Kaieteur News

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Kaieteur News

Friday November 09, 2012

Noisy opposition forces parliamentary adjournment “President not obliged to adhere no confidence motion” - Speaker

By Latoya Giles Speaker of the National Assembly, Raphael Trotman, was forced to adjourn yesterday’s sitting of the National Assembly as the opposition parties maintained that they will not allow Home Affairs Minister Clement Rohee to “utter any word in the House”.

Trotman had earlier announced that the President

of Guyana was not constitutionally or legally obliged to adhere to opposition motion of no confidence in Minister Clement Rohee.

“I have received the categorical and unequivocal opinion that His Excellency the President is not constitutionally or legally obliged to adhere to the motion and similarly, that the member, Mr. Clement J.

In other jurisdiction he would have been forced by convention to resign as a Minister - British MP

Rohee, is not restricted from performing the duties of the office of Minister of Home Affairs,” The Speaker said that he had sought legal advice and opinions from lawyers here in Guyana and abroad. He said that this was in keeping with a promise he made at the last sitting that he would have sought legal guidance on the issue.

According to Trotman, he

consulted Senior Counsel Rex McKay, attorney Steven Fraser and London-based lawyer Ulele Burnham.

During a recent visit to the United Kingdom, Trotman and Parliamentarian Odinga Lumumba approached a British Member of Parliament on the issue of the opposition no confidence motion.

According to Cabinet Secretary Dr. Roger

Luncheon, yesterday, the British Member of Parliament checked the laws and arrived at a decision that President Donald Ramotar was not bound by the no-confidence vote.

According to the speaker, yesterday, the consensus was that the minister cannot be restricted from performing in the office of Home Affairs.

Trotman further stated that he could find no provisions in the standing orders to prevent the minister from speaking and he should be allowed to speak.

He did not repeat what the British Member of Parliament said, that in any other jurisdiction, the Minister would have resigned.

Senior Counsel McKay, on consulting the statures, found that the no confidence motion could have no effect on President Ramotar or on Rohee’s appointment. He too posited that in any other jurisdiction Rohee would have resigned as a Minister.

Having listened to Trotman, however, the minister got up and attempted to speak but the opposition members drowned him out with loud chants of “Rohee

must go”…..”Rohee should not speak”.

The Speaker tried his best to bring order to proceedings, but the opposition members were not having it, they were adamant that the minister should not speak. The speaker was forced to go into his chambers for about ten minutes. Upon his return, the opposition continued to drown out the minister’s attempts to make his presentation.

Trotman then intervened.

“One would have thought that if a member realised that he does not enjoy the confidence of the majority of the House in which he serves that he would consider resigning or request a reassignment to another ministry. In the absence of the observance of such hallowed practice and custom the member remains in his position; this is both an unfortunate and regrettable development for our young nation which is always seeking to etch its own brand of parliamentary customs and practices.”

The Speaker then adjourned the sitting to November 22.

Ogle Airport ganja accused granted bail - Another traveller busted

A woman from Beterverwagting, East Coast Demerara (ECD) who allegedly attempted to send a quantity of marijuana to an interior location has been granted bail after being charged with trafficking in narcotics.

Samantha Charles, 25, of 135 Canterbury Walk, Beterverwagting, ECD, was yesterday charged with trafficking in narcotics.

The woman made her appearance before Magistrate Alex Moore at the Sparendaam Court.

It is alleged that on Monday November 5, Charles had given a bag to a man to send on a flight which was heading to Ekereku. Ranks from the Police Anti-Narcotics Unit conducted a search of the bag and a quantity of compressed marijuana - 460

grams - was found. The woman was subsequently arrested during a sting operation after she had reportedly returned to claim the bag.

Charles was granted bail to the tune $400,000 and is expected to make her next court appearance on December 21.

Meanwhile yesterday, ranks from the Police AntiNarcotics Unit again intercepted a quantity of compressed marijuana at the Ogle Airport. And once more, the marijuana was found on a man who was about to board a local flight to Ekereku. A total of 404 grams of the illicit substance was found concealed in a hose.

The man has been arrested and is in police custody. Charges will be instituted shortly.

Friday November 09, 2012

Kaieteur News

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… dubs it “an unruly horse”

Government MPs showed solidarity with Minister Rohee (sitting, second from right) during their press conference

By Abena Rockcliffe In light of the opposition parties’ actions during yesterday’s parliamentary session, in which incessant chanting against Home Affairs Minister Clement Rohee forced an abrupt adjournment, the government held a press briefing that sought to restate its position, denounce the actions of the combined opposition, and forecast the likely result, should the opposition continue its

actions against the Minister.

The administration was adamant that it will not back down from or concede to the opposition’s call, that “Rohee must go.” It was also opined that should the opposition continue to be, as put by Attorney General and Minister of Legal Affairs Anil Nandlall, “an unruly horse” it should be kicked out of the National Assembly come November 22, when parliament is scheduled to resume.

In an opening statement,

Prime Minister Samuel Hinds expressed his disappointment in the action taken by the House Speaker Raphael Trotman. Hinds noted that Standing Order 47 gives the Speaker the authority to order the combined opposition to leave the house of assembly as “they were clearly in breach and contempt of his ruling.”

A section of the standing order referred to by the Prime Minister states: “The Speaker or the Chairperson shall order any member whose conduct

is grossly disorderly to withdraw immediately from the Assembly during the remainder of that day’s sitting and may direct such steps to be taken as are required to enforce this order.”

