This is call from a native of T&T to all trade union leaders on behalf our nation of 1.3 million people.

Gone are the days of “Bad John” politics in industrial relationships, the nation is more exposed to information via the Internet and discussions on social media. Our leaders must be more diplomatic and act with decorum whilst going about business.

When one of our leading trade union leaders can tell bpTT, “Take your rig and go,” who are you helping, the nation or your membership? In my view, neither. Those utterances shows ignorance/arrogance. We are an energy based economy, with these industries financed by external oil and gas giants.

Those born within the period of the 50’s to the 80’s are always passing their mouths in a derogatory manner, are we their role models or teachers by the behaviour of those who influence our nation by invading our homes via the electronic media.

A message to all: watch our contents.

ATHELSTON CLINTON

Arima

The offensive and disrespectful attitude of the OWTU should be of utmost concern to all citizens.

It is clear that unions do not have T&T’s best interest at heart and are thus increasingly irrelevant. Why would anyone (local or foreign) want to invest in a country that is stuck 80 years in the past?

Diversification is “ole talk” unless we fix this. The sad part is that no one so far has the testicular fortitude to challenge the unions and effect change—look at the silence from the Minister of Labour and others like Stuart Young. The childish act of unions withdrawing from the Tripartite Advisory Council shows that they have no interest in being part of solutions. It’s time to re-examine the legislative framework that unions operate within for the good of the country.

R SAMAROO

Via email

Deliberate obfuscation or innocent ignorance, either way, smoke and mirrors are being used to delude us into believing that real attention is being paid to addressing crime. Merriam-Webster defines smoke and mirrors very nicely as “something that seems good but is not real or effective and that is done especially to take attention away from something else that is embarrassing or unpleasant”.

Laws upon laws are being passed or generated by succeeding governments to address crime and yet crime continues to escalate. Any law, without the requisite implementation, enforcement and management negates its value. Generating and passing laws, blaming the Police Service, the population, the attorney general and more so the minister of National Security represents an emotional rather than reasoned response to dealing with crime, which requires a multi-pronged approach, one of which has a pivotal role. Unless addressed in a serious manner, crime-fighting will continue to focus on symptoms and not root cause.

Let us focus on the judiciary, which seems sacrosanct, especially where the legal fraternity is concerned. What is the role of the Law Association in dealing with crime? Is it to simply protect attorneys? What is the role and function of the Chief Justice? The legal maxim “justice delayed is justice denied” seems meaningless to the legal system. After all, the longer one can prolong a case, the more beneficial it is to the attorneys, who get the biggest piece of the pie, and to the entire judicial system. There is need for more legal personnel, more courts, more police and military services, more transportation, more court workers and more budgetary allocation for crime. Is it any wonder that criminals laugh all the way to their next victim!

Why must the courts begin hearing matters at 9 am and end at 1 pm? The normal workday is 8 am to 4 pm, not considering shift systems. This is half-day work and therefore doubles the workload of everyone concerned. Or, put another way, wastes half a day for every court appearance. If matters are to be heard after 1 pm this is not a problem, but begin the workday at 8 am. If there is no full hearing for the afternoon, then the day should end at 4 pm. What about postponements?

There should be absolutely no postponements of matters, except in emergency or health-related cases. Attorneys should not be allowed to get away with “I have another matter to attend to” or “we need more time to file some documents” and such foolish excuses. The client is paying for representation and the attorney should represent. The client pays for an attorney’s time, which the attorney claims is his stock in trade, but should this be exploited by innumerable postponements? Each time a postponement is given, barring illness or emergency, the attorney must forfeit one-third of his fees, which must be pre-determined and adhered to scrupulously. There should not be more than three postponements, after which, the attorney should be struck off the legal register for incompetent representation. Police prosecutors must suffer the same fate. One-third of their salary forfeited for every court non-appearance. After three such non-appearances, they should be fired from the service.

Judges and magistrates should provide their judgments within a maximum period of one week. They have too many resources, especially the court stenographers who take verbatim notes. If necessary, the judge or magistrate should be given one week off to provide his judgement. This is not too much a price to pay for the wheels of justice to turn.

The laws that should be passed are laws to address the fundamental issues of court workday, postponements, incompetent legal representation and delivery of judgments. If these are addressed competently, it will obviate the need for many of the debates, both current such as abolishing preliminary inquiries or trial by jury and perennial ones such as more courts, more judges, more transportation and even greater use of technology. After all, justice delayed is justice denied and this comes with untold pain and suffering for litigants when their matters are postponed ad nauseam. A discussion should be had with the Law Association, Chief Justice, attorney general, police commissioner and Police Service Commission to address. Who will bell the cat?

HARJOON HEERALAL

Carapichaima

On April 13, 1970, Astronaut Jim Lovell repeated something that Astronaut Jack Swigert, on the Apollo 13 spacecraft, told Mission Control in Houston: “Houston, we’ve had a problem.”

In 1995, a movie by the name, Houston We Have A Problem, based on a misquote of Jim Lovell was made. My column today is based on the title of the movie in relation to Prime Minister Rowley’s recent visit to Houston for talks with some of the world’s leading energy companies.

Shortly after the Prime Minister departed Houston, the OWTU and JTUM leader Ancel Roget responded to a decision by bpTT to withdraw the final construction of its Angelin platform from TOFCO in La Brea and sent it to be completed elsewhere by saying that BP could “take its platform and go.”

In a statement, bpTT said: “bpTT remains fully committed to maximising local content in all our operations, however, given the compressed project timelines and other competitiveness factors for the Angelin project, local fabrication is no longer a feasible option.”

It was relocating the project elsewhere. The “Houston we have a problem” aspect of this scenario is that T&T is beginning to have competitiveness issues in the energy sector with this decision on the Angelin platform.

Prime Minister Rowley’s response to the comment by Roget was made on the CNC3 programme The Morning Brew with host Hema Ramkissoon last Wednesday when he said: “That is not really the kind of thing that causes somebody in a BP boardroom or elsewhere to say Trinidad is the place we want to put our money.”

In conceding that he was aware that BP was going to pull the Angelin project out of La Brea before he even arrived in Houston, the Prime Minister is telegraphing to the nation that he went there to negotiate, not from a position of strength, but rather to seek concessions in asking BP to reconsider its decision.

He conceded that T&T “is still a free country and leaders choose to lead their followers the way they see fit.” This column was prepared before any response was made by Roget.

The various private sector bodies have condemned Roget’s statement outright saying that it does not bode well for the competitiveness of the country’s energy sector and transmits an air of militancy in the industrial relations climate that is not attractive to foreign investment.

The Prime Minister did not hide the fact that he was aware of that reality when he said that companies like BP “don’t owe us anything , what they look for is the best outcome for their shareholders.”

The way that this discussion is emerging is that there is an ever-widening gap between the state control of the economy model and the foreign investment free market economy model. As that gap continues to widen in these difficult economic times, the Government has to make a choice between one model or the other.

Having just completed a round of discussions and negotiations in Houston where he was unable to convince BP to change its mind on the Angelin project, he must know that he is up against an industrial relations climate that has the potential to diminish his efforts on behalf of the country.

He told Hema Ramkissoon that if he was sitting in front of Roget, he “would have no difficulty telling him it was not a helpful statement.” In the context of the MOU between the PNM and JTUM that he signed with Roget on August 27, 2015, one gets the sense that the strain of holding it together is becoming extremely difficult to bear.

