By Raffique Shah
November 16, 2015
I address two issues of public importance today. First is the emerging controversy over this country’s attendance at the Commonwealth Heads of Government (CHOGM) meeting to be held in Malta next week. And second, I join the chorus of frustrated voices crying out for something to be done to curb the dangerous, deafening din of explosives and fireworks that have become intrinsic to festivals like Divali.
Continue reading Boors will be boors
New EFCL board unearths secret operation
By Darren Bahaw and Renuka Singh
November 14, 2015 – guardian.co.tt
A secret contract millhouse was discovered at the Education Facilities Company Ltd (EFCL) in Maraval, and armed guards have been called in to secure a mountain of potentially damning evidence which points to the illegal manufacturing of backdated tender documents worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
The discovery was made one day after the new board of the state-owned company suspended its Chief Executive Officer Kiran Shah and Chief Operating Officer Sharma Maharaj over claims of impropriety.
Continue reading Workers caught back-dating deals
November 13, 2015 – guardian.co.tt
Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley will attend the upcoming Commonwealth Heads of Government conference in Malta accompanied by a small delegation including his wife Sharon, Communication Minister Maxie Cuffie said yesterday.
Continue reading Query over Sharon’s Malta trip
By Raffique Shah
November 09, 2015
I cannot understand the national outrage over the video posted on the Internet that shows several Trinidadian Islamic “jihadists” somewhere in Syria, dressed in combat gear, firing rifles on what appears to be a range, and inviting their Muslim brethren to join them in holy battle in “Hijra”, wherever that paradise or hellhole may be.
I’m serious when I say we should not only be happy that those men (and their many wives and children) are thousands of miles away from our country, but we should encourage others who believe in the nonsense they do to answer their call to arms.
Continue reading Land of freedoms and freeness
Vasant eyes UNC leadership
THE race for leadership of the United National Congress (UNC) yesterday turned into a three-way battle following a decision by former Trade and Industry Minister Vasant Bharath, to throw his hat into the ring and contest the post of political leader. The other two contenders are incumbent leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar and Oropouche East MP Dr Roodal Moonilal.
By Feroze Hosein
November 08, 2015
Vasant Bharath has been said by quite some people to be a good contender for leadership of the United National Congress, but there are questions far too serious that could make him a non-starter if he enters the party’s internal electoral race.
Continue reading Vasant Bharath for leadership of the UNC
By Stephen Kangal
November 06, 2015
The reason, inter alia, advanced by the Moonilal “Go Kamla” Team including that of Dr. Tim Gopeesingh for the defeat of the PP in the 2015 elections and hence the current lobbying for rejection of Kamla for re-election to the Political Leadership of the UNC, is that the unprecedented, untried and untested Presidential style campaign strategy engineered by Campaign Manager, Rodney Charles, that made Kamla 2015 the focal point and dominated the PP election campaign strategy was flawed and did not resonate with nor did the electorate buy into it. This convenient thesis goes against the dynamics of the elections, is far off the target and would give the stamp of objectivity/ issues-based politics underpinning the final tally.
Continue reading Was Kamla 2015 the Source and the Course for the Waterloo?
By Dr. Kwame Nantambu
November 02, 2015
The 27 October 2015 (191-2) vote/resolution passed by the UN General Assembly that called “for an end to the decades-long US embargo on Cuba” brings to the fore the contemporary modus operandi of the 15th century European plantation system of governance in two aspects, namely, the Euro-British-imposed Westminster system of government on then colonies in the Caribbean and Africa in the 1960s and the United Nations system in 1945.
Continue reading Decoding European plantation system of governance
By Raffique Shah
November 02, 2015
Choosing a leader to take the United National Congress forward, backward, sideways, or keep it stagnated, is the business of members of the party.
It is not for me, who never belonged to any party other than the original United Labour Front, and that very briefly, to tell UNC members who they should elect as their leader, the way frontline members of the UNC openly lobbied for Penny Beckles over Keith Rowley during the internal elections in the People’s National Movement in May 2014.
Continue reading The party’s over
By Stephen Kangal
October 27, 2015
The unfortunate, intentionally political mileage-grabbing, wholly incorrect, barrel-scraping and wholly unnecessary statement made by the Minister of Foreign Affairs (MFA) Senator the Honourable Dennis Moses during the recent Budget debate concluded in the Senate in which he attempted to uphold to national ridicule and blame the former T&T OAS Ambassador, Dr Neil Parsan for seeking employment in the OAS to which he was accredited, is so superficial and annoying because it is reflective of tenour of the other interventions we have had to endure from the current cadre of the young and inexperienced Government ministers who seem to be grasping at elusive straws in the wind for gaining public attention and indulging in the ubiquitous and monotonous blame game.
Continue reading Senator Moses is a Primordial Sinner Casting the First Stone
By Anna Ramdass
October 26, 2015 – trinidadexpress.com
On December 5, there are likely to be two major contenders for the leadership of the United National Congress (UNC) —Kamla Persad-Bissessar and Dr Roodal Moonilal.
Former prime minister Persad-Bissessar kicked off her re-election campaign last Saturday and faces internal heat as some of her colleagues and MPs are of the belief that she cannot lead the UNC to victory as she did in 2010.
Continue reading Kamla, Moonilal squaring off in UNC election