Hinds said that the business of the government and country need to continue and should be not stalled on account of the opposition.

To further emphasise the government’s position, Nandlall added that there is no basis under the rules of the assembly or the constitution for a no confidence motion to be brought against an individual Minister.

He then stated that Rohee has two bases on which he sits as a Member of Parliament: his appointment as Minister of Home Affairs by the President and his election to the National Assembly, which was done by the electorate.

“Rohee does not sit based upon the confidence of the National Assembly …”

Nandlall asserted that the opposition has no right to interfere with Rohee’s “freedom and constitutional right to function in the

National Assembly.”

Nandlall insisted that by defying the ruling of the speaker, which should be conclusive and final, the opposition was conducting itself as “an unruly horse” by violating the norms of the National Assembly.

In that regard, the Attorney General stated, “We are going down the path of anarchy and the opposition is taking us there by virtue of its one-seat majority… while wasting $1.7M per sitting.”

Advisor to the President, Gail Teixeira, joined her colleagues and dubbed the actions of the combined opposition an attack on the Constitution and on the Speaker himself, by disregarding his ruling.

“The Speaker of the House called the two Chief Whips in after the first phase of noise and tried to get the opposition’s Chief Whip Ms. Amna Ally to go back to the House and to get her side, to allow the minister to speak, and she said no. We went back in and you have seen the results of it.”

Teixeira said that the opposition’s action showed

gross disrespect to the highest forum in the land.

As Minister Rohee spoke, and extended gratitude for the support given, his fellow Ministers stated that “Rohee ain’t going nowhere” and “Rohee will stay!”

Rohee expressed the opinion that A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) leader David Granger and leader of the Alliance For Change (AFC) Khemraj Ramjattan, are of the “mistaken belief” that he was a member of their list that went to election.

“I am on the PPP list of persons, so any decision with respect to my future in parliament or in the capacity of Home Affairs Minister, rests with the leader of that list.”

Rohee categorically stated that he was cleared of all the allegations made against him and believes that when the results of the Commission of Inquiry are revealed “I will again be cleared.”

He said that he has until 2016 to be a minister, after which the people will once again decide on “the new dispensation”.

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Kaieteur News

Kaieteur News Printed and Published by National Media & Publishing Company Ltd. 24 Saffon Street, Charlestown, Georgetown, Guyana.

Publisher: GLENN LALL Editor: Adam Harris Tel: 225-8465, 225-8491. Fax: 225-8473, 226-8210

EDITORIAL

The Obama Lessons On Monday, the day before the US presidential elections, we reviewed the reasons for the virtual dead heat between the two candidates in our editorial “Obama and Romney”. We pointed out: “With all of the foregoing factors against Romney, it should be obvious that he has only caught up with Obama because of the latter’s performance.” Obama’s major failures had been his inability to turn around the economy as he had promised in 2008.

We concluded, however, “Our bet is still on Obama.”

Obama has won the elections and we would have won our bet, but the challenges that Obama had faced in his first term and could not overcome are all there in front of him as he sets out on his second and final term. The economy is still the elephant in the room, and he will not be getting a breather on this issue. Because of Obama’s inability or unwillingness to work with the Republicans that control Congress to reduce the country’s deficit, America’s credit rating was downgraded: something unthinkable even a decade ago.

Congress ultimately adopted a plan nobody liked – the so-called “fiscal cliff” of obligatory spending cuts and tax increases that kicks in Jan 1st, unless a compromise is struck. If for instance some Bush-era tax cuts are allowed to expire, this will result in an average tax increase of almost $2,000 for middle-class Americans. This is unacceptable to Obama, who wants the tax increases to be applied only on rich Americans earning over $250,000. Similarly, the estimated $109 billion worth of automatic budget cuts to defence spending, social services, education and other discretionary federal spending were resisted by Obama.

Since Congress will meet for only 16 days till the end of December, the compromise will have to be reached by both sides on raising the debt ceiling and reducing future deficits, while not increasing the persistent 8% unemployment rate or derailing the fragile economic recovery. This is a balancing act that should be a lesson to our politicians in Guyana. In the US system of government, the Congress has total control over spending, so unless a compromise is reached, the ratings agencies have already announced they will further downgrade the US sovereign debt.

In Guyana, while the power of the House of Assembly over spending is not as definitive as in the United States’ extreme separation of power and competencies, care will have to be taken that the Opposition do not throw out the baby with the bathwater in their insistence on ‘fiscal rectitude’.

Programs vital for the life of the country and institutions, mandated by the constitution, cannot be starved out of existence. Compromise is vital in the US and in Guyana, and unless this is achieved, we will fall off a higher cliff than the US’s: the cliff of social stability.

President Obama has early on called for talks with Romney and the Republicans leadership on crafting a way forward. In Guyana, President Ramotar has also repeated his call for institutionalised Tripartite Talks – as he did a year ago when he won the Presidency. We hope that political parties have discovered that there is no substitute for dialogue in societies as fragmented as ours. Let no preconditions be set to these meetings.

Obama’s victory was built on his recognition of a new feature of the electorate: its growing diversity, occasioned by the increase in ‘minorities’ outstripping that of whites.

Guyana has long known that it has a very diverse population. In the last couple of years, there is no longer any inbuilt majority of any one group.

But some of our politicians insist on acting as if there is one, as they pander to the interest of one constituency or another. Apart from further polarising the country, it is very poor political strategy – as Romney and the Republicans discovered.

