THE media lost some notable personalities this year none larger than former Express editor-at-large Keith Smith and television presenter Allyson Hennessy.
Smith, who was one of the foundation members of the Express newsroom, died in February this year after an award-winning career that saw him fashion a unique journalistic style that celebrated not just the local idiom but also brought calypso and Carnival coverage into the media mainstream.
Hennessy, who like Smith, was a connoisseur of fine cuisine also shared his love of Carnival and used her television programmes to profile some of the very people Smith wrote about in his columns and featured in the Express. She died in May after a sudden illness.
Former Intercol football stand-out turned reporter Gregory Trujillio died in July. Trujillio, who worked briefly with the Mirror, made his name as a Guardian sports reporter. His passing was a shocking as that of another Mirror veteran, former culture photo-journalist Rolph Warner, who died in October and was at the time functioning as Media Advisor to Arts and Multiculturalism Minister Winston ‘Gypsy’ Peters.
Another notable passing in October was former Express columnist Rajnie Ramlakhan. Ramlakhan’s contribution to journalism was not just her column, which brought a Hindu perspective to mainstream media, but her defamation suit against the TnT Mirror and then Assistant Editor Ramjohn Ali, who described her as an “ugly, racist cobo” in a series of columns. She was awarded close to $.9 million in what was an unusual libel case.
The media also lost Herman Roop Dass in November and with him coverage of the issues of Central Trinidad, which he brought to the pages of the Guardian and later Newsday.
Media Watch acknowledges their passing and their contribution to journalism in Trinidad and Tobago up to 2011.