In the same breath that Roget made his “take your platform and go” remark, he also said that Rowley is walking a “Kamla road” and that he could suffer the same consequences as the former Prime Minister insofar as he aided and abetted her electoral defeat in 2015. That is the closest that he has come to tearing up the MOU, but at the time of writing that had not occurred.

The investors in Houston are looking at what is happening on the industrial relations front in this country, especially in the energy sector. The unions are not going to back down from their firm ideological beliefs that are not welcoming to foreign investment unless there are industrial relations agreements that they are comfortable with. That attitude has been cultivated over decades of struggle on their part to arrive at a place that they feel fits comfortably into the Williams narrative of the PNM’s Chaguaramas Declaration of 1970.

The challenge for Rowley today is to find a way to slacken the rigidity of that firmly held PNM model of state control of the economy at a time when the energy sector globally has changed and this country has suddenly found itself so uncompetitive that foreign companies will not come here for meetings, but rather he had to go there to meet them.

The underlying storyline of this emerging scenario is simply nothing more than “Houston we have a problem.”

The land of Syria has been a strategic crossroad throughout human history. From the ancient Egyptians to the post-World War I French, many have fought and ruled over this vital piece of geography. But even after gaining independence in October 1945, the Syrian Arab Republic would be plagued by a series of political upheavals.

Stability eventually came during the 1960’s when the Ba’ath Party, a pan-Arab socialist movement, seized power, paving the way for a series of dictators. These men, loved by some and reviled by others, have maintained their grip through fear and acts of brutality. But the recent chemical weapons attack on the population, supposedly committed by the Assad regime, has incurred the righteous wrath of America. This puts Syria, a country steeped in violence and intrigue, at the centre of the world once more.

In light of my previous column, I had reservations about writing another on the geopolitical situation in the Middle East, especially since all the facts surrounding the regime’s responsibility and the US military strike have yet to be revealed.

What made me decide was some feedback I received pertaining to last Sunday’s write-up. A few readers felt that my attempt to present a balanced perspective understated the use of violence by the Palestinians, especially towards Christian minorities. But one long-winded email, in particular, chastised me for failing to mention the Jewish plan for a “Greater Israel”, which the writer explained involves the pacification of the surrounding Arab states so as to guarantee Israel’s security. To that end, their agents have directed the “Zionist-controlled” US government to act on its behalf, resulting in the invasion of Iraq and the intervention in Libya. Now their attention has turned to Syria.

This is an argument that I’m very familiar with. As I mentioned in my first columns (June 21 and 27, 2015), Arab nationalism in support for the regimes tends to go hand-in-hand with an anti-Zionist and anti-American rhetoric. This is in keeping with the point I tried to make last week regarding Muslim solidarity for the Palestinian cause which is also rife with anti-Western and anti-Semitic fervour. As far as the Syrian conflict is concerned there are two issues that should be addressed: what it represents to the parties involved and what it says about the indigenous Arab mindset.

Regarding the workings of international relations, the American political scientist and former Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger, aptly explained it when he said his country, “ … has no permanent friends or enemies, only interests.”

Syria has become a cluster of confusion, with all the participants having their own agenda. The Islamic State may be the current threat, but it is also a conveniently-timed catalyst for a much larger plan to take effect. It’s no secret that America’s decades-old foreign policy for the Middle East is democratisation. This is not only advantageous for the Israelis but is also intended to hamper the spread of Islamic extremism.

For Russia, whose military isn’t known for being delicate, the purpose of their support is to maintain the relationship with one of its few remaining global allies, which in the case of Syria, includes access to its only naval base on the Mediterranean coast. Added to the volatile mix is a regional power-play between the Iranians and the Saudis, sectarian Muslim groups with old scores to settle, and the Kurds who are hoping to carve out a homeland for themselves.

So what we have is multi-sided conflict featuring direct and proxy involvement that’s fuelled by political, religious, and ethnic ambitions. The cost of which is ultimately being paid with the lives of the Syrian people.

Now putting the civil war aside, the question that needs to be asked is whether democracy is compatible with the Arab mentality. Most of the countries in that part of the world score low on developmental indices—they are politically corrupt, economically crippled, and civil liberties are suppressed.

While Israel, in comparison, is the only properly functioning democracy in the Middle East. Its laws protect the freedoms of speech, the press, and religious worship. For far too long the Arab states have used Israel and the West as scapegoats for all their woes. It’s time they recognise that their failures and deficiencies are the results of societal stagnation, where the focus is not on the well-being of the many, but to ensure that power stays in the hands of a few. Men like Assad may have supporters but it is achieved at the expense of those in opposition. And a tyrant, no matter how benevolent, is still a tyrant if all citizens aren’t treated equally and fairly.

The Middle East is a tragic contradiction—its lands are rich with natural resources, its people are equally rich in culture, and yet it is a region wrought with crises. Has Arab civilisation become so divisive that rulership by the iron fist is the only thing keeping it from self-destruction? If that is the case, it doesn’t offer a positive outlook that their future will be any better. Which means that Syria, whose historical significance once made it a country of ruins, will probably remain a country in ruins.

Ryan Hadeed

Our continuing failure to achieve a measure of working unity in the best interest of all the groups in this plural society is having a disastrous effect in these times of economic, financial and social distress and political antagonisms. Contributing to the latter are our racial and social-class fears, divisions, and insecurities.

If bpTT’s original intent was to have its Angelin platform fabricated abroad, we, through our industrial relations culture of aggravated antagonism, the inefficiencies of government and the political pulling and tugging based on race and party fanaticism facilitated that desire of the multinational corporation to take the fabrication of the platform abroad.

Aware of the political inefficiencies, the internal conflict lodged in our industrial relations, and the weaknesses of the political system, bpTT could say with conviction that “given the compressed project timeliness and other competitiveness factors for the Angelin project, local fabrication is no longer a feasible option.”

Our pitiful condition, rising out of the weaknesses of our governance systems and culture of conflict, is best illustrated by the unavailing flailing in the wind of Ancel Roget, president general of what is usually described as the “most militant and powerful” trade union, the OWTU: “Take your platform and go.”

Well, bpTT has done so, and in doing so has left us with the responsibility for the decision to deprive the economy collectively of thousands of direct and indirect jobs, contracts for local fabricating and service companies, even the doubles vendor at the gate of the industrial plant, and revenue for the state, inclusive of hard currency, so badly needed at this time.

However, the multinational has not left us without what I consider a warning: “Although the Angelin platform will not be fabricated in Trinidad, bpTT is committed to maintaining an option of fabrication in-country for future platforms, and will be working with local service providers on key competitiveness factors such as productivity.”

One conclusion to be drawn from that statement is that if we continue with our separateness and indiscipline, bpTT will continue on the road of not utilising to its fullest capacity, our fabricating skills and industry.

Not too incidentally, I continue to use this plural all-inclusive “we” to illustrate my point that whether or not there are individuals and groups who see themselves outside of the conflict zone, we, all of us are nevertheless affected.

What this possible loss of platform fabricating contracts will do is to end or badly damage our efforts to develop the capacity and reputation for being an industrial site that can efficiently and effectively do the job and so sell our services here and abroad.

As to who is to blame for T&T not being selected to fabricate the Angelin platform, the opposition United National Congress places responsibility on the government of the People’s National Movement for failing to bring the agreement with bpTT to an efficient and timely conclusion within the first six months of its term; the argument being that if this had been done, bpTT could not contend that time was too short to fabricate the platform here.