We are willing to bet that the Republicans will change their hard-line posture on immigration: they will have learnt they cannot alienate Hispanics with their rhetoric. Will our politicians show a similar mature willingness to adapt to our new realities?

Friday November 09, 2012

Letters... Where your views make the news

CLARIFICATION ON AUDITOR GENERAL’S REMARKS DEAR EDITOR, The Kaieteur News carried two comments from the Auditor General which caught my eye and which requires a clarification.

The first relates to his reference to the 2003 Auditor General’s report (which I had prepared) that “there is hardly any physical inspection compared with mine”. This is totally untrue in that all capital works as well as major maintenance works were physically verified. The difference was that if all was well, there was no mention in the report.

The current Auditor General was part of that effort in his capacity as Assistant Auditor General, and I am surprised that he could have made such a statement.

There are two types of reporting: (a) full reporting of the results whether they reflect negative findings or not; and (b) exception reporting where only deficiencies and shortcomings are highlighted. Drawing from my experience working with the United Nations in Africa, I opted for exception reporting for 2003.

The reason was simple: to avoid the reporting being too bulky and cumbersome to read, and to assist the reader to grasp the essentials of the report. This is standard practice and conforms with international best practices. In fact, the United Nations has word limits for all its reports.

Prior to 2003, all of my reports beginning from 1992 onwards were written in the full reporting format.

This was deliberately done because we had just come out of an era of lack of accountability, and the public needed to know in a very detailed way how their funds were expended. But as time elapsed and accountability became a settled arrangement, the merits of full reporting had to be reevaluated. The 2003 report was based on that reevaluation as well as my international exposure.

The second comment by the Auditor General relates to his assertion that he was the only person that did VFM audits and that he had done two of them.

A performance audit, sometimes referred to as VFM audit, is normally carried out by national audit offices.

It is an attempt to ascertain to what extent the resources of an organisation are utilised in achieving stated objectives in an economical, efficient and effective manner (hence the value for money concept). Since 1992, the Audit Office has been conducting performance audits but an integrated approach was taken in reporting the results.

Many of the comments contained in the Auditor General’s report from 1992 onwards were in the nature of performance audit findings.

There was a legal restriction in that the Auditor General could have only reported separately on any matters incidental to his duties under the relevant legislation.

Notwistanding this, during my tenure, several special reports were issued that reflected the results of performance audits. Two examples will suffice: (a) The Essequibo Road Project where it was discovered that there was short-shipment of stone, inferior quality of stone, inflated prices and falsification of invoices, among others. This resulted in the World Bank cancelling the project; and (b) The illegal exportation of dolphins and the disappearance of $50 million from the Wildlife Fund.

For a long time, I have been advocating for standalone, dedicated performance audit reports, and I am happy to have included in the draft Audit Act provision for this to be done.

The draft Act became the Audit Act 2004. However, I did not have the good fortune to implement many of the good aspects of the new Act because I demitted office at the time when it was about to be made operational. I went to the United Nations and advocated a similar approach, and at the time of leaving, I had prepared a draft report on the matter for consideration by the UN

Board of Auditors before submission to the General Assembly.

This has been seven years since the Audit Act was passed with provision for undertaking performance audits and issuing standalone reports.

The Auditor General has so far issued only two such reports. Whether that reflects credit on his part, for the topics selected and for the quality and effectiveness of the reports, I will leave for the reader to judge for himself/ herself.

Finally, I wish to state that I lectured to the Auditor General when he w a s reading for his accounting d e g r e e a t U G. U p o n completion of his degree, he was promoted to the position of Assistant Auditor General ahead of those who were senior to him but who did not have the requisite qualification for appointment to the post. In 1998, he was sent to participate in a nine-month audit fellowship programme with the Canadian Audit Office.

As his supervisor, I also imparted as much on-the-job training to him as possible. I might be critical of his work but it is all done in the best interest to the country.

I am therefore taken back by the two statements he has made above, trying to boost his own performance and in the process seeking to fault my work.

Anand Goolsarran

Friday November 09, 2012

Kaieteur News

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Letters... Where your views make the news Letters... Where your views make the news

Lowe’s convictions are precipitate DEAR EDITOR, I agree with Mr. Lionel Lowe’s “Excusing illegality in one sphere while condemning it in another is folly” (KN Nov 6). But that is exactly the sin Lowe has committed. Worse, Lowe convicts EZJet and Mr. Sonny Ramdeo (without a trial) all the while condoning and excusing flagrant election rigging which the world has condemned.

Allegations of illegal acts were leveled at Ramdeo. But as best as I am informed, he was not convicted and by treating him like a convict is enough evidence of inherent folly in Lowe’s thinking. Also, by referring to my condemnations of election riggings and using it to judge me or to justify rigging is another of Lowe’s folly. So instead of accusing me of engaging in folly, it is Lowe who has been exposed with his many folly acts and writings.

It is imperative that writings (letters in particular) be fair, balanced and objective and substantiated with facts.

Neither of Mr. Lowe’s two letters have met those criteria.

For the record, in my response to his letter, I never attacked Lowe who I do not know and never met. Until he brought it my attention, I didn’t even remember that I responded to Lowe in his defense of PNC election rigging.

Thus, it is Mr. Lowe who is “eminently qualified to be greeted with opprobrium and suspicion” because of his views on Sonny Ramdeo and the PPP Government and in using personality attacks to defend his position.

