By Raffique Shah October 07, 2019 It is a newspaper commentator’s dilemma—having to write on the Finance Minister’s annual budget presentation, as readers expect him to, both before and after the Appropriation Bill is laid in Parliament. This becomes even more challenging when the package covers the year leading to a general election when the … Continue reading Budget biggest ‘bag’ thieves lay their hands on
By Dr Tye Salandy September 22, 2019 As I mentioned in the first article in this three part series, the Sedition Act is not archaic or outdated, but it was an extremely bad law in the first place given its deliberate vagueness, its colonial intentions and the way that it was weaponized against those who … Continue reading Sedition and other Nonsensical Colonial Laws
By Raffique Shah September 16, 2019 I had no prior information that the Express had commissioned a poll on Dr Keith Rowley’s performance as Prime Minister after holding office for four years, far less that publication of the results would coincide with my return as a columnist in last week’s Sunday Express. So you can … Continue reading Crabs in a barrel
By Dr Selwyn R. Cudjoe August 06, 2019 Last Sunday, four of the five Sunday columnists of this newspaper wrote about the crime problem that confronts the nation. The Sunday Guardian also published a long investigative piece on the subject. On Monday, Archbishop Charles Jason Gordon talked about the pervasiveness of crime and concluded that … Continue reading The Road Make to Walk…
By Raffique Shah July 25, 2019 Oozing from the barrels of blood that flowed from the bullet-ridden corpses of last week’s 24 murder victims and almost as many who suffered serious to critical gunshot wounds were several important lessons that we may choose to ignore, to our peril. Violent crimes have spiralled out of control, … Continue reading Crime and punishment T&T style
By Dr Selwyn R. Cudjoe July 25, 2019 After I spoke at London’s Maritime Museum last Monday, I traveled to France for personal as well as scholarly reasons. Years earlier I had spent a semester at Paris and had taken my daughter to the University of Strasbourg on another occasion to study the French language … Continue reading Thinking Globally; Acting Locally
By Dr. Selwyn R. Cudjoe Posted: March 16, 2019 A lecture delivered at the Public Library of Trinidad and Tobago, Adult Education Program, January 11, 1983. This lecture can be located at the Trinidad Public Library, Port of Spain, under the call number Ref. W.I. 308, Cudjoe (Trinidad Collection, January 1983). Slight editorial changes have … Continue reading Cultural Policy and National Development
By Raffique Shah March 09, 2019 Having written last week that I did not see the successors to Sparrow and other icons in the pantheon of great calypsonians of Trinidad and Tobago, hence of the world, I think I must be man enough to apologise to the London family, three of whom won the four … Continue reading Salute the London clan
By Raffique Shah February 28, 2019 It was a moment of sheer serendipity last Friday night. My wife Rosina and I had just watched the television news, and, scanning the local stations for some Carnival-related activity but finding nothing of interest, I resorted to YouTube for some good music that would take us to bedtime, … Continue reading Thanks for the lyrics and music, Sparrow
By Stephen Kangal November 11, 2018 The current international outreach achieved by the annual Divali Nagar exposition having already cultivated cultural links with numerous Caribbean countries hitherto as the first platform, is something to be applauded as it redounds to enhancing the image of T&T as a multicultural destination to be visited by cultural enthusiasts … Continue reading Declare Divali Nagar a National Festival