By Raffique Shah
October 20, 2013
This local government elections campaign was the nastiest ever in the history of this country.
And three man-rats, abetted by their respective executives, can take credit for having reduced electioneering to a level so low, anything worse will be burrowing the sewer mains. Dip your heads Jack Warner, Anand Ramlogan and Roodal Moonilal.
Continue reading Nastiest campaign ever
By Dr. Kwame Nantambu
October 17, 2013
The decision by Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar not to participate in the Trinidad and Tobago Debates Commission’s (TTDC) leaders’ debate on 15 October 2013 speaks volumes as to her overt, detrimental/self-destructive tit-for-tat myopic politics.
Continue reading Kamla not ready for prime time
By Raffique Shah
October 13, 2013
Over the past 40 years, since the first oil boom began in 1973, allegations of corruption against government ministers, other politicians and senior public officials must have exceeded the one-thousand mark. I refer to alleged acts of corruption involving tens of millions of dollars and more, not to petty sums below, say, five million.
Since each corrupt transaction of this magnitude necessarily involves several persons—politicians, contractors, corporations, bankers, public officers—we could easily say that at least 5,000 persons of high standing in the society were involved.
Continue reading Corruption and deception
By Andre Bagoo
October 13, 2013 – newsday.co.tt
THE MOST crucial exercise in any democracy is an election. Therefore, the rules governing the electoral process take on a particular significance. Yet the elections rules, as currently formulated, appear to have crucial gaps which make them arguably inconsistent with the provisions of the Constitution, the Supreme Law.
Continue reading Unruly election rules
By Renuka Singh
September 29, 2013 – guardian.co.tt
Energy Minister Kevin Ramnarine has distanced himself from the negotiation process that allegedly led to an almost ten per cent drop in local voting rights over the cross-border Loran/Manatee bloc. This move comes on the heels of scathing criticism that the minister had mucked up decade-long bilateral talks between Venezuela and Trinidad that, if negotiated properly, could have boosted local energy reserves and made allowances for Venezuelan pipelines to pass through the local refinery.
Continue reading Bad Deal: Ramnarine blamed for messing up energy negotiations
By Stephen Kangal
September 20, 2013
The critical factor underlying the growth, continuing relevance and survival of all political organizations especially in diverse democratic societies is the priority accorded to developing, adapting and embellishing an open-ended, politically-dominated and all-embracing strategic framework. It is against this standard that all challenges to the status quo/ existence are assessed and a politically correct and objectively determined response to external stimuli brain-stormed, conceptualized and implemented.
Continue reading UNC Has Dollars But Little Political Sense
By Raffique Shah
September 14, 2013
When House Speaker Wade Mark invoked the contentious constitutional provision that an elected MP, Herbert Volney in this instance, must vacate his seat upon resigning or being expelled from the party on whose slate he was elected to Parliament, it piqued my interest. You see, I was a principal player in the events that led to the passage of that amendment to the Constitution in 1978, and I am intimate with its genesis.
Continue reading Donkey with a kick
By Andre Bagoo
September 10 2013
FINANCE Minister Larry Howai yesterday unveiled a $61.4 billion budget, yet again the largest in the country’s history.
The 2014 package — the PP Government’s fourth — includes what the Minister said was also the largest-ever capital programme of $8 billion. However, the deficit projection will shrink relative to overall productivity coming in at $6.3 billion or 3.6 percent of GDP.
Continue reading $61 billion Budget
By Sean Douglas
September 10, 2013 – newsday.co.tt
Speaker Wade Mark removed St Joseph MP Herbert Volney, “with immediate effect” from the House of Representatives moments after yesterday’s Budget Speech, in an unprecedented invocation of the “Crossing of the Floor” provisions of the Constitution.
Volney resigned from the United National Congress (UNC) — on which ticket he had been elected to the House on May 24, 2010 – after being fired as Justice Minister over the “section 34” scandal, and has since joined the Independent Liberal Party (ILP).
Continue reading Speaker Puts Out Volney
Newsday’s Editorial
August 25, 2013 – newsday.co.tt
IT was the height of irresponsibility for OWTU leader, Ancel Roget, to be among a group of masked, black-clad protesters participating in an illegal demonstration at the Halls of Justice on Wednesday, that had panicked Deputy Commissioner of Police, Mervyn Richardson, into fearing the makings of another attempted coup.
As a seasoned leader of one of the country’s most prominent trade unions, Roget must have known that the protest was a violation of several aspects of the law, both statutory law and common law.
Continue reading Irresponsible!