Ot­to Car­ring­ton

Se­nior Re­porter

ot­to.car­ring­ton@guardian.co.tt

The Uni­ver­si­ty of Trinidad and To­ba­go (UTT) made his­to­ry yes­ter­day when 82-year-old Jack Austin Warn­er—for­mer FI­FA vice-pres­i­dent, busi­ness­man, and politi­cian—was award­ed a Doc­tor of Phi­los­o­phy, be­com­ing the old­est PhD grad­u­ate in the in­sti­tu­tion’s his­to­ry.

Warn­er’s achieve­ment drew a stand­ing ova­tion from the 2025 grad­u­at­ing class, fac­ul­ty, and dig­ni­taries, in­clud­ing Pres­i­dent Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo.

Speak­ing af­ter re­ceiv­ing his doc­tor­ate, Dr Warn­er said he hoped his ac­com­plish­ment would in­spire young peo­ple.

“I feel that this could serve as an in­spi­ra­tion for young peo­ple. I have al­ways main­tained that ed­u­ca­tion doesn’t have a shelf life—you can nev­er stop learn­ing,” he said.

“There were days, I must ad­mit, when I felt frus­trat­ed and thought it would nev­er end. Yet my fam­i­ly, my staff, and my two pro­fes­sors kept faith with me, and to­day I have achieved what I set out to do. I am over­joyed—on top of the moon—and I must thank the Lord and every­one who has sup­port­ed me through­out this jour­ney.”

But the cer­e­mo­ny’s most strik­ing mo­ment came from Hon­orary Doc­tor of Laws re­cip­i­ent and Se­nior Coun­sel Is­rael Ra­ja Khan, whose ad­dress shift­ed the tone from cel­e­bra­tion to a sober re­flec­tion on the state of the na­tion.

The 2025 grad­u­a­tion cer­e­mo­ny, themed “Forged in In­no­va­tion: Em­pow­er­ing Change Mak­ers for a Re­silient Na­tion,” was held at the Na­tion­al Acad­e­my for the Per­form­ing Arts (NA­PA).

Khan, recog­nised for his con­tri­bu­tions to law and pub­lic ser­vice, told grad­u­ates that Warn­er’s per­se­ver­ance em­bod­ied dis­ci­pline and re­silience.

“In life, the race is not for the swiftest, nor the bat­tle to the strongest,” he said, “but to those who can en­dure to the end.”

He then de­liv­ered a sear­ing cri­tique of the jus­tice sys­tem, urg­ing grad­u­ates to con­front na­tion­al short­com­ings with courage, in­tegri­ty, and moral clar­i­ty.

“It is moral­ly wrong, if not il­le­gal, that over 300 ac­cused per­sons are rot­ting away in jail for 12 to 15 years await­ing tri­al,” he de­clared. “The law pre­sumes them in­no­cent un­til proven guilty, yet they lan­guish while jus­tice sleeps.”

Khan added that ap­prox­i­mate­ly 1,600 po­lice killings over the past three decades have not been prop­er­ly in­ves­ti­gat­ed through in­quests.

“We owe fair­ness to the rel­a­tives of the de­ceased and to the po­lice them­selves,” he said.

Turn­ing to the rise in vi­o­lent crime, Khan warned that the coun­try had reached a break­ing point.

“Our cit­i­zens can­not con­tin­ue liv­ing in fear. Bold-faced crim­i­nals in­vade homes, ter­rorise fam­i­lies, and walk free. And the na­tion asks: Where is jus­tice?”

To dri­ve home his point, he ref­er­enced the re­cent killing of a hus­band and wife dur­ing a home in­va­sion in Pe­nal, which left their teenage daugh­ter or­phaned.

“This is the hu­man cost of a sys­tem that is fail­ing its peo­ple,” he said. “And you, the grad­u­ates, must be part of the so­lu­tion.”

Ad­dress­ing the grad­u­at­ing class of 1,500, Khan urged them to view their ed­u­ca­tion not mere­ly as per­son­al ad­vance­ment but as a tool for na­tion­al up­lift­ment.

“Ex­am­ine your com­mu­ni­ty. Ask your­self: ‘How can I use my ed­u­ca­tion to im­prove the lives around me?’ In­tro­duc­ing change is not easy. De­trac­tors will try to si­lence you. But you must stand firm.”

He re­mind­ed them that among the co­hort could be fu­ture prime min­is­ters, pres­i­dents, chief jus­tices, and schol­ars.

“You have come from the vil­lage,” he said. “And now it is time for you to give back to the vil­lage—to Trinidad and To­ba­go.”

“You must nev­er, ever, ever com­pro­mise your in­tegri­ty,” he added. “That is the lega­cy you will leave to your chil­dren, your grand­chil­dren, and this beloved coun­try.”

Dr Khan was among five in­di­vid­u­als re­ceiv­ing hon­orary de­grees. Busi­ness­man Pe­ter Elias re­ceived an Hon­orary Doc­tor of Fine Arts; vi­sion­ary leader and cul­tur­al pi­o­neer Gilman Fi­garo was named Hon­orary Dis­tin­guished Fel­low; and ed­u­ca­tor and cul­tur­al ad­vo­cate Dr Jamwant Ma­haraj re­ceived the Hon­orary Doc­tor of Sci­ence.

Chair­man of the UTT Board of Gov­er­nors, Dr Sel­wyn Cud­joe, praised the uni­ver­si­ty’s re­search out­put and part­ner­ships, not­ing that UTT must con­tin­ue strength­en­ing con­sul­tan­cy ser­vices and pri­vate-sec­tor col­lab­o­ra­tions to en­sure long-term sus­tain­abil­i­ty.

“The board will cham­pi­on fi­nan­cial pru­dence and sus­tain­abil­i­ty,” he said, high­light­ing on­go­ing ef­forts to cre­ate new rev­enue streams.

Speak­ing to his own lead­er­ship ap­proach, Dr Cud­joe added, “Lead­er­ship must be vi­sion­ary, col­lab­o­ra­tive, and some­times, yes, even com­bat­ive. We are not placid ob­jects sim­ply to stamp things and give the go-ahead.”