Originally published in Newsday
Sunday, October 8, 2017
Narad
Mahabir acts as Hyarima in the play Hyarima and the Saints written by
Gyasi Garcia of St Francis College during the First Peoples Schools
Outreach programme, UWI-ROYTEC North Campus, on September 26. This was
one of the events leading up to Friday’s First Peoples holiday.
After years of clamouring for greater national acknowledgement,
the First Peoples in TT will be recognised formally on Friday with a
one-off public holiday.
And to commemorate the observance, the community has organised a week
of activities, under the theme, On Becoming Visible Towards Meaningful
Recognition, in an effort to enlighten fellow descendants and others
about the history and contribution of the indigenous peoples to the
country’s development.
The activities began on Friday with a lecture on the topic, DNA
Testing of the First Peoples of Trinidad and Tobago: Identification of
their genealogical ancestry, at the National Academy for the Performing
Arts, Port-of-Spain.
Later that day, the group hosted a Waponaka Concert, a rich mix of
parang, calypso and other cultural presentations at the Santa Rosa First
Peoples Centre, Paul Mitchell Street, Arima.
Today, at 6 pm, the community is expected to host an orientation
ceremony for visiting First Peoples delegates at the centre on Paul
Mitchell Street.
Tomorrow, the group is due to host an ancestral journey to Moruga, at
which celebrants will perform sacred rites and various musical
expressions.
Other events scheduled for the week include a symposium, titled, From
Chrysalis to Butterfly: On Becoming Visible Towards Meaningful
Recognition, at the University of Trinidad and Tobago’s O’Meara campus; a
children’s rally and a ceremonial walk through Arima.
For Chief Ricardo Bharath-Hernandez, president of the Santa Rosa
First Peoples, Arima–perhaps the largest and most vocal First Peoples
community in the country–the holiday is not intended to encourage
relaxation.
Rather, he said, apart from reflecting on the atrocities which were
committed against the indigenous peoples, centuries ago, the holiday
presented an opportunity to truly celebrate their contribution.
It gives First Peoples descendants, numbering close to 1,500 in
Arima, and others a chance to participate fully in the community’s
events.
“Because, in ordinary times, without a holiday, people would usually
say they can’t come because they have to work or their children can’t
come because they have to go to school. So, my feeling and the
community’s feeling was that with a national holiday, nobody cannot use
that excuse not to participate.”
Outside of Arima, First Peoples descendants can be found in Lopinot,
La Pastora, Maracas/St Joseph, Santa Cruz, Paria, Brasso Seco,
Tabaquite, Moruga, Brazil, San Rafael and Talparo.
Bharath-Hernandez, who has said repeatedly they are not just another
minority cultural group, insisted they had inherent rights with respect
to land titles, which were supported by the United Nations Declaration
of Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Some 144 countries, including TT, voted
for the Declaration.
Bharath-Hernandez was cautiously optimistic that the group’s lobby
for a heritage park–a permanent place to call their own–will become a
reality.
Plans for the park began during the former People’s National Movement
administration, under late prime minister Patrick Manning. A Cabinet
decision was taken to give the First Peoples a five-acre plot of land
along Blanchisseuse Road, Arima, which they found to be inadequate. The
community later identified a hilly piece of land which had once been
occupied by First Peoples centuries ago.
When the People’s Partnership came into office, in May 2010, it
rescinded the PNM’s offer of a five-acre plot, and gave the community an
additional 20-acres at the same site. The land has since been surveyed,
following which an offer of lease was issued to the community from the
Commissioner of State Lands on September 9, 2015. Alluding to the
movement toward economic diversification in this year’s budget,
Bharath-Hernandez said First Peoples in other parts of the region,
namely Dominica, Guyana and Suriname, were already firmly entrenched in
their islands’ tourism initiatives.
“We are still to reach that point but we see potential in our vision
for a permanent space to call our own. We can contribute to the tourism
sector".
Bharath-Hernandez said the parcel of land which the community has
received for its park, is expected to provide employment in the areas of
food processing and sales, handicraft, wildlife farming and
eco-tourism.
The facility also will contain a museum, cultural/recreational space
and living quarters for the Carib Queen and about a dozen families.
