Nigel Teles­ford

Free­lance Cor­re­spon­dent

Dance­hall megas­tar Adid­ja “Vy­bz Kar­tel” Palmer has been cleared to ar­rive and in Trinidad ahead of his per­for­mance at the One Caribbean Uni­ty Mu­sic Fes­ti­val sched­uled for Sat­ur­day night at the Queen’s Park Sa­van­nah in Port-of-Spain.

Sources close to the or­gan­is­ing com­mit­tee of Ja­cho En­ter­tain­ment said the God Is The Great­est singer was of­fi­cial­ly cleared to en­ter the coun­try and per­form on Sat­ur­day. The of­fi­cial let­ter, stamped by the Min­istry of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty and dat­ed as at May 26, 2025, reads: “This per­mit en­ables Mr Adid­ja Az­im Palmer, hold­er of Ja­maican Pass­port is­sued on Au­gust 12, 2024 to en­ter and re­main in Trinidad and To­ba­go for a pe­ri­od of sev­en (7) days.”

The per­mit fur­ther out­lines con­di­tions un­der which Palmer can do ra­dio in­ter­views (be­tween 9 am to 12 noon and 1 pm to 3 pm), but pro­hibits the trend­ing artiste from par­tic­i­pat­ing in any group, com­mu­ni­ty or of­fi­cial crime aware­ness func­tions or meet­ings and asks that his per­for­mance reper­toire be adapt­ed to ex­clude ma­te­r­i­al that may be con­sid­ered of­fen­sive. The per­mit fur­ther states that Palmer “must not com­mu­ni­cate any words or en­gage in any ac­tiv­i­ty which may like­ly be con­strued as pro­mot­ing a gang, con­trary to the pro­vi­sion of the An­ti-Gang Act.”

On May 15, Guardian Me­dia ex­clu­sive­ly re­port­ed that Min­is­ter of De­fence Wayne Sturge had is­sued a draft or­der lim­it­ing Palmer’s move­ment while in T&T for the con­cert. Dur­ing a post-Cab­i­net me­dia brief­ing that same day, Sturge said the de­ci­sion was made for the well-be­ing of the na­tion’s chil­dren, since Palmer was sched­uled to speak to young­sters and make oth­er ap­pear­ances. He was re­leased from prison in Ja­maica last Ju­ly and had been in prison for mur­der since 2014.

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar said it was she who had voiced con­cern about Palmer in­ter­act­ing with chil­dren. A day lat­er, Sturge ex­plained that he act­ed in the “pub­lic in­ter­est” by re­fus­ing per­mis­sion for Palmer to en­gage in a com­mu­ni­ty meet and greet, a school vis­it and youth cen­tre, a cul­tur­al lunch with com­mu­ni­ty lead­ers, a crime aware­ness func­tion, a pan­el talk and a com­mu­ni­ty walk-through.

Dig­i­tal mar­ket­ing lead for the One Caribbean Uni­ty Mu­sic Fes­ti­val, Jonathan Gomez said that the clear­ance “paves the way for the top trend­ing event of the week­end to wel­come the top trend­ing artiste.”

“The World Boss has now been of­fi­cial­ly cleared to ar­rive and per­form in Trinidad, so all roads lead to the Queen’s Park Sa­van­nah this Sat­ur­day night, where Vy­bz Kar­tel will de­liv­er an elec­tri­fy­ing per­for­mance, along­side some of the na­tion and the re­gion’s top acts,” he said.