To­day’s In­de­pen­dence Day cel­e­bra­tions will pro­ceed safe­ly, se­cure­ly and un­in­ter­rupt­ed.

The Min­istry of Trans­port and Civ­il Avi­a­tion has an­nounced that light mo­tor ve­hi­cles will be per­mit­ted to use both the east­bound and west­bound lanes of the Pri­or­i­ty Bus Route (PBR) from 8 pm to­day to fa­cil­i­tate In­de­pen­dence Day cel­e­bra­tions.

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar has made a call for Trinidad and To­ba­go to take re­spon­si­bil­i­ty for its post-in­de­pen­dence de­ci­sions, say­ing the coun­try must stop blam­ing its on­go­ing prob­lems on its colo­nial past.

As Trinidad and To­ba­go marks 64 years of in­de­pen­dence to­day, Pres­i­dent Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo is call­ing for cit­i­zens to have the free­dom to live with­out fear while con­fronting the coun­try’s on­go­ing crime and vi­o­lence cri­sis.

Op­po­si­tion Leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les is ques­tion­ing the Gov­ern­ment’s man­age­ment of State in­sti­tu­tions, point­ing to the “re­port­ed 24 de­par­tures from State boards” as she calls for greater ac­count­abil­i­ty.

As Trinidad and To­ba­go cel­e­brates its in­de­pen­dence to­day, Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice (CoP) Al­lis­ter Gue­var­ro is pay­ing trib­ute to fe­male of­fi­cers who have helped build and shape the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS).

That was the cen­tral mes­sage from Jus­tice Frank Seep­er­sad as he chal­lenged cit­i­zens to re­flect on how they have used the free­doms gained since in­de­pen­dence.

A Cunu­pia busi­ness­man who was shot sev­er­al times on Sat­ur­day as he walked out of his es­tab­lish­ment in Trinci­ty re­mained at the hos­pi­tal in crit­i­cal con­di­tion up to yes­ter­day.

San Fer­nan­do East MP Bri­an Man­ning stayed away from the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) pre-in­de­pen­dence event at Port-of-Spain City Hall yes­ter­day, as po­lit­i­cal leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les used the oc­ca­sion to stress the need for uni­ty, re­spect and dis­ci­pline with­in the par­ty.

Pub­lic Ser­vices As­so­ci­a­tion (PSA) pres­i­dent Fe­l­isha Thomas is re­ject­ing sug­ges­tions that her union is re­ceiv­ing pref­er­en­tial treat­ment from the Gov­ern­ment, even as the PSA moves clos­er to se­cur­ing a ten per cent salary in­crease for its mem­bers while oth­er unions con­tin­ue to press for com­pa­ra­ble set­tle­ments.

The Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Work­ers’ Union (CWU) has called for the re­moval of Telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions Ser­vices of Trinidad and To­ba­go (TSTT) chair­man Kern Dass, ac­cus­ing him of pre­sid­ing over a gov­er­nance cri­sis and at­tempt­ing to make for­mer act­ing chief ex­ec­u­tive of­fi­cer Keino Cox the “fall guy” in the con­tro­ver­sy sur­round­ing a pro­posed $49 mil­lion call cen­tre con­tract.

A High Court Judge has pro­vid­ed guid­ance on the cri­te­ria for ap­point­ments to the Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion (PolSC).