Instead of focusing on the contents of my response (Nov 1) to his missive (Oct 30) in which he cheers the financial and scheduling

problems of EZ Jet, Lowe attacks me, painting me as a person Lowe described me as engaging in “self serving” acts. Contrary to what Lowe feels, I don’t take self serving positions and I don’t serve a master except God and the public (I spend a lot of my time engaging in voluntary service, not serving myself including hundreds of hours during Hurricane Sandy helping evacuees at a shelter and hundreds of hours in political campaigns including for Obama).

Lowe writes that Bisram seems obliged to respond to his letters. I don’t respond to people but contents. The purpose behind my writings are to inform, elucidate, educate, correct misinformation, and provide knowledge, etc. It is never to attack people or provide responses based on personality.

Unfortunately, Lowe fails to see the unfairness of his missive attacking Ramdeo and EZ Jet. Not surprisingly, he now engages in vitriolic personality attacks against me and the PPP government to defend his contentions.

Also, Lowe raises unrelated issues (of PNC election riggings and PPP rule) as a defence of his condemnation of Ramdeo who is not convicted in any court – not even in the court of public opinion. In fact, the traveling public loves the man for initiating a charter service to Guyana and Trinidad that has led to lowered fares.

Unlike Lowe who has been an enabler of the PNC and who has taken self serving positions, I am not an enabler of the PPP. I take positions contrary to the PPP’s and I critiqued the party and its leaders numerous times. I disagree with Lowe

DEAR EDITOR, I am not a man of certificates or a graduate from any university.

I am a Black Man. I am not a racial man. My daughter is married to a mixed race man; Chinese and Indian. We live lovingly.

I am proud to be black. I am a school dropout also, but I got my knowledge from the street life and from mixing with persons from all walks of life, race, colour and creed.

My problems are with the extra-judicial killing, and under strange circumstances, of Black youths by black members of the armed forces of this country.

This seems to be a

holocaust and a Crime Against Humanity and has become a norm over the years.

It started with Keith Caesar in the seventies and increased in the eighties and got worse in the nineties to now. The average age of the victims is twenty-five years.

All the races run through my blood, out of my darkness comes light. The Creator created one race; the human race with the colour of the rainbow. From dark to light; what is for the light must be for the dark.

One love Kenneth Chance Justice For Jermaine Committee Human Rights Activist

The plight of the young

and his PNC friends and government critics that the PPP is a dictatorship.

The mere description of the PPP as a dictatorship leads one to conclude that Lowe is a biased commentator and this may be one factor that motivated Lowe to go after EZjet. No academic worth his salt would characterize the PPP as dictatorial. It is an abuse of the usage of the word.

The PPP is the first and only democratic government

we have had in Guyana since the 1950s and that was (has been) elected by the people in free and fair elections.

Since 1992, the PPP has not violated basic norms of democratic rule – the country still has free and fair elections as well as individual, religious and press freedoms, and goods have not been banned – the basic hallmarks of democracy.

I disagree with various aspects of PPP governance but these and blunders it

made don’t rise to the status of a dictatorship.

I do not know Ramdeo and his finances and as such I am “no enabler of his alleged fraudulent acts”. If Ramdeo or EZ Jet has engaged in wrongdoing, they should be punished. But neither one has been convicted in public opinion much less the court.

It is therefore wrong to demonize them as Lowe has been doing.

When one writes that “Guyanese are not interested

in EZ Jet Funding …” it does not mean all Guyanese have that position. There are expected to be those with opposing or neutral views.

The overwhelming number back EZ Jet and there is no way they could have known about impending allegations of embezzled funds used to finance the carrier.

In no way am I condoning the usage of questionable funding of any business if indeed the allegations are Continued on page 7

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Kaieteur News

Friday November 09, 2012

Letters... Where your views make the news Letters... Where your views make the news

Rohee’s COI testimony deems him grossly incompetent DEAR EDITOR, I read Nigel Hughes’ letter to the media outlining the evidence, which in his opinion, has emerged from the COI on the Linden killings. I had previously stated that Rohee is negligent if he knew of the protest and failed to ensure that no lethal force would be used.

Hughes stated Rohee testified that on 17th July he met for at least 25 minutes with the Commissioner of Police, Persaud and Hicken, at his office about the protest which was scheduled for the next day. Lethal force was discussed at this meeting.

Rohee reportedly said he was given an undertaking that no lethal force would be used during the protest.

Let’s assume Rohee is telling the truth and examine his actions in light of what happened. The fact that the undertaking to the minister was disobeyed means there is gross disrespect for that minister. The fact that the Minister did not sanction any of the policemen (senior of junior) who allegedly disobeyed him tells us he accepts this insubordination

and is incapable of ordering and commanding the police force.

Nothing reinforces this point more than Agricola where even after the crippling Linden fallout from killing unarmed civilians, the police killed a citizen in cold blood again. Again, Rohee did nothing. If Rohee is to be believed at the Linden COI, he is severely exposed as a grossly incompetent minister who can be lied to and disobeyed by his own minions without consequence. This is serious business because Rohee is responsible for the safety of the entire country.

If Rohee is to be believed, he is nothing but a weak and impotent caricature who has zero control over the police he is supposed to command.

It means the police are controlling him as opposed to him controlling the force.

Thus, with impotent Rohee’s continuation as Home Affairs Minister we will get more Lindens and Agricolas where unchecked police barbarity against unarmed civilians will plunge

this country into dark days.

We will get more police depravities without consequence.

Under Rohee we are assured of more Agricolas where tens of thousands of commuters are stranded while the frazzled police struggles to contain a handful of fierce protesters and where the police demonstrate an inability to protect the public from robbery, assaults and attacks.

