Chester Sam­bra­no

A Guard of Ho­n­our com­pris­ing sharply dressed mem­bers of the De­fence Force sig­nalled the start of the process to in­stall a new Pres­i­dent of the Re­pub­lic of Trinidad and To­ba­go.

Scores of on­look­ers, in­clud­ing school chil­dren in uni­form, looked on from the Grand­Stand at the Queens Park Sa­van­nah as Pres­i­dent-Elect Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo and her hus­band Ker­wyn Gar­cia ar­rived at the venue.

Their ar­rival was fol­lowed by Chief Jus­tice Ivor Archie and Mrs Archie, Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley and his wife Mrs Sharon Row­ley.

The fi­nal ma­jor dig­ni­tary to ar­rive was Pres­i­dent Paula-Mae Weekes to par­tic­i­pate in the cer­e­mo­ni­al hand­ing over of the reigns of Com­man­der in Chief of the Armed Forces.

The break­ing of the Pres­i­den­tial Stan­dard was next, fol­lowed by the Pres­i­den­tial Salute, while the Na­tion­al An­them was played si­mul­ta­ne­ous­ly.

Chief Ri­car­do Bharath Her­nan­dez of the San­ta Rosa First Peo­ple and pres­i­dent of the In­ter-Re­li­gious Or­gan­i­sa­tion Pun­dit Mookram Sir­joo did the in­vo­ca­tion.

A mu­si­cal in­ter­lude by the South­er­naires Choir per­form­ing Melanie Hud­son's 'I will al­ways be there for you' en­ter­tained the at­ten­dees be­fore the Swear­ing-In Cer­e­mo­ny took place, ad­min­is­tered by the Chief Jus­tice.

In her first act as the 7th Pres­i­dent of Trinidad and To­ba­go, Mrs Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo re­ceived a Pres­i­den­tial Salute ac­com­pa­nied by the Na­tion­al An­them and a Twen­ty-One Gun Salute.

She then pro­ceed­ed to in­spect the Guard of Ho­n­our.

An­oth­er per­for­mance from the South­er­naires Choir fol­lowed, with a ren­di­tion of Mer­chant's 'Let us build a na­tion to­geth­er'.

In her In­au­gur­al Ad­dress, Her Ex­cel­len­cy Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo thanked for­mer Pres­i­dent Paula-Mae Weekes and paid trib­ute to this coun­try's past pres­i­dents.

She then as­sured that" As your Pres­i­dent, I will fight to the end to make the Of­fice work bet­ter for all of us."

Her Ex­cel­len­cy out­lined plans to de­mys­ti­fy the role of the Pres­i­dent, year-round youth delin­quen­cy pro­grammes, and the mod­ernising of pro­to­cols of the Of­fice of Pres­i­dent, to be­come more ac­ces­si­ble to the and "less iso­lat­ed from the pub­lic."

She al­so ac­knowl­edged that there are some who were and still are against her ap­point­ment.

How­ev­er, she said, "we are still this coun­try's daugh­ters and sons. And so I pledge to work with and to re­spect all cit­i­zens even and es­pe­cial­ly those who might not yet wish to work with me."

Mrs Kan­ga­loo end­ed by thank­ing her hus­band of 24 years and her oth­er fam­i­ly and friends who have sup­port­ed her through­out her life and ca­reer.