By Stephen Kangal
January 29, 2011
The official visits undertaken by Prime Ministers Panday (1997) and Bissessar-Persad ( 2012) to their respective ancestral homeland villages located in North India after receiving the Pravasi Samaan Awards bring into sharp focus the truth inherent in the maxim that God works in mysterious ways His wonders to behold.
Continue reading Alternative to Crossing the Kala Pani
By Raffique Shah
January 29, 2012
PRESIDENT Barack Obama’s bold move to seek to apply a tax rate of 30 per cent to America’s super-rich should serve as a catalyst of sorts for Finance Minister Winston Dookeran. Dookeran said recently that his ministry would soon review the income tax regime in Trinidad and Tobago. Changes to this country’s income and corporate taxes were last made in 2006. Then, the Patrick Manning government raised the personal allowance for individuals to $60,000, and applied a fixed rate of 25 per cent tax on all chargeable incomes above that.
Continue reading Let the tax debate begin
By Dr. Selwyn R. Cudjoe
January 26, 2012
Question: If Trinidad and Tobago were one hundred percent Hindus, would our response to Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar kissing President Pratibha Patil’s toes elicit a different response? I suspect it would. But only thirty five percent of Trinidad and Tobago’s population are Hindus and therein lays the conundrum. Such a move calls for a better understanding among the population and a more sensitive response from the PM in terms of her act of piety or respect as she calls it.
Continue reading Kamla’s Delicate Dance
By George Alleyne
January 25 2012 – newsday.co.tt
Government should state clearly the nature and extent of the planned Indian investment in Trinidad and Tobago, which it is trumpeting, and whether this relates to the setting up of entirely new businesses or whether it will be the acquisition, wholly or largely, of State-owned and other existing companies.
Continue reading Investment or assets sale?
Prayers, best wishes pour in for Patrick Manning
POLITICIANS, both friends and rivals, yesterday expressed their shock at the stroke suffered by former Prime Minister Patrick Manning and offered their prayers for his speedy recovery.
Kamla: Spare no resources
Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar has advised Health Minister Dr Fuad Khan to ensure former prime minister Patrick Manning is well taken care of during his stay at the San Fernando General Hospital.
Continue reading Prayers, best wishes pour in for Patrick Manning
Former Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago, Patrick Manning, suffered a stroke last night and is at the San Fernando General Hospital.
Continue reading PATRICK MANNING SUFFERS STROKE
Newsday Editorial
January 23, 2012 – newsday.co.tt
There are bound to be questions and indeed raised eyebrows at the purchase of a luxury Porsche Cayenne SUV – with a showroom price tag of $925,000 – for the official use of Minister of Food Production, Vasant Bharath. Bharath defended the purchase by saying the actual price paid – after exemptions for taxes and duties – was about $400,000, which he said was comparable to the cost of other SUVs.
Continue reading Porsche questions
By Stephen Kangal
January 22, 2012
It is patently clear that the staging of the tenth annual Pravasi Bharatiya Divas (PBD) pilgrimage to India by the Indian Ministry of Overseas Indians Affairs is geared and exclusively configured to exploiting and attracting for the benefit of the Indian economy the enormous wealth, political influence and entrepreneurship to be found within the 30 million Indian diaspora. Remittances alone to India amount to over US$50bn annually that is seven times T&T’s budget.
Continue reading Kamla Spoils the Bharatiya Party in Jaipur
By Raffique Shah
January 21, 2012
JUSTICE Minister Herbert Volney invariably comes across as a joker in the theatre of the macabre…a kind of black humour specialist.
He seems not to know whether his role is to make people laugh, cry or have a compelling urge to throttle him. He cannot decide if he is an entertainer, intimidator or Soca Monarch contender.
Continue reading Joker wild in Cabinet
By Dr. Selwyn R. Cudjoe
January 20, 2012
I have never accepted V. S. Naipaul’s description of our society as being half-made or our people as mimic men and women. Some years ago, I wrote a trenchant criticism of Naipaul’s work in which I responded to those designations in an effective manner. For the past three weeks, I have been traveling in Germany and England. As I view our political landscape from afar, I cannot help but get the impression that our Prime Minister is playing dolly house with our people’s future; fiddling around which their good nature; and treating them with a contempt they do not deserve.
Continue reading De Prime Minister Eh Dey