By Raffique Shah
February 08, 2009
Trinidad and Tobago News Blog
www.trinidadandtobagonews.com/blog
UP TO ten days ago, Lawrence Duprey was one of most admired businessmen in Trinidad and Tobago. He was not self-made, as some of his peers and predecessors were. He inherited the biggest and strongest insurance company in the country founded by his uncle Cyril. But having taken over the reins of CLICO, he quickly moved to diversify the insurance giant’s vast resources, to venture where no other local entrepreneur had, into the downstream energy sector.
Continue reading Beyond Duprey
In countries where people often face persecution because of race, ethnicity, religion and a myriad of social constructs intended to divide and rule, I often wonder how many brilliant minds have never come to blossom. Historians bemoan the knowledge that was lost when unenlightened foreigners invaded ancient lands burning books and reducing to ash what had already been known about the universe and about our progress as a species.
Contrary to the view expressed by Foreign Affairs Minister Gopee-Scoon the time is most propitious and ripe for the Inter-American System to be initiating dialogue with the regime of Raul Castro. President Barack Obama has signaled in clear, unambiguous language that US rapprochement with Cuba is on the cards especially with the closure of the Gitmo Detention Centre. He has also relaxed travel restrictions to Cuba by Cuban-Americans.
The handing over of prime Caroni lands to selected companies certainly raises cause for concern about the government’s agricultural policy and who benefits from it.
It is imperative on the Manning Administration having regard to the current global financial and economic meltdown that is ravaging all Latin American economies to appreciate that it cannot spend over $2bn to provide an April platform for the conduct of hemispheric multilateral diplomacy as if it is business as usual. Since May 2008 when the T&T Concept Paper detailing the agenda of the Fifth POS Summit of the Americas was accepted, the economic, social and trading conditions in the 34- membership of the OAS including in the USA and the Summit Host, T&T, have deteriorated radically. Latin America is not the same today.
January 24, 2009
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