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Monday, July 7, 2025

Legendary South panman honoured

by

20130925

Leg­endary San Fer­nan­do pan­man Lennox Bob­by Mo­hammed, dubbed as one of the un­sung he­roes of the south­ern city, has re­ceived a Re­pub­lic Day award from the non-gov­ern­men­tal group, Cit­i­zens for a Bet­ter T&T.The func­tion took place at the CBTT's quar­ters at Lazarri Street, San Fer­nan­do, on Mon­day.Dur­ing the brief cer­e­mo­ny in his ho­n­our, Mo­hammed said thou­sands of cit­i­zens were de­serv­ing of an award for their tire­less and un­selfish con­tri­bu­tion to their coun­try but re­ceived none for one rea­son or the oth­er.

"These are the cit­i­zens with whom I would like to share this award," the mu­sic icon said.Mo­hammed who at the age of 22 be­came the youngest arranger in T&T to win a Panora­ma ti­tle said God had touched his life in such a pow­er­ful way that he was able to claw his way from the from the brink of per­son­al de­spair to one of hope for him­self, his fam­i­ly and his coun­try.He is adamant that crim­i­nals can be­come law-abid­ing cit­i­zens if on­ly they will al­low God to take con­trol of their lives.

"Christ is the an­swer to many of the prob­lems which man can­not solve," the 71- year-old pan icon said."This is my per­son­al ex­pe­ri­ence and that of many oth­ers who con­tin­ue to tes­ti­fy that their mis­er­able past has changed dras­ti­cal­ly from the day they give their lives to God."Mo­hammed, who be­lieves mu­sic and God are in his blood and soul, took the Guin­ness Cav­a­liers to the Panora­ma ti­tle in 1965 and re­peat­ed this feat in 1967 af­ter fin­ish­ing sec­ond in 1966.

He was ho­n­oured with the Hum­ming Bird Medal (Gold) in 1992. Mo­hammed, who was born at Siparia Old Road, be­fore mov­ing to San Fer­nan­do, at­tend­ed Siparia Road CM School, Mon Re­pos RC and Pre­sen­ta­tion Col­lege.

The for­mer pan arranger al­so said he would like to ded­i­cate his Re­pub­lic Day Award to his late fa­ther Zain­ool Mo­hammed who was a school prin­ci­pal, his late moth­er Enid, broth­ers Sel­wyn and Lester who both played for the Guin­ness Cav­a­liers, as well as his sis­ter Lynette and his grand­par­ents, all of whom sup­port­ed his love for the steel­pan.Mo­hammed point­ed out that he was very proud to be part of the rise of the steel­pan "which is not on­ly our na­tion­al in­stru­ment but is to­day recog­nised all over the world."

In his con­tri­bu­tion, he de­scribed him­self as an in­no­va­tor and trend­set­ter, in that he was the first per­son of East In­di­an de­scent to suc­ceed at the high­est lev­el as a steel­pan arranger. He stat­ed that in his days, steel­bands were dom­i­nat­ed main­ly by Afro-Trinida­di­ans from Port-of-Spain, so it was a sur­prise and shock to many when his rel­a­tive­ly un­known South band–the Guin­ness Cav­a­liers–won the Panora­ma ti­tle in the 1960s.

Mo­hammed, who is al­so an ac­com­plished pi­ano play­er, con­tin­ues to play and teach his mu­sic at many church­es."Good cit­i­zens are those who serve their coun­try with dis­tinc­tion with­out ex­pect­ing much in re­turn," he said.CBTT's pres­i­dent Har­rack Bal­ram­s­ingh told the small gath­er­ing that Mo­hammed was a true pa­tri­ot who want­ed to en­sure that many young peo­ple be­came in­ter­est­ed in our na­tion­al in­stru­ment.


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