Category Archives: Politics

Curb road carnage with punitive laws

By Raffique Shah
Sunday, May 24th 2009

Trinidad and Tobago News Blog
www.trinidadandtobagonews.com/blog

Vehicular AccidentSOME 30-odd years ago, when the Solomon Hochoy Highway was completed and fully opened to traffic (initially, only one carriageway was built and used), accidents close to the Claxton Bay flyover were not uncommon. Many were fatal, and that at a time when there were fewer than one-third the vehicles we now have using the nation’s roadways. Because accidents close to Claxton Bay happened more frequently than elsewhere, people tried to figure out why this was so.
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Integrity Act must be fair to all

By Raffique Shah
Sunday, May 17th 2009

The Integrity Commission of Trinidad and TobagoFRANKLY, I don’t give a flying fig whether President Max Richards opts to stay in a ski-lodge in the Alps for the entire summer, or he and Mrs Richards rent a castle in Austria, or they drop in on Denis Solomon at his “remote cottage” in north Italy, as he once described it to me. What I resent is every-man-Jack-or-Bas calling on President Max to return home pronto.
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Presidential dictatorship/pappyshow in T&T

By Dr. Kwame Nantambu
May 16, 2009

President Professor George Maxwell RichardsThe recent domino-like collapse of the membership of the Integrity Commission brings to the fore the stark reality of the co-existence of dictatorship politics in the Office of the Prime Minister and the Office of the President of T&T.

The fact of the matter is that the decision by President Professor George Maxwell Richards to appoint Jeffery Mac Farlane as a member and co-chairman of the Integrity Commission suggests two things: either the President is totally incompetent in the highest decision-making process in the country or he has overtly exhibited the utmost “arrogance of power” in this regard or both.
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Father, forgive them not…

By Raffique Shah
Sunday, May 10th 2009

The Integrity Commission of Trinidad and Tobago“There is one trait in the character of a leader that above all things, really counts-being straight. No amount of ability, knowledge or cunning can ever make up for not being straight. Once those under him find out that a commander is absolutely straight in all his dealings with them, and free himself from the slightest trait of self-interest they will love him trust him, work for him, follow him-and should the occasion arise, die for him”

—Basilisk Talks on Leadership, extracted from the “little red book” of Sandhurst, Serve to Lead.
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PM again boasts of Summit

By Sean Douglas
Thursday, April 30 2009

Fifth Summit of the AmericasPRIME Minister Patrick Manning said the Fifth Summit of the Americas is earning TT and Caricom more respect and foreign investment. Addressing the 20th anniversary celebration ceremony of the Caribbean Telecommunications Union (CTU) on Tuesday, at the Diplomatic Centre, he boasted: “There can be no doubt about the gains to our country and the region from this undertaking. Tourist arrivals will increase and it will certainly be much easier to market our region as a single tourism destination.”
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Caring too much about image

By Raffique Shah
Sunday, April 26th 2009

Fifth Summit of the AmericasPRIME Minister Patrick Manning seems surprised that so many people are angry over this country hosting the Fifth Summit of the Americas. I wrote a few weeks ago that having committed the country to the summit when he did, he no doubt thought that we could afford that $500 million or whatever the real cost was.

He must have felt, too, that just having all hemispheric Heads of Government here would boost his image as a the premier Caribbean leader. I do not dispute his reasoning that the country would benefit from world recognition, only because it was billed as the battleground between Presidents Obama and Chavez.
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Recession

Harsh reality
FinanceCentral Bank Governor Ewart Williams has officially confirmed what everyone, except the Cabinet, had long known: the economy is in decline.
The starkest figure cited by Mr Williams when he released the Bank’s Monetary Policy Report last Thursday was related to unemployment. The unemployment rate has already moved from just over four percent last year to between six and seven percent in the first quarter of 2009. This means that the Government can no longer boast about having achieved zero unemployment in Trinidad and Tobago. But, as long as two years ago, economists such as Jawala Rambarran and Ronald Ramkissoon were warning that the unemployment figures were essentially illusory.

Central Bank gives banks a lending hand
Faced with stagnation and an inflation shadow, the Central Bank yesterday sliced off fifty basis points of its repo rate to eight percent, a move designed to get banks to reduce their interest rates and spur borrowing.
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Press Briefing with Evo Morales at the 5th Summit of the Americas

Bolivian President Evo Morales at the 5th Summit of the Americas in Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago
Bolivian President Evo Morales during a press briefing at the
5th Summit of the Americas in Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago

This interview has been transcribed from a translation during a press briefing featuring Bolivian President Evo Morales at the Fifth Summit of the Americas – April 18, 2009

PRESIDENT MORALES: Thank you my friends from the press. For those of you that don’t know me, I am Evo Morales Ayma, President of the nation of Bolivia. I would like to take this opportunity, first to thank you for your presence, and also to engage in a political and ideological debate that is taking place at the Summit of the Americas.
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The Summit and the lie

By Fidel Castro Ruz
April 22, 2009 – granma.cu

Fidel CastroSome of the things that Daniel told me would be hard to believe if it was not him who told me them and it was not at a Summit of the Americas where they occurred.

The unusual thing is that there was no such consensus on the final document. The ALBA group did not sign it; that was confirmed in the last exchange with Obama in the presence of Manning and the other leaders in the morning of April 19.
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