Editorial

Ethnic violence in Myanmar has now displaced more than 400,000 members of the Rohingya minority and the ongoing military crackdown on the group has been described by UN High Commissioner Zeid Raʼad al-Hussein as a “textbook example of ethnic cleansing.”

The Hurricane season in 2017 has seen the rise of three hurricanes of epic proportions – Harvey, Irma, and Jose – and while Hurricane Harvey mainly caused widespread flooding in Texas, it was Hurricane Irma that hit the islands of the Caribbean Sea the hardest.

On Sunday last, the world observed Suicide Prevention Day; the global theme was ‘Take a Minute, Change a Life,’ in a push to reduce the annual worldwide death rate, estimated at some 800,000 by the World Health Organisation, based on statistics gathered from around the world.

“In time to come,” to borrow the title from Crazy’s masterpiece calypso, West Indian cricket fans will look back at the events that took place last week – 3rd-9th September, 2017 ‒ at the MCC at Lord’s and their feelings will run the gamut from hope to utter disgust.

Guyana is by no means the only country that espouses political democracy but where, nonetheless, general elections are usually marred by controversy over the electoral process, charges of ballot rigging and attendant protestations that have sometimes been violent and which are driven by political and ethnic differences.

In the April 30th, 2014 edition of Stabroek News there was a Page One comment lamenting the absence of local government elections over the preceding 20 years and criticising the PPP/C government for not holding them.

The marathon meeting of the Georgetown City Council on Thursday ran the gamut from the rational to the risible. 

The World Meteorological Organization has a master list of names for storms that originate in the Atlantic.

In a statement issued from his office recently, Minister within the Ministry of Social Protection, Keith Scott, announced his bold intention to “minimise in the first instance and eventually eliminate night work for single mothers within the Private Security Industry.”

September marks the beginning of the new school year and it is also the time when Education Month is observed.

Tomorrow morning cricket fans from around the world will tune their radios, whether it be via analogue, digital or over the internet (where broadcast rights will permit, perhaps) to the world renowned British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) Test Match Special (TMS).

Every year, without fail, a matter of days before the new academic year begins, teams of builders can be seen frantically trying to remedy and repair school houses defective in one way or another, for the start of classes.

In October 2015, with Guatemala wracked by decades of poor governance, the aftermath of death squads and corruption, comedian and political neophyte Jimmy Morales won an astounding 70% of the vote in the final round of the presidential election.

Three weeks ago David Jessop in his Sunday column wrote about the resuscitation of railways in some parts of the Caribbean.

Two days ago, a building in South Mumbai collapsed, killing 23 people and trapping at least 37 others in rubble.

In the United States, since 1998, there have been 735 recorded deaths of children by vehicular heatstroke – a term used to describe the tragic death caused by a child being left trapped in a hot car.

Trials done by farmers on a small scale, mostly in coastal Guyana have determined that growing onions on a large scale is feasible.

Last week, the Ministry of Public Infrastruc-ture revealed the plan for the roundabout to be constructed at the circular junction where the Seawall Road (Atlantic Avenue), Rupert Craig Highway, Public Road Kitty, Vlissengen Road, J B Singh Road and Carifesta Avenue intersect.

Up to the time of local government elections last year, for the first time in more than two decades, there appeared to have existed the notion (at least in some quarters) that a change in the political administration at City Hall would necessarily bring about a corresponding transformation in the performance of the municipal civil service.

At an Alliance For Change (AFC) press conference on August 17,  the matter of the APNU+AFC government’s dealings with ExxonMobil came up.