Retired major Sarwan Boodram has been appointed as director of the National Operations Centre (NOC).
Boodram, who replaces former director Lieutenant Commander Garvin Heerah, took up duty yesterday, a statement from the National Security Ministry said.
Heerah is currently on leave and is being assigned to the National Security Training Academy (NSTA).
The statement said that former deputy police commissioner Mervyn Richardson, strategic coordinator of the Multi-Agency Task Force, remained in his substantive post.
The Express reported yesterday that Richardson, who is at the centre of a police probe, was being named as director of the NOC.
Former national security minister Jack Warner named Richardson as the officer who came to him after a small quantity of marijuana was found at the private residence of Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar in 2013.
In a signed statement, dated June 6, Warner said that he, a senior police officer and another named politician were involved in a cover-up of the discovery of five grammes of marijuana found at Persad-Bissessar’s Phillipine home.
Warner also claimed that the PM’s then security advisor and former national security minister Gary Griffith was aware of the drug find.
About Sarwan Boodram
Boodram began his professional career in 1980 as a military combative instructor for recruits in the T&T Regiment and has been actively involved in the development of training programmes. He has been crucial in live combat situations including various Special Forces Operations and the 1990 attempted coup.
He is also the first in the Defence Force to achieve the rank of Grandmaster.
Boodram holds a Master of Sciences Degree in Security and Risk Management from the School of Criminology at the University of Leicester in the United Kingdom, and a Certificate in Physical Education from the University of the West Indies.
He has also served as the corporate security advisor for Atlantic LNG, as a security consultant to the tourism and energy industries, and as a special advisor on national security infrastructure to the energy industries.