Toussaint led his 38,000 strong members in a strike, which crippled the industry and shot him into the headlines internationally. The strike was deemed illegal.

For his part in it, he was ordered to serve 10 days in jail, a sentence that made local colleagues poke fun at him saying that he remained with his Trini roots by doing a “10 days” even in New York.

He only did four days and was fined $1,000.

The many union heads who preceded Toussaint on the platform spoke of the daily struggles their members had to endure in the workplace, ranging from poor working conditions, poor salaries to health and safety issues.

Toussaint encouraged his comrades saying that he took on the likes of Mayor Bloomberg and other city heavyweights who, when they failed to listen, brought subways and buses to a total halt to get his message across.

It was the legacy of Fyzabad and the 1970 rebellion with which he left TnT, that he admitted helped him as a union leader, and he feels it is what should carry his colleagues here.

“… that reservoir of determination,” he went on.

He blamed the abundance of wealth as the reason for the problems the country now faces.

Toussaint said the coldness on the faces of today’s youth was a mirror being held up to the faces of the adults.

He told the massive gathering that in the land of plenty he was very much aware of the many shootings in the hills of Morvant, Laventille and Belmont where he was born.

“We have failed them,” he said, “we have done something wrong, we ought not to have failed them.”

Aware that labour unions were divided, he begged that they become united and in that way they would become invincible.

Toussaint told the gathering the last time he visited Trinidad was 30 years ago. It was 1976 when “Chin Lee was contracted to build secondary schools”.

He said various contractors were underpaying workers and he helped organise the then strike.