Conversely, the PNM says that the UNC failed to start the negotiations with bpTT for the gas contract when it was in office up to September 2015. More than that, Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley told I 95.5 interviewers that the decision of bpTT to fabricate Angelin abroad was made during the 2013 massive industrial conflict that seriously delayed the construction of Juniper.

Then, bpTT took the Juniper platform abroad to be finished.

Various chambers of commerce have tagged the OWTU for the conflicts experienced during Juniper’s construction. Roget has responded by claiming that bpTT broke the industrial rules of the country.

Therein lies the conflict between and among capital and labour, foreign and local, political parties contending against each other and nowhere in sight is the national interest.

The average national, even commentators such as this one, does not have a complete grasp of the full information, a comprehensive understanding, and the implications of all that is involved when everyone is perceiving and contending through narrow self-interests.

As could be expected, bpTT’s main loyalty and concern in all of this is to its shareholders and to the operations of the company internationally. That is understandable and the accepted wisdom. However, bpTT should be made mindful of the fact that T&T is an absolute shareholder in its operations.

The resources in the ground are the natural patrimony of this and future generations. Multinational corporations are partners in getting the resources out of the ground, and processing and marketing those resources abroad. Historically, however, such corporations have been the dominant partner while the host country, the owner of the resources, gets the minor share of the profits.

What T&T is to be concerned about is the lack of appreciation and acknowledgement of our history, development, and the critical roles played by all of the ethnic, social, political, religious, cultural segments of the population in where we have got to since arrivals through slavery, indentureship, the coming of plantation owners and merchants, and the more recent migrants who have come here.

Without such an appreciation of and a commitment to making that history work for us, another energy boom will come and go, and when the resources are once again wasted, we shall return to a time such as the present.

We are living in strange times in T&T with high levels of crime, etc. One of the components we as a nation can boast of and not be surprised about is bad management. We are living and seeing it daily. Two incidents that comes to mind are the fire in Port of Spain on Monday and the back up of that incident the following day.

On Monday nightm while watching the news a senior fire officer was explaining the difficulties in getting water to control the fire at ANSA building and saud that a very high percentage of the fire hydrants in Port of Spain are defective.

No surprise that defective fire hydrants fall under the purview of the Fire Service who ought to do periodical checks of these hydrants throughout the country and report defective hydrants to the Ministry of National Security who will have same replaced via the Ministry of Public Utilities where the active agent is WASA to remedy the situation.

Second case. There is a new body of pavement dwellers introduced to the country the brainchild of Mr Jack Warner under the PP Administration. They are called traffic wardens, whose duty is to be out on the streets doing traffic duties. Their function seems to be to stand on the pavement and observe the traffic pile up. A good example was on Tuesday April 11, where the fire at the ANSA Building ignited again. The Fire Services blocked traffic from going beyond Abercombry Street, along Independence Square South. There was a pile up of traffic going north along Chacon St and running back to South Quay. Meanwhile there were six traffic warden standing on Independence Square and along Abercombry Street one holding a bottle of water.

Our country’s problem, as I have highlighted, is bad management, mainly no supervisors.

Athelston Clinton

Arima

Reading the story of one of the people who was infected with the HIV virus from a blood transfusion passing away, made me angry. I am angry for a number of reasons. Primarily among them is that this person’s death, unlike the daily murders, was avoidable. Compounding the insult is when some fly-by-night, neophyte wannabe politician comes telling the population that the person did not die because of HIV. It is evident that this political newcomer lacks information about HIV and health issues in general.

People who contract HIV don’t ‘die’ from AIDS; they die from related issues as a result of their immune system’s inability to resist simple things like pneumonia. So cause of death would not read AIDS/HIV, but simply “pneumonia.” Further complicating matters, in recent times, cause of death in many instances have been simply given as “unknown.”

This bothers me because several years ago I took issue with the Blood Bank when asked to donate blood for a friend. Upon entry to the Blood Bank donors were provided with a questionnaire. The questionnaire seeks to ascertain one’s life story: one’s sex life, including one’s sexual orientation, if one has a criminal record, number of tattoos, how many body piercings one had accumulated to date, etc.

The questionnaire was both intrusive and ridiculous and I made it known to the staff. They indicated they were “only doing their job,” a common response by people who are too lazy to even think. It also implied that if one manages to answer all the questions correctly, there was no need for the blood to be tested. This basic assumption is seriously flawed. All blood must be tested to determine at least “type,’ and one would expect for other possible infections, including hepatitis, sickle cell etc.

Clearly this is not the case with the Blood Bank in T&T. This explains how, not one, but several persons, have become infected with transfusions. What is even more frightening is that it is quite possible that many others have been infected and are unaware. Private and public health institutions are not immune from the fallout of this scandalous behaviour. Someone should be held accountable. But in a land where the “blame game” is the only game people become proficient at, expecting that someone, anyone, will ever be held accountable is simply an exercise in futility.

I made the point on several occasions, both in discussions and in writing, that one of the major problems facing this nation is our poor work ethic. This poor work ethic explains from why bpTT refused to have their platform built here to why we have challenges in every sphere, in particular state institutions. It explains why BWIA/CAL, WASA, Petrotrin, T&TEC, NHA/HDC, government schools, and other state institutions are forever operating in the dark.

Meanwhile, we have yet to see any bank in this nation record a loss, despite recurring claims of recession and depression. The almost non-existent detection rate on murders by the T&T Police Service (TTPS) can also be explained by our sorry work ethic. And while I agree with the current PM that the government is not responsible for solving crime, it is the function of the police, the PM should know that when the government wishes to take credit for when “crime is down,” then they will be blamed for when it goes in the opposite direction.

I have also indicated on numerous occasions that cleaning up this nation is not a job for the faint-hearted. It is not a job for anyone who sees it as just “doing a job.” Cleaning up this nation requires testicular fortitude of the highest magnitude, since we did not wake up this morning and became ‘lawless.” We have been on that lawless path for quite some time and no one saw it fit or necessary to ‘bell the cat.”

Now that the box is finally opened, it is disingenuous to act surprised as we watch our citizens die.

Rudy Chato Paul, Sr.

D’Abadie

If the labour movement has made the right decision in respect to Angelin, then it is wrong of the Hon. Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley, to insinuate that its leadership needs to come up in some way.

After the debacle of the Arcelor Mittal dispute, labour is right to be cautious. We do not just want any kind of international investors, especially in these modern times of multiple layering of risks including destruction in the environment and in social dignity.

Labour is a check-and-balance on both the excesses of “enterprise” and the ordinary activities of business, local and foreign. Labour needs to be careful of being ensnared in types of collusion when it works against them or the common good, whether or not it is a case of capitalistic exploitation.

Even regular entrepreneurs can demand labour act lock-joint with them in some corrupted fashion—whether to their detriment or to the disadvantage in some way of everyone else. Labour should feel encouraged to react. And yet there is more to labour again.

Labour is people and labour ranks ahead of capital; and decisions and policies must prioritize accordingly, in some correct mix; and this is only natural. In other words, optimization of profit ought to mean optimization of returns to labour.

Labour comprises the ordinary, the strong, the prodigy, the weak, the challenged and their communities, all of whom must endure and thrive. We need to be reminded of it all the time now and going forward and, so far, we have not heard it in any way from the Prime Minister. At least he should be willing to admit that, theoretically, there can be situations where the (apparent) greater good can end up being too costly.

