Every­one speaks in half-truths and po­lite lies. The truth, the whole truth, so help me God… The weight of the truth should press hard­er than any ac­cu­sa­tion. Life has a way of mak­ing hon­est peo­ple tired. Hon­est peo­ple de­serve the truth, but the truth is hard; it’s like chas­ing shad­ows.

Ex­pla­na­tions don’t soft­en con­se­quences. What is lack­ing is the truth. Be it the nev­er-end­ing Life Sport saga and al­most every­thing else. To­day’s Things That Mat­ter, how­ev­er, isn’t about Life Sport. It’s about dis­ap­pear­ing trees.

The five trees plant­ed didn’t last as long as the Red House fire. They were up­root­ed. Who the cul­prit or cul­prits are isn’t as im­por­tant as the in­ten­tion and mo­tive. Who knows who did it or why?

What is known is that the Di­ane Hen­der­son-led Trinidad and To­ba­go Olympic Com­mit­tee (TTOC) and Trinidad and To­ba­go Com­mon­wealth Games As­so­ci­a­tion (TTC­GA) plant­ed trees in the com­mu­ni­ty of Bel­mont. A leap of faith. Bel­mont is a choice.

Ac­cord­ing to a TTOC/TTC­GA press re­lease, the Trinidad and To­ba­go Com­mon­wealth Games As­so­ci­a­tion (TTC­GA) joined re­gion­al part­ners across the Caribbean in a Com­mon­wealth Day 2026 Tree Plant­i­ng Ini­tia­tive, a sym­bol­ic ac­tion pro­mot­ing en­vi­ron­men­tal sus­tain­abil­i­ty and col­lec­tive re­spon­si­bil­i­ty among the Com­mon­wealth of Na­tions.

The dis­ap­pear­ing trees plant­ed by the TTC­GA ought not to be tak­en as Bel­mont’s re­jec­tion of sus­tain­abil­i­ty, com­mu­ni­ty en­gage­ment, and en­vi­ron­men­tal pro­tec­tion.

Af­ter all the glow­ing things said by the TTOC and TTC­GA pres­i­dent Di­ane Hen­der­son and Coun­cil­lor for the Elec­toral Dis­trict of Bel­mont North/West Mal­ouia Bourne at the plant­i­ng cer­e­mo­ny a week ago (Com­mon­wealth Day, Mon­day 9th March). The ba­by trees are gone.

That the TTOC/TTC­GA chose Bel­mont-Robin­sonville, to be ex­act, to lo­cate the Olympic and Com­mon­wealth house is not an in­signif­i­cant de­ci­sion. The cur­rent TTOC/TTC­GA pres­i­dent must be cred­it­ed for that de­ci­sion. The tree-plant­i­ng cer­e­mo­ny was more than just a Com­mon­wealth Day event – it was a de­c­la­ra­tion of in­tent to con­tribute to the sus­tain­able de­vel­op­ment of the com­mu­ni­ty of Bel­mont. Coun­cil­lor Bourne, in ex­press­ing her thanks, point­ed to the im­por­tance of the TTOC/TTC­GA choos­ing Bel­mont and the pos­i­tive ben­e­fits it will bring to Bel­mont.

The old peo­ple re­al­ly have a say­ing that af­ter joy comes sor­row. By Fri­day 13th March the ba­by trees were gone. Yes! Dis­ap­peared! Erased!. Make a re­port to the po­lice? Chances are that will most like­ly be treat­ed as friv­o­lous and a waste of po­lice time. Unim­por­tant. The mes­sage such an act may send to the TTOC/TTC­GA and its sense of safe­ty and se­cu­ri­ty is ir­rel­e­vant.

Full dis­clo­sure- as a Bel­mont born and grow. The pride I felt at the tan­gi­ble act of faith and con­fi­dence in Bel­mont was re­al...so hav­ing to use space in to­day’s Things That Mat­ter to ad­dress the—what do I call it—theft, van­dal­ism, what is it re­al­ly? Is it dis­grun­tled or re­sent­ful neigh­bours? No amount of spec­u­la­tion can change the fact that it’s dis­turb­ing and em­bar­rass­ing for Bel­mont.

What is the next step? Plant five more ba­by trees? To what end? For them to dis­ap­pear again?

Maybe I am bi­ased, but I know it isn’t a true re­flec­tion of Bel­mont. Bel­mont is bet­ter than that.

In Bel­mont, com­mu­ni­ty spir­it mat­ters. Build­ing back bet­ter is a Bel­mont mind­set. Who­ev­er re­moved the ba­by trees is not a rep­re­sen­ta­tive of Bel­mont.

Ed­i­tor’s note: The views ex­pressed in the pre­ced­ing ar­ti­cle are sole­ly those of the au­thor and do not re­flect the views of any or­gan­i­sa­tion in which he is a stake­hold­er.