissessar raised the 2022 “unlawful abduction” of Trinidadian businessman Brent Thomas from Barbados during her Caricom address.
- She alleged the then T&T government “coordinated” the kidnapping and said an RSS aircraft may have been used.
- She criticised the Caricom Secretariat, saying it did not respond to letters she sent in 2022 as Opposition Leader seeking answers.
- The incident involved Thomas being arrested at a Barbados hotel and returned to Trinidad without formal extradition proceedings.
- A High Court later ruled the act an unlawful abduction; T&T apologised and both countries accepted liability for constitutional breaches.
By Prior Beharry
PRIME Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar on Tuesday criticised the Caricom Secretariat over what she described as an “unsettling” matter surrounding the 2022 kidnapping of Trinidad and Tobago businessman Brent Thomas from Barbados.
Speaking during her address at the Caricom Heads of Government Conference, Persad-Bissessar said the then-sitting Trinidad and Tobago government “coordinated the kidnapping” of a citizen from another Caricom state.
“In October 2022, the then-sitting T&T government coordinated the kidnapping of a Trinidad citizen from another Caricom state. He was visiting another Caricom state, and he was kidnapped. Our Supreme Court has ruled that he was kidnapped. He was placed in handcuffs, transported to the airport, and then back to Trinidad. I think an RSS plane was used to transport him. He was kidnapped,” she said.
Persad-Bissessar was referring to an incident in 2022 when Thomas was arrested at a hotel in Barbados and returned to Trinidad aboard a military aircraft, without formal extradition proceedings being initiated.
A High Court judge later ruled the action amounted to an “unlawful abduction,” after which the Trinidad and Tobago government apologised and both Trinidad and Tobago and Barbados accepted liability for breaches of Thomas’ constitutional rights.
However, Persad-Bissessar told delegates that when she wrote to the Caricom Secretariat in 2022, while serving as Opposition Leader, she received no response.
In the presence of Caricom Secretary General Dr Carla Barnett, Persad-Bissessar said she wrote seeking an explanation for how the incident occurred and whether Caricom had any role in facilitating it.
“To date—that was 2022—I have not had a response from the secretariat,” she said.
Persad-Bissessar said the lack of a reply could point to “poor management” or “lax accountability,” and suggested it raised a wider concern about whether individuals were treated as Caricom citizens only when they held office.
“So, I say to Caricom, that response—non-response—it may be the result of poor management, lax accountability, or most concerning, that one ceases to be recognised by the secretariat as a member citizen of Caricom when not in government,” she said.