Elias Galy

Port-of-Spain

JOHN ANDREW YOUNG Born 19th May 1939 Departed 13th April 2017 Husband of Baby Rose Rampersad-Young Father of Vaughn GovindaYoung, Simone Vandana Young, Arhlene Young and Charmaine Young Father-in-law of Taryn Gobin-Young Grandfather to Bella, Lucas and Jacob. Brother of Marion, Fabian, Maureen, Paul, Emmanuel, Marie,Amy, Kevin, Mario and Joan. Brother in law of the Rampersads originally of Cochrane Street, Tunapuna

The funeral of John will be held at 9:00am at the Aramalaya Presbyterain Church on Cochrane Street, Tunapuna followed by a private cremation.To offer condolences to the family please go to www.belgroves.com

SPENCER: CYNTHIA PETRA nee Senhouse, of 4 Kelly Street, Tunapuna, died on April12, 2017, at the age of 83. Daughter of the late Lionel & Albertina Senhouse. Wife of the late ArindellSpencer. Mother of Dr. Clarena Spencer& Quilan Spencer-Nicholls. Mother-in-law of Lennox ‘Steve’Nicholls. Grandmother of Quinelle and Lenelle Nicholls.Sister of Lucille, Victor, Max, Winston (all deceased) and Rhona.Aunt of many. Great aunt of many.Great great aunt of many. Relatives of the Holder, de la Bastide, Ramdin, Banfield, Smith and Williams families and many others. Friend of many.

Funeral service for the late Cynthia Spencer takes place at 2:00 pm on Wednesday 19th April, 2017 at the Good Shepherd Anglican Church, FreelingStreet, Tunapuna thence to theTunapuna Public Cemetery. En-quiries, Lee’s Funeral Directors,663-1010.

Gabriella Donahue was a double winner as T&T bagged five gold medals in a first night haul of ten, to lie second on the points table when the first night of finals were completed at the 2017 Carifta Swimming Championships at the Betty Kelly Kenning Aquatic Centre in Nassau Bahamas on Saturday.

Hosts Bahamas took the lead with 193 points with T&T next with 169, just ahead of Guadeloupe (163) followed by Jamaica (150) and Cayman Island (144) to round off the top five.

Donahue led the medal charge with gold medals in the 13-14 girls 200 metres breaststroke and 50m backstroke.

In the 200m breaststroke Donahue won comfortably in two minutes, 48.01 seconds ahead of Guadeloupe’s Farah Sheikboudhou (2:49.96) and Sabine Elison of the Cayman Islands (2:48.01).

The T&T swimmer then returned to win the 50m backstroke in 30.55, marginally slower than her preliminary record swim of 30.36 seconds, which surpassed the 2016 Carifta record of 30.37 which was held by Emma Harvey of Bermuda while fellow T&T swimmer Jahmia Harley was eighth in a personal best of 32.05.

Donahue’s preliminary swim also erased the national record of Kristin Julien of 30.57 which was established at Carifta 2011 and was the record up to 2015.

First gold honours for the 36-member T&T swimming contingent which is under the supervision of head coach Shawn Pouchet went to Jada Chatoor in the 13-14 girls 800m freestyle in 9:24.69 while Marie-Lorella Capolini won the silver for Guadeloupe (9:32.76) and Ria Plunkett of Cayman Islands, bronze (9:40.82).

Kael Yorke avenged his 2016 failure to pass the preliminary stage in Martinique with a “come-from-behind” victory to win gold in the 15-17 boys 100 metres butterfly for T&T.

A veteran member of the T&T team ,Yorke surged past his rivals in the last five metres in a personal best 56.51 seconds, ahead of Bermuda’s Jesse Washington (56.82) and French Guiana’s Steven Aimable (57.22).

The final gold medal on the night for T&T came via the 11-12 boys 400 freestyle relay team of Nikoli Blackman, Josiah Changar, Riquelio Joseph and Zarek Wilson in 4:10.58 ahead of Guadeloupe (4:11.05) and Bahamas (4:14.35).

One event later, Jahmia Harley, Jada Chatoor, Regan Allen and Gabriela Donahue won silver in the 13-14 girls 400 freestyle relay in 4:06.69 just behind winners Jamaica (4:06.08).

There were also two other silver and three bronze for T&T on the opening night.

Graham Chatoor’s got silver in the 15-17 boys 1500m freestyle in a personal best 16:43.34, behind Guadeloupe’s Anaique Zachelin (16:27.38) while fellow T&T entrant Delroy Tyrell was eighth in a personal best 18:11.69 in the boys 13-14 age-group.

And Racine Ross took silver in the 15-17 girls 100m butterfly in 1:05.39 edging Lauren Hew of Cayman Islands (1:05.52), but behind. Martinique’s Mika Keideyr (1:03.34).while T&T’s Jada Chai was fifth in 1:07.07

Regan Allen won bronze in the 13-14 girls 100m butterfly (1:07.77) just ahead of Harley (1:07.91) as both T&T athletes achieving personal bests.

Zarek Wilson, who established a C qualifying time to qualify for this event, stepped up to the plate and got bronze in the 11-12 boys 50m backstroke in 32.07, just ahead of T & T’s Riquelio Joseph (32.35) as both swimmers set personal best times.

Wilson was also eight in a new personal mark of 1:10.25 in the 100m butterfly.

T & T’s missed medals in the 15-17 boys (Yorke, Osaze Riley, Graham Chatoor, Jeron Thompson) and 13-14 boys (Malik Nelson, Jonathan Constantine, Tyrrell, Aqeel Joseph) as both teams placed fourth in their respective finals in 3:39.71 and 3:56.31 while 15-17 girls quartet of Danielle Williams, Ornella Walker, Jada Chai, and Amira Pilgrim placed fifth in 4:09.48.

Jeron Thompson, Justin Samlalsingh, Vrisnelit Faure, Luke Gillette, Neishelah Caseman, Zoe Anthony, Arielle Dickson and Ornella Walker were T & T’s other finalists on opening night.

The pair of Thompson (27.63), a personal best and Samlalsingh (28.52) were fourth and eighth in the 15-17 boys 50m backstroke final while Walker was fourth in the girls in 30.95, another new personal best mark

Still in the 50m backstroke, Caseman was seventh in the 11-12 girls in 34.33, and Aqeel Joseph, fifth in the 13-14 boys in a personal best of 29.84 as well.

In the 200m breaststroke finals, Zoe Anthony ended sixth in 3:04.83 in the 11-12 girls; just ahead of Arielle Dickson (3:06.98), her best time while in the 15-17 category, Faure (2:59.18) and Gillette (2:32.18) were good enough for eighth and seventh respectively

Yesterday morning when competition resumed with heats, T&T’s Amira Pilgrim, one of the team captains of the narrowly missed out on a national record in the 15-17 girls 50m butterfly.

Pilgrim stopped the clock in a personal best 28.56 seconds and was the second fastest qualifier, just off the national record of 28.56, owned by Kristin Julien, while Ross was eighth in 29.88 and also booked a spot in last night’s final.

Yorke signalled his intentions with a 25.54 swim in the 15-17 boys 100m butterfly and was the second fastest qualifier while Thompson was eighth in 25.98.

The trio of Gabriella Donahue (30.04) , Harley (30.24) and Aqeel Joseph, who were fourth, fifth and sixth in their respective13-14 girls and boys 50m butterfly heats all booked final places along with 11-12 duo, Zoe Anthony (32.04) and Kadon Williams (29.41) and in the 400m medley relay the 11-12 girls and 15-17 boys qualified.

