Shal­iza Has­sanali

Her Majesty Queen Eliz­a­beth II says To­ba­go con­tin­ues to be a by­word in the Unit­ed King­dom for Caribbean hos­pi­tal­i­ty. Every year, the Queen said, close to 50,000 British tourists vis­it­ed To­ba­go. She said she hoped peo­ple of all ages would con­tin­ue to trav­el be­tween the two coun­tries and learn about each oth­er, whether work­ing, study­ing or vis­it­ing as tourists.

The Queen, in de­liv­er­ing her speech on Thurs­day at a gala state ban­quet, held in ho­n­our for the Duke of Ed­in­burgh Prince Philip and her Majesty at Pres­i­dent's House, St Ann's, praised To­ba­go for be­ing a pop­u­lar des­ti­na­tion for British tourists. "To­ba­go con­tin­ues to be a by­word in the Unit­ed King­dom for Caribbean hos­pi­tal­i­ty. Some 50,000 British tourists vis­it the is­land each year," the Queen said, as she ad­dressed Prime Min­is­ter Patrick Man­ning, Op­po­si­tion mem­bers, gov­ern­ment min­is­ters and guests."

The Queen show­ered prais­es on To­ba­go. To­ba­go has been faced with neg­a­tive pub­lic­i­ty with­in the last few months af­ter four British na­tion­als fell vic­tims to crime on the is­land. From her last vis­it over two decades ago, the Queen ad­mit­ted that T&T had faced many changes, made great strides and ac­com­plish­ments, but ad­mit­ted that the en­dur­ing at­tribute that re­mained was the great warmth and friend­li­ness of the peo­ple.