There is a bigger problem, if Rohee is to be believed, that he was disobeyed. There is his failure to reprimand those who disobeyed him. It means the PPP’s inability to control the police leads to the PPP’s inability to fight crime.

For Donald Ramotar and the rest of the PPP’s bigwigs to put their faith in Rohee as the man to lead the police force tells us that the PPP controllers do not care about the people of this country.

They are well protected. Their children and homes and belongings are well protected. The rest of us are cannon fodder.

The PPP’s leadership

continued pledge to back Rohee is an admission by the PPP that it cannot reform the police. It tells us that we will continue to get a PPP that defends the police force when it uses blunt force and open brutality. While it serves the PPP to have beasts in the police force acting like animals on citizens and failing to defend citizens assaulted right in the sphere they are operating, it does not serve the people of Guyana.

Many within the PPP have no problem with a corrupt police force that extorts the Guyanese public for it is exactly the kind of misconduct they engage in from the highest offices of the land. The police’s failure to defend poor people in this criminal country is not a problem for those who enjoy full protection in their Pradoville palaces.

That the Jagdeo/Ramotar band has full faith in Rohee is testament to how failed is their perspective on this nation and its people. Clement Rohee has been an abject failure.

M. Maxwell

A strange choice for government information coordinator DEAR EDITOR, I am quite perplexed by the recent decision of the Donald Ramotar administration to name Mr. Kellawan Lall, former Minister of Local Government and former Ambassador of Guyana to Brazil, to the post of government information chief (or some similarly named portfolio). In a nutshell, this choice is one that, as a current and progressive supporter of the PPP, I would have avoided.

There is little doubt that Mr. Lall’s conduct has raised many an eyebrow over the recent past.

This is not something that I wish to elucidate, but it is fair to say that the reputation of this individual is less-thanstellar for a government official.

Why would the government not seek to lessen its already flagging image by keeping someone like Kellawan Lall out of the spotlight?

His upkeep in government positions is no doubt due to his longstanding service to the PPP and, I presume, some level of qualification, but

surely even those around him know that his presence is a lightning rod for controversy. To choose the government information apparatus, itself an area of significant controversy in the recent past, as the new home of Mr. Lall just does not make much strategic sense if the government is trying to purge itself of embarrassment.

With a new president and, indeed, a rejuvenation of the party in the postJagdeo era, the time was (and still is) ripe to get a young face with fresh ideas into the portfolio that has been given to Mr. Lall – an area as broad and crucial as the government informational deserves dynamism and optimism.

If this issue is already closed, I hope that it is not a sign of things to come – PPP supporters of today (not of far into yesteryear) need to see more than just the promotion of good work; we need to see the extirpation of the things that have diminished the party’s once proud image.

S.T. Persaud

Friday November 09, 2012

Kaieteur News

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Letters... Where your views make the news Letters... Where your views make the news

Ignoring the constitution could plunge Guyana into chaos DEAR EDITOR, The special sitting of Parliament in July 2012 to pass a no-confidence motion against Mr. Rohee over the police killings of three unarmed protesters at Linden was to let the public know that he is unfit to hold the portfolio as the Minister of Home Affairs.

But President Ramotar’s refusal to support the noconfidence motion and demand Rohee’s resignation could actually destroy the good image of Guyana as a law abiding country.

In other words, the PPP stubbornness over Rohee’s resignation could plunge Guyana into chaos.

The occasion was significant for it is rare that the combined parliamentary opposition had the power and

authority to pass such motion and embrace the vision to accelerate the needed reforms of the police force under a new and competent Minister of Home Affairs.

The no-con f i d e n c e motion was perhaps the only means available to the opposition to exercise some influence over what ministers could do and cannot do. Mr. Rohee’s strident partisanship and his sharply divisive political rhetoric made reforms of the police force seem impossible in spite of the national consensus to do so.

However, after six years at the helm, Mr. Rohee squandered the opportunity to lead and effect structural and behavioral changes within the force to combat

Teacher Training key to upping Education Standards DEAR EDITOR, At the last CXC Exams, the West Coast Demerara School, the Saraswati Vidya Niketan (SVN), was outstanding in its total results, doing much better than most of the traditional “super” schools of Georgetown.

Someone had written a letter giving reasons for SVN’s remarkable achievement (e.g. banning private lessons), and advocating that the school be studied by the Caribbean Exams Council and by the Ministry of Education.

The one important factor in achieving such remarkable results by SVN which the letter-writer omitted to mention was the fact that the school methodically carries out its own teacher-training programes, both locally and overseas.

I recently came across a newspaper of July 2012 where there was a report that the school was able to enjoy the confidence and gracious generosity of the Ramnarayan

family of the USA who granted full scholarships to three students of Saraswati Vidya Niketan to pursue degrees at first class American colleges.

These students have now returned and are teaching at SVN. The school has also provided scholarships for Cyril Potter training.

Accordingly SVN is building up a high grade professional teaching staff reminiscent of the old Queen’s College.

All secondary schools need to take a page out of SVN’s book and the Ministry of Education should induce them to help themselves and not to sit aimlessly waiting on Government-sponsored scholarships.

It may profit the Ministry to try to keep in close contact with Swami Aksharanand who is committed to raising moral and educational standards of Guyana and who is successfully doing so.