Harley’s 1:10.64 in the 13-14 girls 100m backstroke also earned her the lane six slot in the final as she was the third fastest qualifier. while Walker (1:09.54) was seventh in the 15-17 girls, and Wilson (1:14.93) eighth in the 11-12 boys ahead of last night’s final.

Wilson also qualified to the 200m freestyle final with the third best time of 2:14.90 just ahead of countryman Nikoli Blackman (2:15.05), the latter of whom swam a personal best.

Jada Chatoor was fifth best in the 13-14 girls 200m freestyle heats in 2:15.90 and Aqeel Joseph, eighth in 200m boys equivalent in 2:09.46.

Last night’s programme featured the finals of the 200m freestyle, 50m butterfly, 100m backstroke, 400m individual medley and the 400m medley relay.

The Carifta Championships are also an additional opportunity for T & T athletes to qualify for the 2017 CCCAN Championships which are to be held in T&T in June.

T&T’s Tyriq Horsford accomplished a hat-trick of victories in the Boys Under-18 javelin and he did it in style yesterday in Curacao at the Flow Carifta Games.

Horsford broke the Carifta record of 73.00 metres he achieved last year in Grenada, sending the spear 76.50m to seal the gold medal, adding to the gold won by Tyra Gittens, who totally dominated the Girls Open Heptathlon. She was joined by Anya Akili, who recovered well in the final two events to bag bronze. Another multi-sport athlete Kerlon Ashby nabbed a bronze as well as the Girls and Boys U-18 4x100m relay teams and a silver in the Boys U-20 4x100m relay unit, to increase T&T’s tally of medals to 12 (5 gold, 1 silver and six bronze), yesterday at the multi-purpose Ergilio Hato Stadium in Willemstad.

On the opening day, sprinters Khalifa St Fort, Adell Colthrust and shot putter Ianna Roach picked up gold for T&T while two bronze came from discus thrower Konnel Jacob and quartermiler Jacob St Clair.

Horsford bettered the record in his first attempt and could have won with any of his three other attempts- 70.46m in his second attempt, 72.77m and 73.21m in his fourth and fifth, respectively. Copping silver and bronze were Bahamians Sean Rolle (65.51) and Michael Angelo Bullard (63.84), respectively. Horsford had also won in 2015 in St Kitts and Nevis.

Horsford and Gittens’ victories set up an intense and exciting third and final day at the Games as today, both St Fort and Colthrust go for the sprint double titles when they tackle their respective 200-metre races.

US-based athlete Gittens tallied 4,854 points to claim the top spot on the podium. She entered the second day leading with 3,478 points after winning the opening four disciplines—the 100m hurdles in 14.22 (947), the high jump, leaping 1.83m (1,016), shot put 12.00m (661) and the 200m (854).

She remained in charge of the second day, opening with a win in the long jump with a leap of 5.94m for 831 points. The next event posed a challenge for local heptathlete as she fouled on each of her three attempts to exit the javelin throw with no points but so great was her lead that she stayed on the top of the table with an unassailable 4,309 points heading into the final discipline.

Gittens went on to clock 2:42.45 to place sixth in the 800m to earn 545 and be confirmed as the gold medallist.

Meanwhile, Akili repeated as the bronze medallist with 4,360 after placing eighth in the long jump with 5.14m (598), fifth in the javelin throw with 24.20m (367) and then second in the two-lap event in a time 2:33.03 (655). Second overall was French Guiana’s Thelia Ruster with 4,540.

Ashby secures Octathlon bronze

In the Boys Open Octathlon, Ashby stayed resilient and managed to hold on for the bronze. He entered the second day in third place with a tally of 2,821 points. In the opening discipline, the 100m, Ashby was fourth in 11.25 (806), third in the long jump with 6.64m (729), produced a 11.24m-throw in the shot put event for 560 and in the 400m, he placed fourth in 51.98 (726).

He returned to earn 887 in the 110m hurdles, 636 in the high jump (1.81) and 537 in the javelin for his fourth place finish in both events and closed off with a eight-place finish in the 1,500m in 5:36.91 (366). Winning gold was Barbadian Aaron Worrell (5,461) by a narrow one-point margin over Wikenson Fenelon of Turks and Caicos (5,460).

T&T relay successes

In the 4x100m relays, T&T team of Onil Mitchell, Jalen Purcell, Tyrell Edwards and Jerrod Elcock, running in that order, copped silver in 40.24. Winning was Jamaica in 40.10 and third was Bahamas (40.59).

T&T Girls U-18 foursome of Akilah Lewis, Ayla Stanisclaus, Rae-Anne Serville and Deleth Charles clocked 46.49, to finish behind winner and Carifta record-breaking Jamaica (44.35) and second-place Bahamas (45.05), respectively.

In the Boys version of the race, the local quartet of Colthrust, Avindale Smith, Timothy Frederick and Kiddel Carrington was third in 40.84, followed Carifta record-breaking Jamaica (39.97) and Bahamas (40.77) to the line.

Hoping to add more medals will be St Fort, who qualified for the final of the Girls U-20 200m with a 24.44-clocking to cross second in the first semifinal heat. Joining her in the final is Shikyla Walcott who clocked 24.68 to advance as one of the automatic qualifiers, placing third in heat two.

Colthrust, is another T&T sprinter who will be looking to claim a sprint double, after the U-18 Boys 100m champion progressed to the Boys’ U-18 final by winning heat four in a time of 22.27. Smith too, booked his spot in the finale after easing to victory in the opening heat in 22.11.

More T&T sprinters will also feature in the other two 200m finals. In the Boys U-20 dash, Elcock and Purcell both advanced with times of 21.80 and 21.69, respectively while Lewis (25.04) and Stanisclaus (24.52) will face the starter in the Girls U18 version of the race.

Also active on the day were, Patrice Richards, who crossed in 1:03.02 to place fifth in the Girls U-18 400m hurdles while her teammate Cheziah Phillip was seventh in 1:08.54 and in the Girls U-18 800m, T&T lone competitor Joanna Rogers did not finish the race.

In Trinidad, the first official policy in respect to religion was the Code Noir of 1789, which was a set of slave laws published by the Spanish governor of Trinidad, José María Chacón. This Code stated that slaves were to be taught the Catholic faith and be given days off on Sundays and holy days.

Dr Eric Williams, the country’s first Prime Minister and a historian, noted in a 1973 speech to the Methodist Church that, “There was generally speaking only one Church, the Roman Catholic Church, at the time which governed directly or indirectly a large part of Europe. It was not only a Church, it was also a most powerful state. The Church came to the West Indies with enormous powers naturally derived from its pre-eminent position in Europe...the Spanish regime in the early years in the West Indies was dominated by the determination to keep out all Moslems and all Protestants from the Catholic territories...You will find throughout this entire period the active association of the Church with the slave system of the Caribbean...”

HARSH TREATMENT

In 1797, the British took over Trinidad, at which point the island’s free population included 1295 white males, 856 white females, 2094 coloured males, 2382 coloured females, 495 Amerindian males and 587 Amerindian females. Enslaved Africans totalled 5396 males and 4613 females. Although there are no records of the religious affiliations of these groups, it is reasonable to assume that the majority of whites and “coloureds” were Catholic.

