Editorial

This newspaper reported yesterday that some 17 students –all in their early teens—from two city secondary schools had been held by the police and were giving statements after they marched into the Leonora Secondary School armed with knives, to settle a score.

It would not be at all surprising if individuals and officials in various parts of the world with whom Caricom countries do business, are asking themselves this question about our region, concerning what they have been led to think is a regional institution, the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ).

It would, perhaps, be precipitate to suggest, at this stage, that the hurdles that appear to be springing up following GRA Commissioner General Kurshid Sattaur’s publicly stated commitment to a full and transparent investigation into the Vega Azurit cocaine incident could end up derailing a major drug bust.

There has been much parsing of President Jagdeo’s Babu John address this month as in the past his presentations at this hallowed site have set the scene for what is to follow both politically and in terms of policies at the national level.

The Government of Guyana, normally so garrulous on the subject of democracy and human rights, has been quite quiet on the matter of Libya and the violence visited by Muammar Gaddafi on his citizens.

Sometimes it is worth stating the obvious. In Guyana we are trapped in a mirthless tautology.

No one should have been surprised by the West Indies’ departure from the quarterfinals of the Cricket World Cup on Wednesday.

“Water in Guyana can be also deemed as a liability instead of an asset,” Agriculture Minister Robert Persaud said on Tuesday in an address at an event held to mark International World Water and Meteorological Day.

President Obama, having achieved a resolution at the United Nations satisfactory to what appeared to be his preliminary hesitations, finally tip-toed into a limited intervention in Libya, on the basis of ensuring that the country is made a ‘no fly zone.’

There appeared to be a hint of contriteness in some of the comments made to this newspaper by Commissioner General of the Guyana Revenue Authority Khurshid Sattaur, and reported in our Friday edition, in the matter of the recent Vega Azurit cocaine bust in Jamaica.

Twice last year, in August and October, Stabroek News editorialized on the likelihood that the engineering calamity at the Supenaam Stelling would see the government playing for time and eventually holding no one blameable or financially liable for it.

Earlier this month we reported on Vice-Chancellor Lawrence Carrington’s concerns about UG’s finances.

Katharine Birbalsingh is a bright young Englishwoman, a teacher by profession and of Guyanese extraction.

‘Reculer pour mieux sauter’ – the French maxim means ‘to take a step back in order to jump better’ or, in other words, to retreat in order to achieve a stronger position – was supposed to be a favoured tactic of Napoleon Bonaparte.

Some time after 1 pm on Tuesday, a tree outside the Georgetown Cricket Club (GCC) Ground at Bourda became uprooted and fell bringing down an electricity pole with wires and upsetting a swarm of bees that had probably been living in its branches.

In spite of periodic hiccups, a slow but fairly consistent positive evolution in Cuba-United States relations continues to be apparent.

From the look of things this year’s general elections campaign may well be characterized by the customary verbal vitriol to which we have grown accustomed over the years and which, during previous general elections campaigns, has served to subsume manifesto commitments beneath the din of word-throwing and name-calling on the hustings.

Governments that are as unaccountable as this one and insulated from scrutiny because of the absence of vibrant watchdog institutions tend to become even bolder in their indiscretions as their terms draw to an end.

When President Jagdeo came to office he was touted as representing youth, with a vision which would usher in a vernal season in our old, tired politics.

The political carnival which frustrated the government’s recent attempts to pass a “hanging bill” in the Trinidadian parliament had little to do with a serious debate of the issues, constitutional or otherwise.