Victoria Giles

From page 5 proven. I spoke with several travel agents over the last two weeks on the recent allegations embroiling Ramdeo and EZ Jet EZ and they all said passeng e r s showed confidence in the carrier by purchasing tickets.

In sum, I don’t condone any form of wrongdoing – not rigging, not embezzlement, not attacking people – and I most certainly have not glorified any wrongdoing of Ramdeo as alleged by his former employer. But Lowe is glorifying the problems facing the airline and the man.

I do support reasonable critiques and suggestions for improvements of the airline.

Instead of attacking Ramdeo, EZ Jet and Bisram, Lowe could have offered suggestions on how to improve the airline service.

Cheering the carrier’s problem and praying for its demise are wrong. I wait for the court before I pass judgment on the man.

Like Gandhi and King, I wait for the court’s judgment and the goodness of Ramdeo and EZ Jet. And so far, both have been good to the Guyanese nation.

Vishnu Bisram

Lowe’s convictions are...

police brutality/murders, and crime and violence against the citizens of Guyana.

During the past five years, the police force has gone through a terrible period in terms of its public image and reputation; most of it caused by its own missteps, misbehavior and corrupt practices of some rogue officers. But was this sufficient for the opposition to pass the no-confident motion against the Minister?

Yes! Prior to the last election when the PPP had a majority in Parliament, Mr. Rohee refused calls from the opposition to reform the

police force in the midst of massive crimes and bribery.

He remained adamant that the opposition would not dictate to him how to manage the force. We believe that in addition to blatant misconduct by some police officers, the reckless murders of the three unarmed Linden protesters warrant Rohee’s dismissal.

With the recent upsurge in violent crimes in the country, many citizens have been left breathless and are seeking plausible answers from the government.

In this the 20th anniversary since the PPP came to power, many law-

abiding citizens have to cower in fear of losing their lives. The criminal minds have been lowered to beastly behavior to rape, plunder and kill anyone who resists or refuses to comply with their demands.

It is sad but true that the current Jagdeo/Ramotar regime seems to be clueless about how to rid society of the criminal demons, corruption and the illegal trafficking of narcotics.

The PPPites and the ragtag Jagdeoites are at war with one another as to whether to solve crime or end corruption.

We have concluded that Mr. Ramotar continued support

for Rohee is meant to appease the rag-tag Jagdeoites.

Following the passage of the no-confident motion, President Ramotar had made it clear that it was a colossal waste of valuable parliamentary time and an exercise in futility by the opposition to pass the motion.

Today, it is clear that President Ramotar has ignored Parliament’s motion (the highest law making body in the country) and has refused to demand Rohee’s resignation.

Dr. Asquith Rose and Harish S. Singh.

Page 8

Kaieteur News

Friday November 09, 2012

Opposition mulls other avenues for Rohee’s removal

By Sharmain Grainger The parliamentary opposition took what it described as a “principled position” to ensure that Minister of Home Affairs Clement Rohee was unable to move the second reading of the Firearms (Amendment) Bill when the National Assembly continued.

This “principled position” was adopted yesterday. The move was characterised by the parliamentary opposition again drowning out the attempts of the Minister to speak. There was continuous drumming on tables and vociferous chants of “Rohee must go.”

This prompted the Speaker to call a five-minute recess, but this did nothing to change the minds of the parliamentary opposition, whose members continued in full chanting mode when the session resumed.

As such, the Speaker was forced to suspend the Assembly until November 22, 2012. His action, which was evoked some 20 minutes into the sitting, was premised on Standing Order 47:09, and effectively brought the business of the House to an

end yesterday.

Following the suspension of the sitting, Leader of the parliamentary opposition, Brigadier (Ret.) David Granger told media operatives that “we relied on the practice of the United Kingdom House of Commons. We are confident that the Speaker’s ruling ignores the ability of our National Assembly.”

The United Kingdom House of Commons, according to Granger, allows the House to sanction a Minister and call upon the Minister, having been sanctioned, to resign. The Opposition Leader stressed, too, that “for reasons of public security – we are not concerned with one incident – we are concerned with a pattern of behaviour by the Minister of Home Affairs over a six-year period.”

Speaker Trotman, yesterday, said that he had sought legal advice concerning a no confidence motion against Rohee by the parliamentary Opposition, which was passed in July.

According to Trotman, based on the advice he received, the Home Affairs Minister cannot be prevented from moving the motion at the

level of the National Assembly.

The advice the Speaker obtained, mirrors that which was offered by Attorney General and Minister of Legal Affairs, Anil Nandlall, when the motion was initially brought to the National Assembly.

According to the Attorney General, when that no confidence motion was passed three months ago, he informed the parliamentary opposition that they had no power in the National Assembly to oust the Minister.

“I said they had no power to compel the President to revoke Mr. Rohee’s appointment and that they had no power to interfere with Mr. Rohee’s right to function, in terms of him being a Minister and an executive officer in the National Assembly.”

In fact, Nandlall deemed the motion “futile and impotent. They ignored me and proceeded to impede the Minister from functioning.”

The Attorney General opined, too, that the Speaker at the last sitting of Parliament had indicated that he would have sought legal advice outside of that

offered by him. Nandlall boasted that the advice received from two other lawyers is not only identical to each other but are identical to his.

“The opinions said exactly what I said, that the National Assembly has no power whatsoever to interfere with the Minister’s capacity to function as an elected member of the National Assembly and as a Minister of the government.

“Consequentially, an attempt by the National Assembly to interfere with the minister ’s ability to function in fact constitutes a violation of the doctrine of separation of powers,” Nandlall added.