In 1800, Thomas Picton, Trinidad’s second British governor whose tenure lasted until 1813, issued a new set of slave laws. These were generally seen as harsher than the Code Noir, and here the impact of religion on the treatment of enslaved Africans may be seen. Generally, the French and Spanish planters, who were Catholic, seemed to have treated the enslaved Africans less harshly than the British Anglican planters.

However, since most of the British inhabitants were not planters, they would also have had less opportunity to proselytise among the Africans, even if they had been so inclined. This difference was observed by the colony’s third governor Sir Ralph Woodford, who governed from 1813 until he fell seriously ill in 1828 and died at sea on his way back to England. In an 1817 letter, Woodford asserted that “Nothing can contribute more to the improvement of the Negroes than the custom of evening prayers, it renders them submissive, order and devout. The Spaniards invariably attend to this and their Negroes are much more obedient and well ordered than others. On the French estates the Sunday evening is rarely passed over without prayers but on the English it is seldom if ever observed.”

CATHOLIC SUPPRESSION

One of the key objectives of the British government was to undermine the power and influence of the Roman Catholic planter class in Trinidad (the “French Creoles”). At first, the Church of England tried to suppress all other religious groups, especially Catholics, but this proved futile, in part because Catholicism had first-comers’ advantage and in part because Trinidad had a continual flow of settlers who followed many different religions. The Anglicans hardly bothered with Tobago, which in 1812 had seven parishes but just one clergyman who had no church building.

The British government thus used the alternative strategy of education to gain support from the populace of the colony. In 1835, the British Parliament created a Negro Education Grant to fund all nonconformist churches that wanted to establish schools. The Baptists declined, but Moravians, Presbyterians and Methodists joined with the Anglican church to educate the African-descent people. These “ward schools” operated on secular principles, rather than attempting to have the Anglican clergy compete with the Catholics to win converts from the Africans and the newly arrived indentured labourers from India.

TOBAGO

In Tobago, which became a ward of Trinidad in 1889, the first government school was not constructed until 1938. Before that, all the schools were run by churches, and even the private ones were started by religiously prominent individuals. The established denominations in Tobago included the Anglicans, Methodists, and Catholics, but Seventh Day Adventists came to the island in 1890, London Baptists in 1895 and the Gospel Hall Brethren in 1923. In Tobago by 1838, there were already 12 day schools, 110 Sunday schools, and three evening schools, with 1,678 students.

Table One shows the religious make-up of the society in 1911, when the total population of Trinidad was 333,552. This was the template for the religious traditions of Trinidad and Tobago.

MORTON BRINGS PRESBYTERIANISM

Since people of European descent made up just a small percentage of the population, the large blocs of Catholics and Anglicans show the success of these churches in converting African-descent persons to these religions just two generations after the abolition of slavery. Twenty years later, Catholics had expanded their congregation at nearly three times the rate of the Anglicans, even though the colonial government was British. However, the most significant increases occurred among the Presbyterians and Baptists which, although still small groups, increased their membership by 32 per cent and 34 per cent respectively.

In the case of the Presbyterians, this was mainly due to the conversion of East Indians, who were specifically targeted by that church. The first Presbyterian missionary came in 1836 to minister to Scottish planters as well as the enslaved Africans. In 1843, a Mission was established by the United Presbyterian Church of America. However it was when 29-year-old Reverend John Morton came to the island in 1868 that the Presbyterian sect really established its roots in Trinidad. Morton soon observed that East Indian parents were reluctant to send their children to ward schools, and decided to focus on that community for education and conversion.

AFRO-CENTRIC BAPTISTS

In the case of the Baptists, the consciousness of African ancestry may have been a key factor in African-Trinidadians embracing that sect since, while Trinidad was the least African of all the territories in 1833, the island afterwards became the most African in respect of the latest contacts with Africa in the 19th century through arrivals of slaves bound for Brazil and Cuba rescued by British navy. Most of these Africans were Yoruba, and both Spiritual Baptists and Orisa followers are drawn from the same socioeconomic cohort (poor and black) and, indeed, Baptist churches often shared compounds with Orisa shrines. Orisa in Trinidad also has elements of Catholicism which had been incorporated into the original Yoruba beliefs.

20TH CENTURY CHANGES

Table Two shows the proportional changes in religious membership from the mid-20th century. Both Catholics and Anglican experienced significant declines, with the Anglican church’s membership falling most steeply. All the other major denominations remained more or less steady. The Wesleyans and Moravian sects, which had come to the Caribbean specifically because of the anti-slavery sentiments of founder John Wesley, had vanished from the census, presumably subsumed under the Methodist church. But, although Methodists were influential in Tobago, where the Catholic influence was less pronounced, they never gained a real toehold in Trinidad.

By contrast, the upper-class of Trinidad were up to the early 20th century still the Catholics. In a seminal 1953 study, the sociologist Lloyd Braithwaite wrote: “Most of the members of the upper-class are either Roman Catholic or Anglican, but these are by no means identifiable as upper-class religions. Affiliation to these Churches, and to the Presbyterian, Wesleyan, Baptist and Moravian, is to be found through all the social classes. It is really on the Seventh Day Adventists and those sects which are here described as non-Christian which have...an affiliation with the lower class. Thus, the religious tie cuts across the divisions of social class...However, although religious affiliationdoes not follow class lines there is stratification within the Church itself. For instance, the high dignitaries in all the Christian denominations are mostly Europeans.”

CHRISTIANITY NOW?

What, then, is the state of Christianity in T&T in the 21st century? Table Three provides a snapshot. While Catholics remain the largest group, the RC church shows dropping membership compared to 2000 and even 1990. The denominations that are growing are the Jehovah Witnesses, Seventh Day Adventists, Baptists and, especially, the “born-again” Christian sects. This implies that the literalist or fundamentalist religious ethos is attracting more of the population.

Historically, religion has played a key role in shaping the social norms, institutions and policies of Trinidad and Tobago. Even if the influence of the different denominations has now shifted, the pattern in the 21st century seems little different than it was 100 years ago.

SIDEBAR

Book referenced for this article:

The Plantation Slaves of Trinidad, by Meredith A John, 1988.

Caribbean Religious History. Ennis B Edmonds & Michelle A Gonzalez, 2010.

The Changing Society of Tobago 1838-1938. Susan E Craig-James, 2008.

Forged from the Love of Liberty. Dr Eric Williams. 1981.

He Had The Power. Frances Henry, 2008

Social Stratification in Trinidad. Lloyd Braithwaite, 1975.

Caribbean Favoured Presbyterianism. Jerome Teelucksingh, 2008.

TABLE 1:

Religious denominations in Trinidad, 1911.

