Daily Archive: Sunday, February 17, 2013

(Trinidad Express) Killers went on a rampage last weekend, snuffing out the lives of seven men between Friday night and late yesterday evening.

QUITO,  (Reuters) – Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa claimed a re-election victory today that would allow him to strengthen state control over the OPEC nation’s economy and gives a timely boost to Latin America’s alliance of socialist leaders.

St. John’s, Antigua – The West Indies Selection Panel today announced the West Indies squad for the first two of three One Day Internationals against Zimbabwe in Grenada.

LONDON, (Reuters) – Pop singer Rihanna launched her first clothing line with British high-street retailer River Island on Saturday, adding A-list glitz to the British leg of the international fashion circuit.

JOHANNESBURG,  (Reuters) – It was billed as a fitting tribute to “an intelligent, beautiful and amazing woman” but the airing of a Caribbean reality TV show featuring the girlfriend of Paralympic star Oscar Pistorius two days after she was shot dead has upset some South Africans.

HAVANA,  (Reuters) – Cuba’s best-known dissident, blogger Yoani Sanchez, checked in without incident at Havana’s international airport today on her way to Brazil, the first stop on an 80-day-tour of a dozen countries.

CAPE TOWN,  (Reuters) – South Africa showed why they are the number one test team in the world with a clinical performance on day four of the second test against Pakistan to clinch the series with a four-wicket victory today.

(Reuters) – The fifth movie in the Bruce Willis “Die Hard” franchise scored the biggest box-office action over the U.S.

A US-based company says it is actively pursuing the development of a bauxite mining project at Linden and has applied for exploration licences from the Guyana Geology and Mines Commission (GGMC).

(Trinidad Guardian) Caribbean fisherfolk are expected to benefit from a €1,032,099 grant from the European Union, via its Europe Aid programme.

MUMBAI, India,  CMC – West Indies failed in their bid to win the ICC Women’s World Cup for the first time when they went down to five-time champions Australia by 114 runs in today’s final at Brabourne Stadium.

(Jamaica Observer) After months of planning, the operators of the country’s newest airline are breathing a sigh of relief and are looking forward to prosperous days for Fly Jamaica, which went on its inaugural flight from Kingston to the John F Kennedy (JFK) International Airport in the United States on Thursday.

(Jamaica Gleaner) Director of Public Prosecutions Paula Llewellyn is standing by her decision to continue the prosecution of the two men charged with the rape of five women in St James despite DNA samples not matching the two accused.

(Jamaica Gleaner) The lotto scam will be high on the agenda when Minister of National Security Peter Bunting and Justice Minister Mark Golding travel to the United States (US) this week.

(Barbados Nation) At least 130 doctors may not be allowed to practise medicine here if they don’t get their accreditation in order within the next six weeks.

(Trinidad Express) Soca star Machel Montano has apologised to the assault victims involved in the fracas outside a nightclub in Port of Spain in April 2007.

Foreign Affairs Minister Carolyn Rodrigues-Birkett says it’s now up to Caricom Secretary General Irwin La Rocque to dig for details about an alleged conflict of interest by Dr Naresh Singh, the man appointed to be his deputy, while in a press release issued late yesterday Dr Singh refuted the conflict of interest allegations.

One year after announcing plans to explore the feasibility of a setting up a multi-million dollar ethanol factory here, Ansa McAl is yet to find the right land space and the best soil and climatic conditions to plant sugarcane for the project.

Sometimes the wind sweeps the dark rain clouds to the side of the blue-green mountains and a grey curtain of rain drops to the dark forest below.

Louisa Daggers describes herself as a “heritage enthusiast” and the newly appointed Anthropological Officer of the Walter Roth Museum of Anthropology has plans to advance the work of the museum, particularly in the academic field.

Trade unionist and executive member of the Guyana Trades Union Congress (GTUC) Lincoln Lewis has said that his organisation may be moving to the courts to fight for the right of Guyanese workers to find employment at the Marriott construction site, where labour at the moment is provided exclusively by Chinese nationals.

Fly Jamaica may be roaming the skies between Jamaica and North America but as far as the Govern-ment of Guyana is concerned, the airline is grounded until all requirements are met as per standard international procedure.

As relatives, friends and residents of Bartica today remember the 12 men who were viciously slain in a massacre that sent shockwaves through the nation five years ago with a memorial service at the Monument of Hope, Crime Chief Seelall Persaud has revealed that the investigation remains open as the hunt continues for a sixth suspect.

The parents and teachers of the St Lust Primary School in the Berbice River are calling on the relevant authorities to construct a new school building as the present one is over sixty years old and is in a deplorable condition.

