Trinidad and Tobago

By Guy D. Garcia

Trinidadians traditionally express their political feelings in satirical calypso songs. Prime Minister A.N.R. Robinson won a landslide four years ago to the tune of Captain, the Ship Is Sinking, a telling commentary on the island nation's economic decline. But the conservative Robinson almost lost the helm himself last week, when a group of fanatic black Muslims took him and 54 others hostage in an attempt to bring down the government.

After five days, at least 30 dead and 150 wounded, Yasin Abu Bakr, leader of the abortive coup, emerged from the television-broadcast building in Port-of- Spain and laid down his rifle. "Allah is the greatest," he said, then stood in the pouring rain as 70 of his followers added their arms to the growing pile of weapons and were taken into custody by Trinidadian soldiers. The rebels are expected to face criminal charges of treason, murder and kidnapping, and could be hanged if found guilty.

Thus ended a bizarre chapter in the history of peaceful, democratic politics in the English-speaking Caribbean, where coups are virtually unknown -- only in Grenada has an elected leadership been successfully overthrown, by Maurice Bishop in 1979. "As far as the government is concerned, it's unconditional surrender," said spokesman Gregory Shaw. But the incident was a chilling illustration of how easily Trinidad's economic straits could be exploited by desperate men like Bakr.

The seeds of the crisis were planted eight years ago after a former policeman named Lennox Phillip went to Canada to study engineering and returned to Trinidad as Yasin Abu Bakr, an ardent Islamic radical. Bakr soon became the leader of the Jamaat al-Muslimeen, or Group of Muslims. The Islamic splinter group, with few ties to the mainstream Muslims who make up 6% of the Trinidad and Tobago population of 1.3 million, espoused a potent mixture of religious fundamentalism and left-wing politics. The self-styled "Imam" traveled to Libya and was a vocal supporter of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, but the main interest of his armed band of militants, he said, was to rid Trinidad of drugs, corruption and poverty. He lived with most of his 300 adherents on a commune on the edge of Port-of-Spain, where he commandeered government land to build a mosque, schools and shops. In recent weeks he was said to have become increasingly upset at official attempts to reclaim the land and at Robinson's failure to address the needs of the poor.

Bakr's anger turned to action on the evening of July 27, when he and more than 70 of his men stormed the Trinidad and Tobago TV studios, a mile from their mosque. At the same time, a powerful car bomb gutted the downtown police headquarters, and another group of gunmen seized the parliament building, taking Robinson and seven Cabinet ministers hostage. At 6:18 p.m., Bakr appeared on state-owned TV and announced that his "troops" had overthrown the government. Later he demanded that Robinson resign, new elections be held and an amnesty be granted to his rebel band.

As the shock of the news sank in, Trinidadians went on a weekend looting spree that left Port-of-Spain's main shopping street a shambles. But the popular uprising that Bakr had counted on never came, and he and his men soon found themselves surrounded by troops and without food. On the fifth day Bakr agreed to release Robinson, 63, who had been shot in the leg and suffers from diabetes and glaucoma. Next day Bakr and his men freed the remaining hostages and gave themselves up.

The government had to use a bit of diplomatic sleight of hand to resolve the standoff. Spokesman Shaw admitted that Robinson had agreed to Bakr's terms, but stressed that the Prime Minister had endorsed the demands under extreme duress, making them nonbinding. "Tricked, double-crossed, whatever you want to call it. It is foolish to quibble with ethics when you are dealing with situations of this kind," said Shaw. "Why not promise them the moon and the stars?"

While the audacious putsch introduced a new and disquieting dimension of Muslim extremism to the Caribbean, Jamaat al-Muslimeen remains a fringe group. Still, leaders attending last week's annual Caribbean Community meeting in Jamaica were haunted by the specter of Middle East-style Muslim uprisings.

Far more ominous, perhaps, were the economic implications of the widespread looting that broke out. The violence resulted in the worst damage seen since the Black Power riots in 1970, when half the army rebelled in support of hundreds of discontented young blacks who took to the streets of Port-of- Spain. Poor Trinidadians were signaling their growing impatience with a life of deepening poverty and an unemployment rate that has exceeded 20% since the collapse of the 1980s oil boom. Robinson has seen his standing eroded by such unpopular International Monetary Fund-dictated measures as a 10% pay cut and a new 15% value-added tax, and by his decision to spend $125,000 on a statue of a deceased civil servant. "It is a message and a lesson for the government," said one Port-of-Spain truck driver, adding "There are too many unemployed, and they don't understand all that complicated economic stuff that's strangling them." If that doesn't change soon, the people may soon be singing Bye, Bye, Mr. Prime Minister.

With reporting by Bernard Diederich/Port-of-Spain (Article appears on page 25 in some issues)