Pan Trin­ba­go has ex­pressed deep dis­ap­point­ment at the gov­ern­ment’s de­ci­sion to de­fer the of­fi­cial im­ple­men­ta­tion of the Steel­pan on the na­tion­al Coat of Arms un­til 2031.

The or­gan­i­sa­tion said the move un­der­mines the his­toric amend­ment passed in Feb­ru­ary 2025, which had re­ceived unan­i­mous sup­port in Par­lia­ment and for­mal­ly recog­nised the Steel­pan as part of the coun­try’s na­tion­al em­blem.

Pan Trin­ba­go pres­i­dent, Bev­er­ley Ram­sey-Moore, said the de­lay con­tra­dicts the uni­ty demon­strat­ed ear­li­er this year when both sides of the House agreed that the Steel­pan de­serves its place on the Coat of Arms.

“We are deeply dis­ap­point­ed. Both the Gov­ern­ment and Op­po­si­tion stood shoul­der to shoul­der in full sup­port of the amend­ment. It was de­bat­ed, scru­ti­nised, passed, as­sent­ed to, and pro­claimed. To now de­fer im­ple­men­ta­tion to 2031 sends an un­for­tu­nate mes­sage, not on­ly to the Steel­band com­mu­ni­ty, but to every cit­i­zen who cel­e­brat­ed this long-await­ed mo­ment of na­tion­al pride,” she said.

Pan Trin­ba­go high­light­ed that the Steel­pan’s in­clu­sion on the Coat of Arms is more than sym­bol­ic.

“It for­mal­ly recog­nis­es a glob­al cul­tur­al achieve­ment that has shaped Trinidad and To­ba­go’s cre­ative econ­o­my, tourism brand, and in­ter­na­tion­al rep­u­ta­tion,” the or­gan­i­sa­tion said.

Pan Trin­ba­go al­so cit­ed re­cent mile­stones, in­clud­ing Ge­o­graph­i­cal In­di­ca­tion recog­ni­tion, pas­sage of the Na­tion­al Mu­si­cal In­stru­ment Act, and the es­tab­lish­ment of UN-recog­nised World Steel­pan Day, as ex­am­ples of the na­tion ho­n­our­ing its cul­tur­al her­itage.

Ram­sey-Moore em­pha­sised that the Steel­pan con­tin­ues to unite com­mu­ni­ties across the coun­try and that de­lay­ing the im­ple­men­ta­tion risks di­min­ish­ing its sig­nif­i­cance in na­tion­al iden­ti­ty.

Pan Trin­ba­go called for trans­paren­cy on the re­vised 2031 time­line and reaf­firmed its com­mit­ment to work­ing with the gov­ern­ment and oth­er stake­hold­ers to up­hold the spir­it of the 2025 par­lia­men­tary de­ci­sion.

“De­lay­ing im­ple­men­ta­tion to 2031 is not in align­ment with the spir­it of uni­ty and progress demon­strat­ed when this Bill was unan­i­mous­ly passed,” Ram­sey-Moore said.