Tag Archives: Raffique Shah

Elections, General T&T, Labour, Opposition Party, People's Partnership, PNM, Politics, Race and Identity, Racism Watch, UNC

More CEPEP, URP ‘lochos’

10 Comments

By Raffique Shah
Jun 13, 2015

Raffique ShahAs she enters uncharted territory seeking a second term in office, the Prime Minister exudes a measure of confidence that is at odds with a widely-held perception that her People’s Partnership coalition will lose the general election.

She and her ministers have made it clear that they plan to campaign on performance, which they hope will mute charges of corruption, waste and scandal that were deafening during the past five years.
Continue reading More CEPEP, URP ‘lochos’ →

corruption, Elections, General T&T, ILP, International, Media, Opposition Party, Parliament, People's Partnership, Sports, UNC, USA

Shame and scandal, indeed

27 Comments

By Raffique Shah
June 07, 2015

Raffique ShahCorpus Christi morning, I come awake, latish, closer to seven o’clock. I tune in to BBC television to see what’s happening in the world, since, Thursday being a Christian holiday, the local electronic media stations will have no real news.

I do a double-take, re-check the channel number when, big and bold at the bottom of the screen I see “…Trinidad and Tobago…breaking news…”
Continue reading Shame and scandal, indeed →

Court, General T&T, ILP, International, Law, People's Partnership, Politics, Sports, UNC, USA

Karma, boy, karma

16 Comments

By Raffique Shah
May 31, 2015

Raffique ShahIf, in what may be described as normal countries, a week in politics is a long time, in abnormal Trinidad and Tobago, a week can be likened to a lifetime. Last week, most scribes and commentators in the media engaged in heated exchanges over the latest bacchanal in the Integrity Commission.

Today, few remember what that furore was about or who the protagonists were.
Continue reading Karma, boy, karma →

General T&T, Integrity Commission, Law, People's Partnership, PNM, UNC

The law is an ass

18 Comments

By Raffique Shah
May 24, 2015

Raffique ShahIf the adage “the law is an ass” is held to be true-and over the years, I have heard eminent persons, many of them lawyers, cite it as gospel-then I must confess that some very senior attorneys in this country are confusing me to the point where I am beginning to think that I am an ass, or they are a pack of donkeys.

Hear me out, eh, before you ask me to stop braying.
Continue reading The law is an ass →

General T&T, Health, Parliament

Coping with the generation gap

12 Comments

By Raffique Shah
May 17, 2015

Raffique ShahIf you allow yourself to be consumed by politicking that more so in the run-up to elections, is a deafening cacophony that can distract you to death, you miss out on not-too-subtle changes that are altering the landscape fundamentally.

I am in my 70th year, and while some aspects of aging are catching up with me, I remain mentally alert, capable of digesting many of the exciting advances in technology that, for better or for worse, have opened up new horizons that we must learn to live with or find ourselves buried in the sands of time.
Continue reading Coping with the generation gap →

Elections, General T&T, Opposition Party, Parliament, People's Partnership, Politics, UNC

Vengeance could strangle you

13 Comments

By Raffique Shah
May 09, 2015

Raffique ShahI seldom agree with pronouncements made by Basdeo Panday, such is my mistrust of a man I came to know before he became a big name in politics.

From early o’clock, meaning in 1973 when he was parachuted into leadership of the sugar workers union by the PNM (yes, you read right…check your history) to take up from where the other puppet, Bhadase Maharaj, had died leaving a vacuum, I recognised Panday for what he was—an opportunist posing as a pragmatist.
Continue reading Vengeance could strangle you →

Crime in T&T, General T&T, Law, Murder, People's Partnership

A horror story

33 Comments

By Raffique Shah
May 03, 2015

Raffique ShahOne year ago, in this space, I wrote a column headlined “Dana’s Death in Vain”. It was written exactly one week after the popular, respected senior counsel Dana Seetahal was shot to death in what everyone who had his or her say, described as a “well-executed assassination”.

As the anniversary of her death passes without anyone being arrested or charged for her murder, I re-read that column.
Continue reading A horror story →

General T&T, People's Partnership, PNM

Causeway a lost cause

43 Comments

By Raffique Shah
April 26, 2015

Raffique ShahTrust Trinidadians, or more accurately Trini-politicians, to engage in verbal battle over almost every issue—from the distribution of pampers to mothers of newborn babies to building a multi-billion-dollar causeway from Port of Spain to Chaguaramas.

Most people never heard the word “causeway” before Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar uttered it at a UNC rally in Fyzabad last week.
Continue reading Causeway a lost cause →

Crime in T&T, General T&T, Law, Police, Security

Police Mutiny

14 Comments

By Raffique Shah
April 19, 2015

Raffique ShahOn the morning of Monday, March 23, when I became aware of the massive traffic gridlocks in several strategic arteries across the country occasioned by the police purportedly conducting legitimate roadblocks, my immediate reaction was, “This is mutiny!”

Later that evening, when television footage showed police officers of varying ranks holding tens of thousands of law-abiding motorists and commuters hostage, trapped in scorching heat and toxic exhaust fumes with no chance to escape, I thought that by the following morning I would wake up to hear that scores of police officers had been suspended from duty pending investigations into their misconduct.
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General T&T, Media, People's Partnership, UNC

Bulwarks of democracy

36 Comments

By Raffique Shah
April 12, 2015

Raffique ShahCollectively, the so-called trolls on social media may be a pain in the rear for bona fide journalists and columnists in the mainstream media, operating as they do behind anonymity and bound by no rules of engagement or laws of libel and slander, while we have so many strictures, from word-count to sanitised lyrics, we write under the gun, in a manner of speaking.

And yes, it hurts when these mindless cowards spew their venom, delving into journalists’ private lives, distorting facts, promoting fiction and wallowing in half-truths. The current crop seems to have taken a fancy to attacking female writers, probably believing that they would drive their victims to tears, or worse, into depression.
Continue reading Bulwarks of democracy →