Monthly Archives: December 2014

corruption, General T&T, People's Partnership, UNC

Billboard face to launch a million votes?

8 Comments

By Raffique Shah
December 28, 2014

Raffique ShahIn the spirit of the season, which for me means extra-laid-back, lazy if you will, certainly not busy with chores that people ignore all year only to attack feverishly only at Christmas time, I thought I’d round of the year on a high note even as I lay low.

Really, we cannot be so blighted to have endured yet another year of foul-ups by those on high and lawlessness from top to bottom, crime down but criminals running free, a health system that’s ready for the dreaded Ebola but takes two years to deliver cataract surgery, costly free education that churns out a handful of bright young people but a mass of dumb others—surely, we would be spared worse in the final few days of the year.
Or so I thought.
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Cuba, General T&T, International, USA

Cuba and the USA: the long thaw begins

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By Raffique Shah
December 20, 2014

Raffique ShahI confess I was surprised when, last Wednesday, announcements from Washington and Havana confirmed that the United States and Cuba had agreed to restore diplomatic relations and work towards the normalisation of other relations, especially trade and travel between the two countries.

I did not think that President Barack Obama had the fortitude to dismantle a 50-plus-year anachronism that lingered as the last vestige of the Cold War that all but ended with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.
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Crime in T&T, General T&T, Law, Police, Politics, Security

Take de Money and Run

22 Comments

By Dr. Selwyn R. Cudjoe
December 15, 2014

Dr. Selwyn R. CudjoeIt was one of those riveting moments when a picture is worth more than a thousand words. Here they were, four young black boys, sitting forlorn, with their luggage around them looking as if their lives had come to an end. All their yearnings seemed to have been dashed, caught up as they were, in an unutterable moment of disappointment: their being unable to compete in a football tournament in Barbados.
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General T&T, Politics

Slaves to digital devices

11 Comments

By Raffique Shah
December 14, 2014

Raffique ShahSome nights ago, a television news reporter covering one of the Prime Minister’s toys distribution functions asked eight children what they would like to get as Christmas presents. All seemed to be between ages five and ten. One boy said he wanted a truck and a girl screamed, “A doll house!”
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Complaints, General T&T, People's Partnership

Taxpayers Must Intervene in the Curepe Interchange

3 Comments

By Stephen Kangal
December 02, 2014

Stephen KangalTaxpayers cannot sit silent and allow a potential Torouba Stadium debacle to overwhelm us motorists and commuters in Curepe. It is very clear that VINCI, a Belgian Company has established an unequalled track record of delivering two imposing and state of the art overpasses in Aranguez and at the Grand Bazaar intersection on time and within budgets.
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International, Racism Watch, USA

Dr. Selwyn Cudjoe’s Remarks to the Wellesley Council

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Remarks to Academic Council,
Wellesley College
Faculty Assembly Room
December 10, 2014

Dr. Selwyn R. CudjoeAs one of the few black men on this faculty, I could not let this opportunity pass without offering a few remarks.

On Wednesday, April 19, 1989, a white middle class woman, a promising young investment banker at Salomon Brothers with a degree from Wellesley College and Yale University was raped as she was jogging through Central Park, New York. The suspects were five black and Latino young men, some with dubious school records from Harlem. The police coined a new term for what they were doing: they called it wilding, to describe the beating up of random victims. On May 29, about five weeks later, the New York Times wrote: “A 28-year investment banker, jogging through Central Park, was attacked by a group of teenagers. They kicked and beat her in the head with a pipe and raped her. The teenagers, who were from East Harlem, were quickly arrested.”
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Elections, General T&T, Media, PNM, Racism Watch, UNC

Satanic race-verses

18 Comments

By Raffique Shah
December 07, 2014

Raffique Shah“This is PNM country. The black African king anointed by the blood of Jesus Christ has decreeded (sic) that is we time again. We Africans will be the masa (sic) and the rest ah allya (sic) will be we slaves. Starting today the terror shall begin for all allya coolie and chin who feel allya better than we. Today is just a flat tire.”

For those who are reading or hearing about it for the first time, the idiotic but poisonous verses quoted above, with the PNM insignia inserted above them, formed a “flyer” that some patrons at MovieTowne found stuck to their vehicle windscreens last Saturday night. In instances, the victims found their tyres deflated.
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Crime in T&T, General T&T, Media, Politics, Sex, Violence

Sex and Blackmail

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DJ marked for death, Rajaee both knew ex-Govt official

By Asha Javeed
December 07, 2014 – trinidadexpress.com

Sex And blackmailRadio DJ Kevaughn “Lurbz” Savory was possibly saved from being a statistic.

But the question he’s being constantly asked now is: who would want you killed?

One week after police uncovered an alleged plot to kill him and swiftly charged six people, including ex-Life­Sport co-ordinator Rajaee Ali, 27-year-old Savory sat down for an exclusive interview with the Sunday Express yesterday.
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General T&T, Media, Religion

Demolition of Greyfriars Church Halted Amidst Protests

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WICKEDNESS

By Ryan Hamilton-Davis
December 01, 2014 – newsday.co.tt

WICKEDNESSWickedness!

This is how Minister of National Diversity and Social Integration, Rodger Samuel, saw the demolition of the historic Greyfriars Church of Scotland on Frederick Street, Port-of-Spain, on of all days, Sunday, the Sabbath for most Christian faiths.

Samuel, a pastor, lamented the near complete destruction of the church even as his ministry has been in talks with its 84-year-old owner businessman, Alfred Galy, on preserving it as a heritage site. Even more outraged than Samuel was his adviser, Dr Nurah Rosalie Cordner who risked her life, climbing onto an excavator to stop the demolition crew of contractor, Don Ramdeen & Co, from tearing down the centuries’ old church.
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