Transport Minister, Robeson Benn yesterday disputed the explanation by Delta Airlines that it has decided to stop flying the New York-Georgetown route from May because it is racking up losses here.

Caricom should take the lead in approaching the British government for assistance to address several problems affecting the region as part of reparations for slavery in the Caribbean, Professor Hilary Beckles believes.

APNU spokesman on Finance Carl Greenidge has called for the relocation of the Parliamentary Counsel from the chambers of the Attorney General (AG) and has said that sending Bills and other material to the AG for advice after approval by the National Assembly is “inappropriate.”

The Deeds and Commercial registries are expected to be delinked in another year and a half with Registrar of Deeds Azeema Baksh hoping that this will lift the image of the Deeds Registry and keep it transparent and accountable.

Introduction The so-called Marriott Hotel, a scheme conceived by former President Bharrat Jagdeo − after one of his friends failed in his bid to buy the Guyana Pegasus – blessed by Mr Jagdeo’s successor President Ramotar, facilitated by Dr Ashni Singh, his Finance Minister and Chairman of National Industrial and Commercial Investments Limited (NICIL), executed by Mr Winston Brassington, NICIL’s CEO, and defended by political heavyweights like Drs Luncheon and Gopaul, puts in the shade the questionable transactions undertaken in the name of the people of Guyana since 1992.

The column below first appeared on Ralph Ramkarran’s blog www.conversationtree.gy Both the PPP and the PNCR supported the proposals for electoral reform which were recommended by the Constitution Reform Commission (CRC) in 2000.

Guyana is up in arms this week over news that the Chinese are building a Marriott Hotel here but not employing any Guyanese in the construction work, and that we’re also going to have a Chinese TV channel; yes, Sumintra, a Chinese TV channel in Guyana.

Six people are now homeless after their Patentia, West Bank Demerara, home was reduced to ashes by the landlord, who they said rushed into the house with two cutlasses forcing them to flee before he set the place ablaze.

At eighty years of age one must expect to factor attendance at funerals into one’s monthly (weekly?)

 Channelling folklore: St John’s College with their ‘Blue Bacchoo’ during the finals of the Costume Parade Secondary Bands category of the Children’s Annual Mashramani Competition at the National Park yesterdayWinging it: President’s College students’ costume band ‘Wings’ on the tarmac at the National Park during the finals of the Costume Parade Secondary Bands category of the Children’s Annual Mashramani Competition yesterday.

An eight-year-old boy drowned on Saturday around 4 pm, after he apparently fell into a reservoir close to a sand yard where he had been playing. 

MUMBAI, India,  CMC – An upbeat West Indies Women will attempt defy the odds again when they face five-time champions Australia in the day/night final of the ICC Women’s World Cup here today.

BRIDGETOWN, Barbados,  CMC – Rookie pacer Miguel Cummins and off-spinner Ashley Nurse shared eight wickets, spurring Barbados to first innings points over Guyana in the Regional Four-Day Championship here  yesterday.

The chairmanship of the four parliamentary Sectoral Standing Committees will change on an annual basis following agreement between government and the opposition.

MIRPUR, Bangladesh, CMC – West Indies opener Chris Gayle returned to form with a spectacular hundred for Dhaka Gladiators  yesterday, to fire them into the final of the Bangladesh Premier League here.

Fumigation exercises were conducted at the two Linden schools that were the scenes of protest action over mosquito infestation and classes are expected to return to normal tomorrow.

The newly appointed executive of the Georgetown Amateur Basketball Association (GABA) has rescheduled its first event, the season opener between Georgetown and Linden, to March 2 at the Cliff Anderson Sports Hall GABA’s new president Michael Singh told Stabroek Sports that the postponement of the event was due to the unavailability of sponsors during this festive season of Mashramani.

The shambolic state of West Indies cricket administration, long established, has been further substantiated by the jostling for the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) presidency, the vote for which is scheduled for its annual meeting in St.

A Guyana Power and Light (GPL) worker, who sustained severe electrical burns after being struck by a live wire on the job, is currently battling for his life in the Intensive Care Unit of the Georgetown Public Hospital (GPH).

A new study on corruption in Latin America contains some alarming figures — an average of about 20 per cent of the region’s people say they have been asked to pay a bribe by a policeman or another public official in the past year, compared with 5 per cent in the United States and 3 per cent in Canada.

    One people: South Road Nursery School’s costume ‘This is We, We are Guyanese’ being ably displayed by this little miss during the finals of the Costume Parade Nursery Bands category of the Children’s Annual Mashramani Competition yesterday.

HOUSTON,  (Reuters) – Usain Bolt, do not quit your day job.

