Editorial

Yet again, the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board (NPTAB) has been found  flagrantly violating  guidelines for the award of contracts.

Last week it was reported that a group of forty-nine business owners had written President Irfaan Ali about the number of non-naturalised Chinese-owned businesses mushrooming across the country.

While the Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) on June 11  shone a spotlight on the procurement sector here, it had been evident during the life of this administration and its earlier incarnations that the process has been seriously corrupted to enable the handing of contracts to the unqualified and invariably to allow supporters of the ruling party and their friends and family to benefit.

Earlier this week we reported on the arrest of two Guyanese fishermen by the police and army in Suriname.

Last year was confirmed as the hottest year on record by the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO).

The international sports calendar was buzzing last weekend with the final round of group matches in the ICC T20 World Cup in the West Indies and the USA to confirm places in the Super Eights and the 2024 UEFA Football Championship kicking off last Friday in Germany.

A great deal continues to be written and said about the Guyana Police Force [GPF], much of which is critical of the extent to which the Force executes its duties to the general satisfaction of the citizenry, insofar as its ‘Service and Protection’ obligations are concerned.  

Tuesday’s thunderclap from Washington sanctioning Nazar Mohamed, Azruddin Mohamed and Permanent Secretary Mae Toussaint Jr Thomas must have sent shockwaves through all parts of the establishment here. 

Our Constitution is long and complicated, and while we now have a Constitution Reform Commission in place, there has been little public discussion of what citizens consider needs to change.

When the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) on Tuesday sanctioned Nazar Mohamed  and his son, Azruddin Mohamed, their company, Mohamed’s Enterprise, and Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Home Affairs Mae Toussaint Jnr Thomas it did so under the rubric of the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act and Executive Order (EO) 13818.

The government was less than enlightening last year about Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Home Affairs Mae Toussaint Jnr Thomas being subjected to a secondary inspection by US Customs and Border Protection at Miami Airport.

Anyone who has watched the American TV series “Law & Order”, or for that matter any of the staple television or streaming shows and films depicting crime solving would be familiar with the ‘good cop, bad cop’ routine.

Last Thursday the Guyana Football Federation (GFF) announced in a press release that the inaugural Diaspora Talent Identification Camp will be held from 26th to 28th July, at the Wiregrass Ranch Sports Campus in Orlando, Florida, USA.

Trinidad and Tobago, we are being told by the country’s media houses, is in the throes of a crime wave which, according to reports emanating from the twin island republic, threatens to significantly loosen the hands of the authorities on law and order.

There are so many metrics through which the odious  deal wangled by ExxonMobil from the APNU+AFC government in 2016 can be examined and exposed for what it is – pure rapaciousness facilitated by this government. 

The UN recently released a report stating that millions of people living in coastal areas around the Caribbean and Latin America will have to contend with major risks to healthcare and infrastructure in the face of the more severe weather events brought by climate change.

So, if established, the state’s case is that  Ian Jacobis, 44, of Lot 749 Plantation Best, West Coast Demerara; Shameena Ahamad, 52, of Lot 38 Roraima Scheme, West Bank Demerara; and Ashiana Salamalay, 34, of Lot 38 Roraima Scheme, West Bank Demerara attempted to export gold without a licence in contravention of Sections 8 and 23 of the Guyana Gold Board Act.

The government habit of ratifying international covenants and then ignoring the commitments they have made is coming back to haunt them.

On Sunday, June 2 Mexicans elected scientist and left-wing politician Claudia Sheinbaum as their new president.

It is not possible to read a newspaper, listen to the news on the radio or watch a  televised newscast without being inundated on the latest conflict, or ensuing turmoil, for which there appears to be no form of resolution in the near future.