Continue reading Tension, picong… Jack is Chief Whip
Disorderly Governance
EDITOR: The Laws of Trinidad and Tobago have been broken by the open removal of Mangrove forests on the Mucurapo foreshore next to the car park where the City Corporation park their trucks. Why has the Mayor or the CEO of the City Corporation not yet been arrested and charged or fired for incompetence and mismanagement? Are the 40 dedicated Environmental Police a few blocks away at the EMA offices in St Clair aware?
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Q & A with the State Department on Haiti
Sending in the Marines
By Judith Scherr
January 29, 2010 – counterpunch.org
THE FRENCH COOPERATION Minister Alain Joyandet accused the U.S. of “occupying” Haiti rather than helping in the wake of the devastating January 12, 7.0 earthquake. Doctors Without Borders and officials from the Caribbean community expressed similar frustrations, as US military personnel controlling the airport turned away their planes. With just under 20,000 U.S. boots on the ground in Haiti or just off shore, the U.N. military force has augmented its numbers to around 12,000. Still, more than two weeks after the disaster, Haitians lack water, food, medicine, shelter and equipment to dig out those that may still be alive under the rubble.
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The Kidnapping of Haiti
By John Pilger
January 27, 2010
The theft of Haiti has been swift and crude. On 22 January, the United States secured “formal approval” from the United Nations to take over all air and sea ports in Haiti, and to “secure” roads. No Haitian signed the agreement, which has no basis in law. Power rules in an American naval blockade and the arrival of 13,000 marines, special forces, spooks and mercenaries, none with humanitarian relief training.
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Panday’s Provoking the Population
By Stephen Kangal
January 28, 2010
The stubborn and ego-driven recalcitrance of the Leader of the Opposition, Basdeo Panday [failed] to do the honourable thing for the third time in the face of the total and overwhelming humiliation and demolition job that was inflicted on him on Sunday [and this] is of great concern to the entire population and not exclusively of the membership of the UNC. This is the fork-tongued Panday who said that he would go when the members no longer wanted him.
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Kamla Persad-Bissessar: Change
Address by newly-elected Political Leader of the United National Congress (UNC), Kamla Persad-Bissessar at the inauguration of members of the new UNC National Executive at Rienzi Complex, Couva, on January 27, 2010.
“Behold they are one people, and they all have the same language. And this is what they began to do, and now nothing which they purpose to do will be impossible for them. [Genesis 11:6]”
Today we start a new phase in our journey to return good governance to Trinidad and Tobago.
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Focus on Haiti – The Politics of Rice
By Al Jazeera English
January 25, 2010 – aljazeera.net
In 2008, in the midst of the global food crisis, we travelled to Haiti to look at the politics of rice – how such a fertile country became dependent on food aid.
In the wake of this current disaster, that dependence is – initially – going to deepen.
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Defeated Basdeo Panday Holds On
Mr Panday must step aside now
Sunday night’s victory by Kamla Persad-Bissessar, placing her as the new political leader of the opposition United National Congress (UNC), is tantamount to a political earthquake in T&T. And while the political shake-up may not leave anyone dead, there are likely to be many careers that end up being badly wounded. Mrs Persad-Bissessar has done what many men before her have failed to do: she toppled the man whose name has become synonymous with post-independence opposition politics in T&T—Basdeo Panday. Although the election machinery was clearly stacked against her and her slate with a large number of voters being disenfranchised, the huge margin of Mrs Persad-Bissessar’s victory for the post of political leader of the UNC was a clear indication that almost every member of the party wanted change.
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PM: PNM does not wash dirty linen in public
by Michelle Loubon
January 25, 2010 – guardian.co.tt
The PNM does not wash its dirty linen in public. Prime Minister Patrick Manning made this comment during the party’s 54th anniversary celebrations interfaith thanksgiving rally at Balisier House, Port-of-Spain, yesterday. Its theme was “We’ve come this far by faith.” Although he maintained the PNM did not interfere in the politics of other political parties, Manning boasted that the PNM model was the best with regard to internal organisation and discipline. “We take careful note of what goes on in other political parties…We want to know what not to do,” he said. He then waded into the practice of washing dirty linen in public. “If you find dirty linen being washed in public, it has to do with the method of selection,” Manning said.
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Kamla is new UNC boss
KAMLA IS UNC BOSS newsday.co.tt
Siparia MP Kamla Persad-Bissessar last night won by a landslide to be elected the new UNC political leader, while Chaguanas West MP Jack Warner is the party’s new chairman, displacing Basdeo Panday, who founded the party 20 years ago. Panday was the party’s leader and chairman.
Kamla crushes Bas guardian.co.tt
Siparia MP Kamla Persad-Bissessar has put a sound licking on her two rivals to become the new leader of the United National Congress (UNC). In the process, she became the first woman to become the leader of a major political party in Trinidad and Tobago. Although results were trickling in at UNC headquarters at Rienzi Complex, Couva, Persad-Bissessar was clear in the lead in most of the 28 polling stations. Chaguanas West MP Jack Warner was also heading for a landslide victory against St Augustine MP Vasant Bharath.
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