Tag Archives: Politics

Crime in T&T, General T&T, Health, Media, People's Partnership, Politics, Schools, Sex, Sex Crimes

ARREST THOSE MEN

4 Comments

By Andre Bagoo
February 05, 2014 – newsday.co.tt

ARREST THOSE MENTHERE ARE an estimated 2,500 teenage pregnancies per year, including several cases at the primary school level, Minister of Education Dr Tim Gopeesingh said yesterday as he called for the enforcement of laws against statutory rape in order to address what he said was a “huge”, “frightening” and worsening problem.

The minister linked the problem to social conditions, saying half the population now live in single-parent homes.
Continue reading ARREST THOSE MEN →

Crime in T&T, Drug Trade, General T&T, International, Law, Money Laundering, Police, Politics, Security, USA

De ‘bust’ buss

3 Comments

By Raffique Shah
February 02, 2014

Raffique ShahWithin days of the announcement by US authorities that they had intercepted 700-odd pounds of cocaine shipped from Trinidad to Norfolk, Virginia, and the well-publicised arrival here of a number of Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agents, I sensed that something had gone awfully wrong.
Continue reading De ‘bust’ buss →

General T&T, Law, Media, Police, Politics, Security

Three eminent jurists

4 Comments

By Raffique Shah
January 25, 2014

Raffique ShahIn my column last week, in recounting the legal encounters between the late Karl Hudson-Phillips and the progressive forces during the events of 1970, I made a serious omission that I now seek to rectify.

I mentioned the condonation pleas that set the mutinous soldiers free—their genesis and the attorneys who successfully pursued them. Readers need note that the court martial over which Nigeria’s Col Theophilus Danjuma presided, rejected the pleas (in bar of trial), which were made by Rex Lassalle, Maurice Noray and myself. The trial proceeded, and most of the soldiers were found guilty of mutiny and other offences, and sentenced to varying terms of imprisonment.
Continue reading Three eminent jurists →

General T&T, Labour, Law, USA

How is applying for an A2 Visa Breaking US Law?

1 Comment

By Stephen Kangal
January 24, 2014

Stephen KangalForeign Minister, the Honourable Winston Dookeran posits that were the T&T Consulate in New York to continue to apply to the State Department for the granting of an A2 US Visa on behalf of a member of its locally recruited staff (LRS), that would “breaking US law…” Well the Consulate under different regimes in POS has been applying and the State Department has been granting these A2 visas or variations of stays to it and many other foreign consulate accredited to the State of New York.
Continue reading How is applying for an A2 Visa Breaking US Law? →

General T&T, Media, Police, Politics, Protest, Security

I come not to praise Karl

6 Comments

By Raffique Shah
January 19, 2014

Raffique ShahFriends, Trinis, countrymen, I come not to praise Karl, nor indeed, to bury him. I come instead to tell some truths about Mr Hudson-Phillips, some complimentary, others unsavory, but which, wherever he may be, he would applaud me for having the courage to enunciate, honourable man that he was.
Continue reading I come not to praise Karl →

Crime in T&T, General T&T, Passed on, People's Partnership, Security, Violence

Edge of the abyss

8 Comments

By Raffique Shah
January 12, 2014

Raffique ShahA tragic consequence of spikes in violent crimes such as we experienced in the first week of 2014, is the baying of the hounds, the blood-curdling cries for revenge that are as transient as the surges are cyclical. As soon as the murder rate settles back to what is normal for us, meaning one-a-day, the society will shift into the muted mode. People will hardly note the killing, and the police and government will enjoy a respite from outrage…until the next surge.
Continue reading Edge of the abyss →

Crime in T&T, General T&T, Law, People's Partnership, Police, Politics, Violence

BLOODY HELL

4 Comments

By Alexander Bruzual
January 07, 2014 – newsday.co.tt

BLOODY HELLTWO young men were yesterday gunned down in broad daylight next to Nelson Street Girls’ RC School in Port-of-Spain on the first day of the new school term — bringing to 16 the number of murders committed in the first six days of January. This, according to statistics, is the bloodiest start to a New Year in the past six years.

In the first six days of January 2008, 15 persons were murdered. The murder rate soared to 547 by December 31 of that year — the highest number of murders ever recorded in a calendar year in this country’s history.
Continue reading BLOODY HELL →

General T&T, ILP, People's Partnership, PNM, Politics, UNC

Year of the Fall

1 Comment

By Raffique Shah
December 29, 2013

Raffique ShahPolitically, 2013 will be remembered as the year of unprecedented multiple elections. It was the year that marked the beginning of the demise of the People’s Partnership; the year in which Jack Warner’s meteor burned brightly before it died an unnatural death; and the year that saw the People’s National Movement (PNM), for yet another time, rise, Phoenix-like, from the ashes of defeat, to position itself for a return to power.
Continue reading Year of the Fall →

General T&T, Politics, UNC

Bas, Ram and Jack

11 Comments

By Raffique Shah
December 14, 2013

Raffique ShahAmong the three of them, Basdeo Panday, Jack Warner and Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj have accumulated 220 years on earth. You would think that these three geezers, having experienced a spread of political permutations, from the crown colony system and colonialism to independence and republicanism, would have also accumulated the wisdom to discern that they have long passed their political-expiry dates.
Continue reading Bas, Ram and Jack →

Africa, General T&T, International, Passed on, South Africa

Mandela: From Prisoner to President

2 Comments

By Dr. Kwame Nantambu
December 10, 2013

Dr. Kwame NantambuNow that 95-year old Nelson Mandela has died, it is indeed a glorious sine qua non to trace/recount/relive his remarkable/heroic journey from prisoner/revolutionary to President of South Africa.

At the outset, it must be emphasized that the year 1994 was a pivotal, watershed turning-point as the white minority-ruled South Africa joined the civilized nations as a de jure actor on the international stage of democracy.
Continue reading Mandela: From Prisoner to President →