Part 3 Economic growth As I bring this discussion on Guyana’s public debt behaviour since 2006 to an end, I direct attention to its broader macroeconomic context.

Pressure continues to build on the Guyana Government over the granting of a broadcast licence to China Central TV with the Georgetown Cham-ber of Commerce and Indus-try (GCCI) being the latest to voice concern on the matter.

Head coach of the Guyana Defence Force (GDF) Track and Field Club Robert Chisholm is confident ahead of the imminent competition season inspite of the tumultuous situation that currently faces athletics in Guyana.

No one should be in doubt: the global energy balance is changing rapidly with profound political and economic consequences for the way countries and regions relate to one another.

A 13-year-old boy of Airy Hall, Mahaicony died after he was struck down by a speeding car around 6 pm yesterday.

Two goals in the space of 10 minutes from Dorwin Filter and Kevin Andrews in the fifth and 14th minutes respectively yesterday enabled Tucville Secondary to post a 2-0 victory over a gritty St.

The West Side Mashramani football tournament will kick off today at the Den Amstel Ground with a double header from 6pm.

Sports Coordinator of the Police Progressive Youth Club (PPYC) Developmental Meet, Lyndon Wilson said today’s scheduled meet has been postponed.

Guyana’s two-time national squash champion Alexander Arjoon was recently named Athlete of the Week at the Franklin and Marshall (F&M) College in Lancaster, Pennsylvania in the United States of America (USA).

  Flood prevention walls: A construction worker building one of the walls at the Ocean View International Hotel, which is expected to prevent flooding in the building.

I am happy to know that many of you grow bougainvilleas and were interested in the last article.

The Malteenoes Sports Club (MSC) will hold its Annual General Meeting (AGM) on March 7 at 18:30hrs at the club’s premises, 17 Thomas Road, Thomas Lands, Georgetown.

KABUL (Reuters) – Afghan security forces will be banned from calling for NATO air strikes in residential areas to help in their operations, President Hamid Karzai said yesterday, three days after 10 civilians died in such a strike in the country’s east.

This time it wasn’t an embarrassment perpetuated by the West Indies Players Association (WIPA), rather one the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) brought directly upon itself.

CARACAS (Reuters) – President Hugo Chavez’s supporters joyfully brandished first photographs of him since cancer surgery two months ago while opposition activists said the images were worrying evidence of Venezuela’s political vacuum.

This is an edited text of the Keynote Address by Al Creighton delivered at the Opening of the School of Drama and Theatre Arts on January 29, 2013.

MOSCOW (Reuters) – The Group of 20 nations declared yesterday there would be no currency war and deferred plans to set new debt-cutting targets, underlining broad concern about the fragile state of the world economy.

    Rainbow queen: A pupil of the Chateau Margot Primary School displaying the school’s costume called ‘Queen of the Rainbow’at the final of the Children Mashramani Competitions at the National Park yesterday.

Dear Editor, It boggles the mind how, after a constitutional process that began in 1999 and lasted for more than two years, in which the opportunity existed and was taken for us to totally rewrite our constitution, one can still speak, as Mr Vishnu Bisram does, of the present constitution being a Burnham/PNC constitution (‘No party has a right to foist a constitution on a people,’ SN, February 14).

We are at the end of the series of TPC articles dealing with ailments associated with reproduction, and with the male and female reproductive organs. 

This week Mr David Jessop in his column ‘The view from Europe’ (page 21) revisited in some detail the topic of global energy sources, this time expanding on the consequences of changes currently under way.

HARARE, Zimbabwe, CMC – Zimbabwe left for the Caribbean yesterday, bracing for an onslaught from the West Indies pace attack in the upcoming Test and one-day series.

  A better Guyana: An Ascension Secondary School student smiles as he displays his float ‘Love and Togetherness for a Better Guyana’ during the final of the Costume Parade Secondary Bands Category of the Children’s Annual Mashramani Competitions at the National Park yesterday.

(Jamaica Gleaner) Although the International Monetary Fund (IMF) team in Jamaica has given its support to measures outlined by Finance Minister Dr Peter Phillips, it appears that one major hurdle stands in the way of the finalisation of an extended fund facility that would make US$750 million available to Jamaica over the next four years.

Dear Editor, Anyone who read, listened to or watched Dr Roger Forbes Luncheon’s latest reply to the question of the China TV deal must have been dismayed at what he said.

CHELYABINSK, Russia (Reuters) – Thousands of Russian emergency workers went out yesterday to clear up the damage from a meteor that exploded over the Ural mountains, damaging buildings, shattering windows and showering people with broken glass.