Denomination Number Percentage

Roman Catholic 106,113 32%

Anglican 90,045 27%

Hindu 85,087 26%

Muslim 14,857 4%

Wesleyans 12,383 4%

Presbyterians 8,562 2.5%

Moravians 7,069 2%

Baptists 5,562 1.6%

Seventh Day Adventists 886 0.2%

Buddhists 428 0.1%

(Source: Central Statistical Office)

TABLE 2:

Secular percentages for main Christian religions 1946-2011

Religion 1946 1960 1990 2011

Roman Catholic 35% 36% 29% 22%

Anglican 24% 21% 11% 6%

Presbyterian 4% 4% 3% 3%

Baptist 2% 2% 3% 7%

Seventh Day Adventist 1% 1% 4% 4%

(Source: CSO censuses)

Table 3:

Christian religions, 2011

Religion Number Percentage % change 2000-2011

Roman Catholic 285,671 21.6% -1.4%

Pentecostal/Evangelical/Full Gospel 159,033 12% +108.4%

Baptists, Spiritual & Other 90,953 6.8% +14%

Anglican 74,994 5.7% -13.6%

Seventh Day Adventist 54,156 4.1% +22.7%

Presbyterian/Congregational 32,972 2.5% -10.2%

Jehovah’s Witness 19,450 1.5% +8.4%

Methodist 8,648 0.7% NA

Rastafarian 3,615 0.2% NA

Moravian 3,526 0.3% NA

(Source: Central Statistical Office, 2011 census)

Behind every dark cloud there is a silver lining. Irvin “Blackie” Blackman aims to fill the void left by De Nu Pub’s fiery death on March 26 by launching a new weekly event—Kaiso and Comedy Wednesdays—at the Q’s Place club, beginning on Wednesday, April 19. Q’s Place is just above SWWTU Hall, along Wrightson Road, downtown Port–of- Spain.

“It’s a central location for people from any direction,” said Blackman, thanking Anthony John (Mr Q), a popular radio disc jockey, for giving calypso a new weekly space.

Under the Soca Parliament banner—a coordinated effort of like-minded people who are all part of Blackman’s social circle—the weekly comedy and kaiso showcase will kick off at 8:30 pm and end at midnight. Blackie assured that there is adequate parking on the club compound.

The entertainers will be backed by Vincent Rivers & The Soca Unit. Patrons will be treated to a slate of comical local calypsonians whom Blackie feels have long been denied a space to show off their talent.

“There are some really good humorous calypsonians out there—fellas like Alpha and Kid Calaloo and so many others. They will be showcased at Q’s Place every Wednesday starting on April 19,” said Blackie.

Blackie says he’s had the idea for quite a while, having approached Anthony John last August with a request for use of the facility.

Blackie says there is a need for this entertainment outlet, especially for mature kaiso music lovers.

“There really isn’t much available for people who enjoy kaiso music—and there definitely is a market. The Mas Camp was that home for kaiso, in the minds of many, so while I am personally saddened by the tragic situation that took place last month, this effort to bring Kaiso and Comedy Wednesdays to life is likely to encourage people to come out and enjoy the local music and entertainment again.”

This isn’t Blackie’s first promotional effort. He’s been a part of event promotions in the past, key among them the 2007 staging of the Caribbean Soca Fest event at the National Stadium. He says he will work hard to ensure that patrons get exactly what they want at the new weekly shows.

“When I did Caribbean Soca Fest, I went through every artiste’s repertoire and I told them exactly what I wanted them to perform. I’ll be doing the same thing this time around, so that the people get the hits they love,” he said.

Excited about future prospects, Blackman and his team anticipate the inclusion of Caribbean acts.

Bloodied as a result of cuts to her body made by the blade of a knife and weakened by repeated strangulation, she could fight no more.

On realising what might be her demise, she mustered the strength in that moment to look at her attacker, who was about to rape her and asked: “If you are going to do this to me, can you at least use a condom?”

This was her point of escape.

Kit Evans-Ford is a victim and survivor of a vicious and violent crime that almost took her life in 2008 while working in the Eastern Caribbean.

The 32-year-old mother of two, author, retreat leader and teacher shared her testimony with the large gathering of families, friends and concerned citizens at the Peace Rally and Concert Queen’s Park Oval, Port-of-Spain, yesterday.

The event was held to mark the culmination of 40 hours of prayer followed by 40 days of action, which was led by the Non Violence Begins With Me Movement to restore peace to the land of T&T.

At the event, which was endorsed by Guardian Media Ltd, Evans-Ford, the feature speaker from the US, gave a detailed description of the horrific event that, for some time, left her with a post-traumatic stress disorder.

But more than her emotional recollection, her bigger story is that she overcame and her attacker is now serving a 46-year prison sentence.

Her message yesterday centered on non-violence with compassion being the main ingredient.

In the voice of former US President Barack Obama, Evan-Ford shouted “Yes We Can” in fact lead lives of non-violence individually and as a country.

“Even when bad things happen in our lives, in our country or the world, even after that, hope peace, love and healing is possible,” she said.

Evans-Ford commended the Living Waters Community, who was responsible for her visit, creating the Non-Violence Begins With Me Movement and organising all the activities promoting non-violence that would have passed over the 40 days which began on March 3.

Borrowing the words of American cultural anthropologist Margaret Mead, she said to the crowd: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful citizens can change the world.”

She said in hosting such events and supporting such movements, it shows people understood that non-violence began with each person as an individual.

Evans-Ford said while everyone may not have been a victim of crime, they may have been a victim of something else or may have victimised someone.

She said it was through grace of God, counselling and testifying that her healing came.

In a subsequent interview with the T&T Guardian, Evans-Ford shared a few points on how society could live and breathe non-violence on a daily basis.

“There are different ways in which we react when we are violated or see violence in our community. Often times we avoid it, even making accommodation for it because we feel this is how our community is so there is nothing we can do, we will just have to accept it for the way it is. But that is not true because violence has root causes and the root causes are what we need to get at,” Evans-Ford explained.

She said violence could take on many forms and was not only perpetrated using a weapon. There was violence in the form of molestation, verbal and emotional abuse, abandonment etcetera, she said.

Her reasoning,though, was that in most cases perpetrators of crime were usually themselves victims of crimes.

She said this is why the cycle of violence continued.

She said while the act of violence by someone must not be negated and we must stand firm on justice, at the same time a level of compassion must also be met in order for healing to take place.

“My attacker turned out to have been a serial rapist. When we heard of his story, it was found he was a victim of abuse and abandonment. While this gave him no right to harm others, he may have chosen violence to deal with his pain and to really get back at the person who hurt him, but usually if you can’t, you will hurt others.”

She said her organisation, Overcoming the STORM, aimed to inspire and help others understand that healing was possible.

“I do this by teaching nonviolence, through the performing arts, and counseling. Helping you move from hurt to healing,” she said.

Evans-Ford will be in T&T until Friday. She will be attending several institutions to speak and will be interviewed on GML’s Sky 99.5FM later this week.

Also supporting the event were numerous artistes and performers. Among them were The Love Movement choir, calypsonian Karene Asche, Aaron Duncan, 2Cents Movement, Mungal Patasar and Soul Man to name a few.

Greetings in the name of and in support of non-violence were also brought through various institutions heads and activists for peace.

Veteran mas designer Brian Mac Farlane was the event’s stage coordinator and told the T&T Guardian it is the hope of the movement that the event would become an annual one.

Abount the event

The Non Violence Begins With Me Movement is a group of concerned citizens who came together in late 2016 because of genuine concern about what was going on in the nation.

Rosemarie Scott, committee member, told the T&T Guardian the aim of the movement was not to point fingers at those who were commiting crimes, or at the police and the Government, but to promote that non-violence began with ndividuals and that everyone had a role to play in changing the situation in the country by addressing themselves and seeing how they were contributing to violence.

“So we launched 40 hours of prayer to start followed by 40 days of action,” she said.

Scott said the movement toured the country, even going to Tobago, speaking in schools, hosting vigils and encouraging every denomination and religious organisation to get on board. This did happen with an inter-faith service on March 4 at the Living Waters Community headquarters in Port-of-Spain.

Asked if she felt change would come, Scott said not overnight, as a lot of work had to be done, but things had to start somewhere and she believed it was a good start.

