Former President and Prime Minister of T&T Arthur NR Robinson has died

[Trinidad Express] – He was the only Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago to have the unfortunate opportunity, and the strength of character, to defy Islamic terrorists.

With a gun pointed to his head during the 1990 coup attempt, Arthur Napoleon Raymond Robinson, the third Prime Minister of T&T, was given a telephone and ordered by Jamaat-al-Muslimeen insurgents holding him hostage in Parliament to tell the Army to back down. Instead, Mr Robinson shouted into the receiver, “Attack with full force!”

For his defiance, he was beaten by his captors and shot in the kneecap – an injury that would stay with him for the rest of his days.

Born on December 16, 1926 in Calder Hall, Tobago, Robinson became the first and only person to hold the three highest offices of Trinidad and Tobago: Chairman of the Tobago House of Assembly (THA), from 1981-1986; Prime Minister from 1986-1991; and President of T&T from 1997-2003.