By Raffique Shah
April 14, 2020
Large mobs of presumably hungry consumers virtually laid siege to fast-foods restaurants across the country last Monday evening after Prime Minister Keith Rowley announced that all restaurants and retail food services will be closed for business until the end of this month. Embedded in that eruption was a conundrum this country faces as it battles the COVID-19 virus.
Continue reading Hooked on foreign foods
By Dr Selwyn R. Cudjoe
April 13, 2020
“They say the sun will shine for all/But in some people’s world, it doesn’t shine at all./ So much been said, so little been done./ They still killing the people/ And they having their fun”
—Bob Marley, “Crisis”
PART 3
I have been writing about the plight of black people in Trinidad and Tobago for a while. Like Marvin Gaye, sometimes it “make me wanna holler/The way they do my life” (“Inner City Blues”). I have argued that we will never solve black impoverishment unless we see it as a national problem that demands the same resolve that we brought to combat the coronavirus pandemic.
Continue reading Black Betrayal (In the Age of the Coronavirus)
By Dr Selwyn R. Cudjoe
March 31, 2020
PART 2
In response to my column of three weeks ago, “Black Betrayal,” a critic attacked me in a slanderous manner. Mercifully, the Express deleted the more vitriolic aspects of his original letter. He claimed I invented Aaron St. John to carry on my nefarious agenda.
St. John responded:
“My name is Aaron Kerwin St. John, son of Gemma St. John, and grandson of Ester St. John. I am very real although certain persons would choose not to see the truth…They would rather we, the ordinary people, just shut up and be sad, unhappy, and poor, and continue, no matter what, to support this wickedness called governance by the PNM.
Continue reading Black Betrayal, Or God Don’t Like Ugly
By Stephen Kangal
March 17, 2020
It is very clear that incumbent Guyanese President David Granger’s current agenda is to use the third- appointed Caricom Observer but low level Team to rubber-stamp and add some “legitimacy” to his virtual “coup” attempt of the Guyana Elections 2020.
One must appreciate that this intervention Team was hurriedly constituted by current Caricom Chairman, Mia Mottley after all the accredited Observer Missions that witnessed the conduct of the March 2 elections as well as the three recounts of the Region Four poll, unanimously criticised that ‘process’ used by Returning Officer (RO) Vraimont Mingo as being illegal and lacking in both credibility and transparency.
Continue reading Granger Bent On Using Caricom Team to “Robber- Stamp” His Coup
By Raffique Shah
March 16, 2020
I suppose it’s human nature to panic and go into the survival mode if there is a threat to life, especially when one’s family might be at risk, however remote the chances of someone dying from the COVID-19 virus may be. I sensed Trinis had arrived at the tipping point where mortal fear provokes panic, when, upon learning that one person had been diagnosed with the virus, mankind in droves stormed supermarkets across the country to purchase toilet paper by the bales.
Continue reading Battling COVID-19
By Dr Selwyn R. Cudjoe
March 16, 2020
It was a polite letter. It was sent to me after my article appeared in last Sunday’s Express. It read: “My name is Denise Brathwaite. I am the Vice President of the South East Port of Spain Secondary Teachers’ Association. I came across your article last night. It was quite an interesting read. But I am eager to discuss it with you further.”
Continue reading The Hot Prison
By Raffique Shah
March 10, 2020
Last week, as I noted the absence of Indo-Trinidadians from the Black Power Revolution of 1970, I made a grave error for which I apologise to readers and to persons who may have been aggrieved by it.. I don’t know how I forgot that Winston Leonard, an Indian, was prominent in National Joint Action Committee almost from its inception—and he was not window dressing. He was vice-chairman of the organisation, a frontline speaker on its platforms, and he remained a member long after the dust from the upheavals of 1970 had settled.
Continue reading Missing out on national unity
By Stephen Kangal
March 10, 2020
In the absence of Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley from T&T the foreign policy position and posturing on Guyana today seems to be in total shambles, nonsensical if not very contradictory and inconsistent at worst.
Its policy of detached non-interference that gained traction in the Maduro political crisis in Venezuela cannot be applied willy -nilly to the current stalemate in finalising the official results of the Guyanase elections for three unique reasons:
Continue reading T&T’s Foreign Policy on Guyana Elections in Shambles
By Dr Selwyn R. Cudjoe
March 09, 2020
AFTER my article appeared in the Express last Sunday I received the following note: “Gd Mr Cudjoe. I have been reading your articles in the newspapers for a while and I want to invite to come and take a look at East Port of Spain where we live. My name is Aaron St John. I am 41 years old and was born in this city. It has not changed for all my life. It remains the same dirty, nasty undeveloped, unprotected and it’s only getting worse and more dangerous. Our lives are not improving and a deep sadness covers every home and everyone in and around the city.
Continue reading Black betrayal
By Stephen Kangal
March 04, 2020
Questions and Legitimate Concerns for the High-Powered Authors of the Statement on the Education of Children of African Origin
(First Published in the Express of 24 and 25 January and 5 and 6 February 2020 in the Newsday)
The foregoing list of questions and concerns is geared to be succinct in my reply. I cannot address all the mentioned points in full in the interest of brevity. These authors dealt with cosmetics and were unfair to the thinking community of T&T.
Continue reading Responding to the Alleged Conspiracy Against African Students