​

Soca artiste Rodney “Benjai” La Blanc is recovering at home following a brutal attack outside a night club in Guyana on Sunday morning.

A media release from Le Blanc’s attorneys Gideon Mac-Master, Keith Scotland and Joel Roper, states that the artiste had just wrapped up his performance at Pulse Entertainment’s soca theme party at the Palm Court Night Club, Georgetown.

Le Blanc was standing in a nearby car park in the company of his manager and other people when the driver of a vehicle in the car park reversed into them. When alerted to the presence of the group, the driver came out and pointed a firearm at them. At that time, the other occupant of the vehicle exited the passenger’s side and hurled a glass object at Le Blanc.

“We say nothing more of the incident at this time, other than to give the perpetrators of this heinous and unprovoked assault the assurance that we have ascertained their identities and will invoke the full legal apparatus against them, including vigorous pursuits of criminal and civil litigation to ensure the justice is served,” the release stated.

Le Blanc was the feature act in the Palm Court Night Club’s Easter Phenomenon party.

Guyanese news site Newsourcegy reported that Le Blanc was struck across the face with a bottle following an altercation with club patrons. He was standing outside the club chatting with a group of fans when a car almost reversed into the group.

The report stated that one of the fans allegedly knocked on the car to let the driver know that he was too close. The driver, a regular at the club known as Imran, got out of the car and began shouting at the group. Le Blanc attempted to quell the situation and the driver threatened him with a firearm. Another occupant then got out of the car and struck him with a bottle across his face with a bottle.

He fell to the ground with blood gushing from deep cuts close to his ear and jaw. He was rushed to hospital where he underwent emergency treatment. It was reported that he received over 20 stitches. Le Blanc filed a report with Guyanese police before leaving the country.

Former transport minister, Stephen Cadiz, under whose watch the Super Fast Galicia cargo vessel was contracted to operate between Trinidad and Tobago, wants to know why after 20 months in office the Government is now releasing the vessel on allegations of corruption without putting a proper alternative in place.

“Why are they doing this to Tobago?” he asked.

Cadiz said with the exception of the Government, none of the stakeholders, including the Tobago Chamber of and truckers, had a problem with the Galicia.

“The Galicia was 100 per cent on time while in T&T and it’s departure record was 99.9 per cent with no failure.”

He said investigating corruption has nothing to do with getting a proper vessel to replace the Galicia.

Cadiz said under his watch the Galicia was contracted in 2014 precisely because the Warrior Spirit was functioning on only one engine.

“When it came to our attention in December 2014 the Warrior was operating on one engine and we could not get the agents to respond in a comfortable manner, we felt we could no longer continue with that contract. The Warrior’s contract was supposed to end in August 2016.”

Cadiz said the Galicia arrived for that sole reason. “Can you imagine the mess we would have been in if the Warrior with its one engine, loaded with passengers and cargo, shut down? The safety and security issues we would have had?”

Cadiz said by January 2014, they started to look for a new vessel and by May that year the Galicia sailed into T&T.

He said the Government, if it wanted to, could have taken the decision to release the Galicia in a similar manner without any interruption in the cargo service to Tobago. “They had 20 months to do it.

“But in 2017, you are now looking to lay blame on a government that demitted office in 2015.”

Cadiz declined to comment on allegations of corruption in the procurement of the Galicia, only saying he is waiting on the Attorney General to complete his criminal investigation. “If there’s corruption, find it, deal with it and lock people up.”

The former minister expressed concern for citizens of Tobago who depends heavily on goods coming from Trinidad.

“The real issue is what is going to happen when there is no cargo service to Tobago?”

He charged the whole issue of corruption into the Galicia being touted by the Government is a major distraction and threw back allegations at the Government.

“To just allow the Galicia to sail out of the Bocas without putting something in place smacks of mismanagement, irresponsibility and just, basically, chaos.”

Cadiz questioned the tendering process of a replacement for the Galicia. “I heard the port chairman saying they are receiving offers daily.

“What is the tendering process for the new vessel? Where are these offers coming from? Who’s vetting these people?”

Concerning claims by the Hyatt Regency, located on the waterfront, it was experiencing “earthquakes” because of the movement of the Galicia, Cadiz said, if anything, that point to questions about the structural soundness of the hotel.

“Maybe somebody needs to do a proper structural survey of the Hyatt,” he suggested.

AG: EVIDENCE OF CORRUPTION

​

Attorney General Faris Al-Rawi has said there is evidence of corruption regarding how the Super Fast Galicia’s six-month contract turned into a two-year stint.

He said documents relating to the procurement of the Galicia were passed to him by Works Minister Rohan Sinanan upon instruction of Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley.

“On the face of it, yes, there is corruption, including by those who were high office holders. The transactions are not on all fours.

“The timing, method and the particulars of the procurement, held side by side with the Cabinet knowledge and approval, are essential features of analysis in the report which I will produce,” al Rawi promised.

Lisa Greenidge’s world changed completely when her daughter, Kizzy (Keziah), was three months old. Greenidge took Kizzy for her first vaccination and a couple hours after she had her first seizure.

“Her body stiffened up, she started drooling and her eyes were just staring,” Greenidge, 41, recalled. “After that she had three to six seizures each week right up until now.”

Greenidge said Kizzy was diagnosed with a seizure disorder with no explanation provided. But the story did not end there. Kizzy was also later unofficially diagnosed with autism. “When she was about three, a friend of mine saw Kizzy on the ground in a store screaming and throwing a tantrum and suggested she might be autistic.

“I took her to the Austism Society of T&T (ASTT) and found she was somewhere around the middle of the austism spectrum, not severely austistic but not highly functional.” And thus began a journey of weeping and joy and learning for Greenidge, one that changed her into a better person, she said.

“Kizzy taught me patience, how to find joy in the smallest things, how to deal with situations. And how to pray and have faith.

“She’s the same little girl I always wanted and loved.” Greenidge spoke to the T&T Guardian as thousands around the world celebrate World Autism Awareness Month.

Recalling some particularly bad times, Greenidge said, “One time she was in the kitchen with me, because I take her with me everywhere I go, and she had a seizure and hit her head on the gang tank.

“When she fell, the area between her eyes and her nose split down to the bone.” Greenidge, who has two elder sons, said she worked as seamstress before Kizzy was born and was always on the go.

She said she and her husband wanted a girl to complete their family and Kizzy was planned. Her baby girl appeared like a normal child, until she got her first vaccination. Greenidge said after Kizzy’s first seizure, she immediately resigned from her job to devote all her time and attention to her. She later began home schooling her child.

Greenidge patiently taught her little girl, who would hug and kiss her but never look her in the eye, how to make eye contact. “Whenever she wanted something, like juice or tea, I used to hold it right up to my face until she looked at my eyes.”

Through her teaching, Kizzy knows her Alphabet, colours and words. She is also a whiz at putting puzzles together. “You can mix up four different puzzles in one box and Kizzy would put it together without even looking at the pictures.”

Kizzy loves flowers and cannot pass one straight, and animals, Greenidge said. Through the ASTT, headed by Teresina Sieunarine who formed the organisation after her own son was diagnosed with austism, Kizzy was taken for therapy with Horses Helping Humans run by Karen Stollmeyer.

“Kizzy loves a white horse called Jo Jo. If she had her way, she would stand next to him all day, patting, feeding and cleaning him.” Greenidge has a word of hope for parents who may feel hopeless about an autistic child. “Don’t be discouraged. There’s help.”