The San­ta Rosa First Peo­ples Com­mu­ni­ty con­tin­ues to pro­mote and sup­port the re­cov­ery and preser­va­tion of its her­itage through its an­nu­al Amerindi­an Her­itage Fes­ti­val.

On Wednes­day Oc­to­ber 14, the com­mu­ni­ty cel­e­brat­ed the 26th an­niver­sary of its Day of Recog­ni­tion with a tra­di­tion­al Smoke Cer­e­mo­ny at the Stat­ue of Hyari­ma in Ari­ma, ho­n­our­ing the coura­geous chief of the Nepuyo Na­tion.

On the fol­low­ing day, a wa­ter rit­u­al was per­formed at the Ari­ma Riv­er, off the Ari­ma-Blan­chisseuse Road.

Chief Ri­car­do Bharath Her­nan­dez presided over both cer­e­monies, which were at­tend­ed by var­i­ous In­dige­nous del­e­gates from oth­er coun­tries, par­tic­u­lar­ly Suri­name, as well as Op­po­si­tion Leader and MP for Ari­ma, Pene­lope Beck­les.

Oc­to­ber 14 was grant­ed Day of Recog­ni­tion sta­tus in 2000, but has yet to be­come a pub­lic hol­i­day, de­spite nu­mer­ous re­quests from the San­ta Rosa First Peo­ples Com­mu­ni­ty.

The group was recog­nised by the Gov­ern­ment in 1990 as the sole le­git­i­mate rep­re­sen­ta­tive of Trinidad and To­ba­go’s In­dige­nous peo­ple.

Edi­son Boodoos­ingh cap­tured these im­ages.