However, Granger is optimistic that more can still be done on the part of the opposition to achieve its mission since according to him “if you listen carefully to the Speaker ’s ruling, he points out that there are still avenues open to the opposition.

“We will bring a motion to strengthen the resolution that we passed at the end of July, so we are confident and we will continue to act in the interest of the public.”

According to the

Opposition Leader David Granger speaks to Media operatives Opposition Leader, “We will continue to ensure that Mr. Clement Rohee is not allowed to speak to this House as Minister of Home Affairs.”

Granger also asserted that although the parliamentary opposition has recognised that it has no authority to ensure the revocation of Rohee’s appointment, it will not cease efforts to highlight that “he is incompetent to perform the functions of

Minister of Home Affairs in this House...we are not going to allow him to do so.”

“Our concern is with a single Minister, Mr. Clement James Rohee, and his performance as Minister; his responsibility for public security,” Granger said.

“No person on either side of this House believes that public security is in good hands and that is the ultimate principle.”

Friday November 09, 2012

Kaieteur News

Page 9

IS THE OPPOSITION INTERESTED IN JUSTICE? The opposition parties have been boxed into a corner, from which they cannot escape. They took precipitate action in prejudging the outcome of the inquiry into the July 18 protests in Linden, and now find themselves cornered.

When the events of July 18 occurred, the opposition refused to accept any responsibility for what took place, even though some of their activists were believed to have been involved in organizing the protests which resulted in the deaths of the three persons killed.

This opposition refused to accept any responsibility – vicarious or otherwise - for what took place. But that is how the opposition in this country operates.

The media has never held the opposition to account for not acting more sternly to prevent the protest descending into unlawful actions. The media in fact paid scant attention to the terrible things that happened to ‘Candy Man’, a confectionery vendor, who said that his home and belongings were destroyed after he was abducted and accused of being responsible for the destruction of the school. The police did not charge him with any such offence and it seems more likely that he was being used as a scapegoat to deflect blame for what took place.

He was to be the fall guy for the burning down of the school. The opposition, however, needed someone to take the political fall for the deaths of the three Lindeners, and they sure are not going

to let that be any of those who organized the protests.

The opposition has always operated this way.

They accept no responsibility when the protests with which they are associated go haywire.

In fact, in this instance, they went as far as refusing to approve in the terms of reference, aspects of the organization of the protests.

They knew that to do so would run the risk of placing the actions of the organizers under scrutiny and possibly them being held vicariously responsible. There has been a suggestion that those responsible for the protests should be held liable for the destruction of property that ensued. This, however, is not a matter for the Commission of Inquiry. It is a matter for the civil courts, and it would be for those affected to file the necessary action against those who they feel should be held vicariously responsible.

For too long, the Guyanese people have suffered unnecessary losses simply because political protestors believe that they can do as they please and not be answerable for the destruction caused by their protests. Those who suffer losses as a result of political protests will test whether there is recourse for damages in civil courts.

Guyana is becoming a litigious society, and it is difficult to see how those affected are not eventually going to try to recover what they lost through legal action.

The opposition has to give its supporters some measure of satisfaction. And

Dem boys seh...

Wanted bulletin mek you end up dead Greed has no limit. Man does sell he wife fuh a few dollar. Mankind does guh to any length fuh money. Some does use gun and knife fuh rob people, some does even thief wid balanjay.

But officials does thief more than dem ordinary criminal. Dem does thief by de millions and billions through projects and dem kantractas.

Dem boys seh that if dem can inflate price fuh some li’l thing like de NIS building wha worth $15 million to $69 million; dem inflate de hotel wha worth US$20 million to US$60 million; dem inflate de hydroseed wha worth US$450 million to US$900 million; dem inflate $15 million koker to $100 million; dem inflate drugs (and not cocaine or ganja) wha worth $40 million to $260 million.

This is wha dem boys can see and check. Dem boys seh just imagine wha dem boys

can’t see and wha dem can’t check—things like road, sea defences, digging and dredging.

Dem seh that dem does clear bush and build bridge in backdam. Dem seh that dem does build dem bridge fuh man, but dem really does build dem bridge fuh monkey.

Obviously dem tek de whole of Guyana fuh monkey. Dem deh pun monkey business.

De police deh pun monkey business, too. Every day dem does put out wanted bulletin fuh people and when de people tun up and dem loose dem, other people does shoot and kill dem.

Ask Rodrigues and Trini.

Now dem want Uncle Paul.

Uncle Paul seh that he ain’t going nowhere. Nobody don’t want to go to CID no more. If Seelall and Brumell put out wanted bulletin fuh Adam, Glenn and Donald dem ain’t going too.

Talk half and watch dem inflated contract.

it has decided that it must gain a political scalp in order to show its supporters that it has achieved something in the name of justice, never mind that it was the very opposition which pressed and got a Commission of Inquiry to ascertain a number of things in relation to the shooting.

The opposition was not interested in awaiting the outcome of the Commission of Inquiry. It wanted its own brand of justice. It wanted to prejudge the commission, and so it boxed itself into a corner by calling for the resignation of the Minister of Home Affairs. It passed a motion in the National Assembly and it insisted that the government respect that motion because it reflected the will of the majority of the House.

It blamed the police for the

shootings even before the Commission of Inquiry was named. It said that the minister was responsible for the police force and therefore had to go. But strangely, it called for none of the members of the hierarchy to go. The opposition is not interested in justice. It wants to hang the minister out to dry. It wanted to make him the fall guy even before the Commission of Inquiry was established.

