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Wednesday, July 23, 2025

Distinguished nationals awarded for outstanding service

by

20121006

Philip Buxo, Trinidad and To­ba­go's High Com­mis­sion­er to Cana­da, has re­it­er­at­ed his Gov­ern­ment's com­mit­ment to en­gag­ing all cit­i­zens in the de­ci­sion-mak­ing process, en­sur­ing they re­main the nu­cle­us of the de­vel­op­ment process. Buxo made the point at the High Com­mis­sion's Re­pub­lic Day Re­cep­tion last week­end in Ot­tawa. He spoke about the strong bi­lat­er­al re­la­tions be­tween Trinidad and To­ba­go and Cana­da since 1962. Cana­da was one of the first coun­tries to recog­nise and wel­come T&T as an in­de­pen­dent state."Cana­da and Trinidad and To­ba­go share many sim­i­lar­i­ties. We are both viewed as mul­ti­cul­tur­al na­tions that ho­n­our all cul­tures. Our peo­ple have worked to­geth­er to build peace­ful, pros­per­ous and re­spect­ed na­tions," Buxo said.

He al­so an­nounced that the High Com­mis­sion will soon be pub­lish­ing a book, To­geth­er we As­pire, To­geth­er we Achieve: Trinidad and To­ba­go in Cana­da 1962 to 2012. More than 50 na­tion­als will be in­clud­ed in this pub­li­ca­tion which ho­n­ours mem­bers of the T&T Di­as­po­ra in Cana­da. Speak­ing di­rect­ly to those na­tion­als, Buxo told them they are the true am­bas­sadors of T&T. "You know who you are and now oth­ers know where you are in the Cana­di­an land­scape. I en­trust you to con­nect with each oth­er and to­geth­er you must as­pire to in­spire the next gen­er­a­tion to achieve ex­cel­lence in Cana­da."

The Dis­tin­guished Na­tion­al of Trinidad and To­ba­go Cana­da Award was con­ferred on five peo­ple for their sig­nif­i­cant con­tri­bu­tions to their com­mu­ni­ties, in the fields of ed­u­ca­tion, pol­i­tics, med­i­cine, arts and sports in Cana­da. The re­cip­i­ents of this award in 2012 are: Dawn Gayle Eu­do­va Ad­di­son, prin­ci­pal of Morn­ing Star Mid­dle School. This ed­u­ca­tor and ad­min­is­tra­tor has made it her man­date to en­cour­age stu­dents to par­tic­i­pate in com­mu­ni­ty-ori­ent­ed projects that sup­port men­tal health, self-es­teem and healthy ac­tiv­i­ties, and to be RE­AL-Re­spect­ful, Ex­cel­lent, Ac­count­able and Life-long learn­ers.

Richard Rawle Az­iz, im­pre­sario, is a per­ma­nent fix­ture with­in the T&T Di­as­po­ra in the Greater Toron­to area and is in­volved with all re­li­gious fes­ti­vals and prop­a­ga­tion of spir­i­tu­al and char­i­ta­ble pro­grammes. His lead­er­ship and in­volve­ment in pro­mot­ing T&T's cul­ture in Cana­da is un­par­al­leled. He is a vi­brant voice in the me­dia, com­mu­ni­ty, the arts and en­ter­tain­ment, cul­ture, and so­cial jus­tice. Dr Gyaan­deo Seusaran Ma­hara­jh, chief of car­dio­vas­cu­lar surgery for the Chil­dren's Hos­pi­tal of East­ern On­tario, has re­mained com­mit­ted to his roots and has been re­turn­ing to Trinidad and To­ba­go on a vol­un­tary ba­sis to per­form car­diac surgery for the less for­tu­nate.

Last year, Ma­hara­jh cel­e­brat­ed an im­por­tant mile­stone-his first full decade of reg­u­lar­ly pro­vid­ing car­diac surgery to res­i­dents of his na­tive coun­try. To date he has per­formed 150 surg­eries in T&T and con­tin­ues to take the lead on re­lat­ed med­ical mis­sions. Dr Deo Poon­wassie, Prof Emer­i­tus, Uni­ver­si­ty of Man­i­to­ba, found­ing di­rec­tor of two ground­break­ing pro­grammes fo­cus­ing on abo­rig­i­nal stu­dents-the Ac­cess Pro­gramme and the Spe­cial Pre­med­ical Pro­gramme. Both projects re­ceived na­tion­al awards from the Cana­di­an As­so­ci­a­tion for Con­tin­u­ing Ed­u­ca­tion. Poon­wassie's con­tri­bu­tions and ac­com­plish­ments as an ed­u­ca­tor have been recog­nised with pro­mo­tion to the pres­ti­gious rank of Prof Emer­i­tus.

Ear­li­er this month, he was award­ed the Queen Eliz­a­beth II 2012 Di­a­mond Ju­bilee Medal Award. Jus­tice Sel­wyn Regi­nald Romil­ly, Su­pe­ri­or Court judge, cre­at­ed his­to­ry as the first black per­son ap­point­ed to any court in British Co­lum­bia, and on­ly the sec­ond black per­son ap­point­ed to any court in Cana­da. He has made sig­nif­i­cant con­tri­bu­tions to ju­di­cial and le­gal ed­u­ca­tion, con­duct­ed sem­i­nars and work­shops for judges, pre­sent­ed pa­pers to the Cana­di­an Bar As­so­ci­a­tion, the Na­tion­al Jus­tice In­sti­tute, the Na­tion­al Crim­i­nal Law Pro­gramme and the Fed­er­a­tion of Law So­ci­eties of Cana­da.


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