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Tuesday, July 8, 2025

New CoP to be sworn in during first-ever handing over parade

by

Anna-Lisa Paul
21 days ago
20250617
Acting Police Commissioner Junior Benjamin, left, speaks with incoming Police Commissioner Allister Guevarro, at the rehearsal for the handing over ceremony at the Police Academy Grounds,  St James, yesterday.

Acting Police Commissioner Junior Benjamin, left, speaks with incoming Police Commissioner Allister Guevarro, at the rehearsal for the handing over ceremony at the Police Academy Grounds, St James, yesterday.

COURTESY:TTPS

An­na-Lisa Paul

Se­nior Re­porter

an­na-lisa.paul@guardian.co.tt

Al­lis­ter Gue­var­ro will be sworn in to­day as T&T’s Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice (CoP) in the first-ever hand­ing over pa­rade of its kind.

The out­go­ing act­ing CoP, Ju­nior Ben­jamin, will pass the ba­ton over to the 49-year-old fa­ther of two dur­ing a for­mal cer­e­mo­ny at the Po­lice Acad­e­my in St James.

The event, sched­uled to be­gin at 4 pm, will show­case var­i­ous arms of the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS), in­clud­ing the Mount­ed Branch and the Ca­nine Unit, along with pre­sen­ta­tions from spe­cialised units.

Guardian Me­dia was told a dress re­hearsal yes­ter­day was “ex­cit­ing” for Ben­jamin and Gue­var­ro.

Speak­ing hours ahead of the much an­tic­i­pat­ed hand­ing over, Ben­jamin thanked God and the au­thor­i­ties for what he de­scribed as an “awe­some” ex­pe­ri­ence in of­fice.

Con­firm­ing he had been present at the acad­e­my to par­tic­i­pate in yes­ter­day’s run-through, he said, “This is the first time we are do­ing this and we want to make sure we get it right. Every­one’s spir­its are good and it is amaz­ing, the num­ber of things that are go­ing to be done.”

He said metic­u­lous plan­ning had gone in­to or­gan­is­ing the pro­gramme in a bid to show just how much we wel­come the new Com­mis­sion­er in­to this arrange­ment to lead the or­gan­i­sa­tion.”

Ben­jamin promised to­day’s pa­rade would be some­thing of a treat for those in at­ten­dance, as well as the wider pub­lic.

Al­though his stint at the helm of the TTPS was short, hav­ing on­ly sat in the chair as CoP from Feb­ru­ary 6, Ben­jamin said, “I want to en­cour­age per­sons to see this as the be­gin­ning of a new dis­pen­sa­tion with­in the or­gan­i­sa­tion.”

Re­it­er­at­ing that the main ob­jec­tive re­mained mak­ing the TTPS an em­ploy­er of choice, he said, “This is how we want to re­al­ly wel­come our new com­mis­sion­er.”

More ex­cit­ed for what is to come, Ben­jamin said, “At this time, pur­pose ex­ceeds my pain and I know Mr Gue­var­ro is go­ing to bring a whole lot of ex­pe­ri­ence to build­ing the Po­lice Ser­vice.”

Cel­e­brat­ing the TTPS’ ac­com­plish­ments dur­ing the past sev­er­al months, he said, “We have come a long way from the time I got it to where we are now, in such a short space of time.

“To hand over the TTPS now with so many ac­com­plish­ments in terms of where the crime sit­u­a­tion is, the morale of the of­fi­cers are re­al­ly more up than how it was...it is re­fresh­ing to know he is not start­ing from ground ze­ro.”

Ben­jamin said he was hap­py to con­tin­ue be­ing part of the ex­ec­u­tive which will serve un­der Gue­var­ro’s lead­er­ship.

To­day’s pa­rade was said to be the brain­child of act­ing Deputy Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Curt Si­mon.

Sev­er­al dig­ni­taries, in­clud­ing Min­is­ter of Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty, Roger Alexan­der, are ex­pect­ed to be in at­ten­dance.


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