By Dr Selwyn R. Cudjoe
April 13, 2024
The passing of Michael de la Bastide, former chief justice and first president of the Caribbean Court of Justice, signified the end of an era in Trinidad and Tobago or even Caribbean jurisprudence. Archbishop Jason Gordon says he was concerned about mercy at the end of his days. However, what stood out during his active years as an attorney was his commitment to law and justice.
Continue reading A sterling example
By Raffique Shah
April 16, 2024
More often than not, people get the government they deserve. We hear this refrain time and again in countries where elections are supposed to be free and fair, and free from fear, much like ours in Trinidad and Tobago.
This latter statement does not necessarily find favour with the majority among the voting population, commonly called the electorate. I shan’t get into it with anyone who thinks otherwise in this land of a million people, a million opinions. We’ll get nowhere if I engage in side arguments that do not help anyone.
Continue reading When we sleep with the Devil
By Dr Selwyn R. Cudjoe
April 08, 2024
Last Monday night Israel killed seven humanitarian aid workers from the World Central Kitchen (WCK) in Gaza who were attending to the suffering of Palestinians. Israel apologised for its deliberate barbarity because all but one of the victims were of other nationalities— Australian, British, Polish, and a dual citizen of the United States and Canada. If Hamas had done such a thing, it would have confirmed its barbarity.
Continue reading Israel’s colonialism
By Raffique Shah
April 08, 2024
I felt like a fool as I walked out of the offices of the Elections and Boundaries Commission after what turned out to be a two-hour education on polling divisions.
Readers may wonder why I spent so long on such a narrow topic. Well, Mr Whatever-his-name-was had decided to teach me a huge lesson in limited time. The year was 1976. It was a general election year and I had gone to the EBC’s offices at the invitation of the gentleman who was said to be very knowledgeable on everything on elections.
Continue reading EBC lessons for XYZs
By Dr Selwyn R. Cudjoe
April 02, 2024
When Eric Williams went to London in 1955 to discuss PNM’s programme with CLR James, George Padmore and Arthur Lewis, he also visited with Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit, the sister of Jawaharlal Nehru, prime minister of India. He raised the possibility of republishing Nehru’s autobiography with the latter writing a new introduction to it.
Continue reading The Indian connection
By Raffique Shah
April 02, 2024
Every time I watch or listen to Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley deliver an address or a contribution to some pre-election forum, I sigh, shake my head, and think: what wasted words.
I have watched Dr Rowley develop over the past 25 years or so, from a bar-room brawler politician to a formidable spokesperson who has earned his place as the leader of his party. He struck me as being bright when after joining Patrick Manning in opposition in the ’90s he went on to become a frontline speaker who helped resurrect the party.
Continue reading Maccoes, not spies
By Dr Selwyn R. Cudjoe
March 28, 2024
In Inward Hunger, Eric Williams revealed that on the very day he left the Anglo-America Caribbean Commission on June 21, 1955, he began discussions with members of the Teachers’ Economic and Cultural Association about the formation of a new party in Trinidad and Tobago (T&T)— the People’s National Movement. “The basic strategy,” he said, “pending the discussion and organisation, was to reach the public.”
Continue reading These men of straw…
By Raffique Shah
March 28, 2024
From agent RS07 SSA
Sire,
Further to our brief but focused discussion one year ago, held at your ultra secret chamber, whose location I cannot reveal even if I tried to, I submit my first annual report for the district where I live and where I have spent all my spying life: let’s call it CB07.
Continue reading To my spy Boss: I resign
By Dr Selwyn R. Cudjoe
March 18, 2024
The Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago was at his most vulgar on Thursday, March 9, when he sought to scandalise my name at a public meeting at Enterprise, Chaguanas. However, his public performance revealed more about his moral blindness, his public vulgarity, his intellectual narrowness and aggressive narcissism. No one who read my 28-page, carefully footnoted lecture could have arrived at his conclusion.
Continue reading Dr Rowley’s public vulgarity
By Raffique Shah
March 18, 2024
Not long ago, after a few years of trying to recover a relatively small sum of pension that government owed me, I concluded that the public service will never change in its attitude towards work and servicing the population that pays them.
Worse, I think I realised then there are people in the public service who use their positions against citizens who are entitled to hold political allegiance, but mostly citizens could not be bothered with such trivial distractions.
Continue reading Rein in the tax-dodgers