By Kevin Felmine From Trinidad & Tobago Guardian

While re­la­tions be­tween T&T and Ja­maica seems ques­tion­able at times, a hand­shake be­tween Ja­maican reg­gae star Bu­ju Ban­ton and Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Gary Grif­fith might just see the start of greater uni­ty be­tween the na­tions.

“How can you ever think Trinidad and To­ba­go, don’t ever doubt, we are your friends. And GG to BB, Trinidad & To­ba­go and Ja­ma­cia, al­lies for­ev­er,” Grif­fith said af­ter be­ing called on­to the stage by Bu­ju Ban­ton at the I Am Leg­end con­cert at the Queen’s Park Sa­van­nah on Sun­day.

Dur­ing his set, Bu­ju Ban­ton called on Grif­fith to show cit­i­zens that all was well. The act fol­lowed crit­i­cism from fans af­ter po­lice car­ried out a search war­rant of the artiste’s ho­tel room on Sat­ur­day, a day af­ter he ar­rived in the coun­try for his an­tic­i­pat­ed per­for­mance.

Fans went to so­cial me­dia, claim­ing that the po­lice were dis­crim­i­nat­ing against the artiste, who months ear­li­er, had just been re­leased from a US prison af­ter be­ing in­car­cer­at­ed for 10-years for drug traf­fick­ing.

Many felt that he had served his time and should not be treat­ed as a crim­i­nal.

“Yes Mr Gary Grif­fith, Mr Com­mis­sion­er, re­spect. Tell the peo­ple of Trinidad and To­ba­go that all is well and it end­ed well,” Bu­ju Ban­ton said.

While there were screams in the crowd for the show­ing of uni­ty, some Face­book users felt it was a ploy by the po­lice to gain pub­lic­i­ty af­ter erring in their at­tack on the artiste.

On Sun­day, the Ja­maica Glean­er had re­port­ed that T&T’s Gov­ern­ment was in dam­age con­trol mode af­ter an “em­bar­rass­ing in­ci­dent” in which Bu­ju Ban­ton’s room was raid­ed by po­lice.

It quot­ed Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Stu­art Young, who not­ed Grif­fith’s as­sur­ances that the po­lice would have done all it could to en­sure that the re­main­der of the artiste’s vis­it was peace­ful and in­ci­dent free. It al­so in­clud­ed Grif­fith’s apol­o­gy and ig­no­rance of the planned raid.

Noth­ing il­le­gal was found dur­ing the raid and Grif­fith vis­it­ed the artiste lat­er that night.

The Caribbean News Ser­vice ran the head­line: “First his of­fi­cers searched Bu­ju Ban­ton’s ho­tel room; then Com­mis­sion­er shows up for pho­to shoot and apol­o­gise.”

Hy­per­life Mag­a­zine wrote that the artiste was tar­get­ed by po­lice. The news was al­so car­ried by Stabroek News in Guyana and the St Lu­cia News On­line.

The in­ci­dent is sig­nif­i­cant as there has been ten­sion among Ja­maicans over the treat­ment they re­ceived from im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cials in T&T in re­cent years.

In 2016, the Ja­maica gov­ern­ment said it was prob­ing al­le­ga­tions that two of their na­tion­als were ill-treat­ed on their ar­rival in Trinidad and re­mind­ed Ja­maicans of the Cari­com Com­plaints Pro­ce­dure, which may be used to en­sure their that na­tion­als who have been de­nied en­try, de­tained or mis­treat­ed at the ports of en­try of oth­er Cari­com states.

A month lat­er, 12 Ja­maicans were de­nied en­try in­to Trinidad af­ter they were “deemed like­ly to be­come charges on pub­lic funds. 

In 2013, 13 Ja­maicans were re­port­ed­ly de­nied en­try, de­tained and de­port­ed.

But at the end of their brief stint on stage, Bu­ju Ban­ton called for greater uni­ty be­tween both coun­tries: “You hear that? So when you go on so­cial me­dia, go on and make it bet­ter. The re­la­tion be­tween the na­tions must im­prove be­gin­ning tonight. Let’s go. We’re press­ing the re­set but­ton. You saw it.”

For more on this story go to: http://www.guardian.co.tt/news/reggae-star-and-cop-press-for-caribbean-unity-6.2.829798.d6a3538081