The opposition is making a mockery of the very Commission of Inquiry that they demanded be established.

They did not wait until the outcome of the inquiry before moving their motions; they did so in a premature and precipitate manner. And then to make things worse they decided that they would not

have anything to do with the Minister of Home Affairs. The Speaker has since ruled that he will not prevent the Minister from speaking in the Assembly and by their actions yesterday, the opposition is demonstrating gross disrespect for the ruling of the Speaker. It is not clear whether the AFC is part of this charade. But if they are, then it places the Speaker in an untenable position.

Since the opposition is insisting that the Minister of Home Affairs be removed because he does not enjoy the support of the majority of the House, it would seem that by extension, if the AFC sides with APNU on this matter of disrespecting the ruling of the Speaker, then the Speaker by the same logic of the opposition, will have to resign,

because he too would no longer be enjoying the support of the majority of the House. It would be sad if this happens, because the present Speaker has tried his best to improve parliament under very trying conditions, and he has been proactive in many ways. If, however, he no longer enjoys the support of the majority of the House, it is hard to see how he can continue, especially in the face of the gross disrespect that was shown to him yesterday. He may now have no choice but to resign his position.

Page 10

Kaieteur News

Friday November 09, 2012

=== THE FREDDIE KISSOON COLUMN ===

President Ramotar and a villager in conversation President Ramotar (PR) was in a village shortly after President Obama was reelected and engaged a farmer, John Jones (JJ), on the concluded American elections. Here are snippets of the conversation.

JJ – President Ramotar, are you pleased with the results of the American elections?

PR – Yes I am glad Obama won but all the commentary, editorials, and news reports I have read about this election are about upcoming gridlock

with the Congress and the hard fight Obama must expect.

What nonsense is this? I don’t understand this gridlock or padlock business.

The man won the election. He must govern.

JJ – Mr. President, I am not an educated man, but I read a lot to keep abreast with politics. Pardon me if I educate you on the American constitution, because the situation is similar to Guyana.

PR- I don’t care what explanation you give me. The man won the election so he

must govern.

JJ – Please Mr. President, please allow me to finish. You see Mr. President, Mr. Obama didn’t win the elections. He won a part of the elections, just as you did in our country.

PR – Look I had enough of this. I don’t know about people winning part of elections. I won the election and Obama won the election.

JJ – No Mr. President, you did not. You and Mr. Obama won the presidential part of the election. You did vote Mr. President, so you would know on the ballot paper you had elections for a parliament and for regional democratic councils.

Mr. Obama won the presidency. His party did not win the election for the House of Representatives. Please let me finish and I will tell what they mean by gridlock. I do read a lot about these things Mr. President, and I suggest you do the same PR – You are sounding a bit rude there. Are you implying I don’t read?

JJ - No, Mr. President. Not at all. You see Mr. President, the founding fathers of the American constitution, and Mr. Burnham in Guyana,

intended parliament to have some power, not the presidency to have all the power. The constitution of both countries gives parliament the authority to approve the budget of the government that you and Mr. Obama lead. Can I now describe this gridlock thing that you call padlock, and that all the commentators are talking about in the US? PR – Who have you been listening to? Are you telling me you read all these things? Are you a member of the AFC or APNU? Is this opposition propaganda?

JJ – With due respect to you, Mr. President, the story of parliament versus the president is something one reads about all the time in many, many countries.

But we Guyanese are close to the US, so we hear about this tussle all the time. Mr. President, Mr. Obama has to go to the US House of Representatives to get his budgets passed.

A l l I a m s a y i n g M r.

President, is that an American President would not do that if it was not the

legal thing to do. In other words, the American c o n s t i t u t i o n g i v es the Congress this power.

PR – So what has this got to do with Guyana? I am the President. I was elected to govern.

JJ - Mr. President please allow me to stay on the American elections. You see, Mr. President, the election was not about Mr. Obama only. A majority of Americans did not vote for Mr. Obama’s party for the legislature. They put in his opponents. Mr. Obama, then, did not win the general elections and neither did you. I come now to gridlock.

PR – Look I don’t want to hear about gridlock or padlock. An elected president must govern.

JJ- Mr. President, please.

An elected legislature must also govern. Please do not concentrate on the presidency only.

Please think of how the parliamentarians feel.

Whether in Guyana or the US, they tell themselves that the voters did not want the party of the president to have total power. You cannot say that you are elected and you must

Frederick Kissoon govern but the parliamentarian, whether in Guyana or the US, must not exercise the power the electorate gave them. After all Mr. President, you are the President because of that very electorate.

PR – So what are you saying? So far you appear more like a professor than a farmer, but what are you saying in the final analysis?

JJ – All I am saying is that you and Mr. Obama have presidential power but your opposition has legislative power. Mr. Obama has recognized that and is smart enough to know what he has to do.

Columnist’s note: This article here is either an attempt at roman á clef or satire.

It should be read as such.

Friday November 09, 2012

Kaieteur News

Page 11

Second reading of Telecoms, PUC Bills deferred A second reading of the Telecommunications Bills was pushed further down the Parliamentary agenda yesterday when the National Assembly resumed yesterday. In fact, when called upon to move the second reading of the Bill, Prime Minister Samuel Hinds requested that Speaker of the House, Raphael Trotman, allow for both the Telecommunications and Public Utilities Commission (Amendment) Bills to be deferred.

This move, he explained to the National Assembly, is to allow for meetings with the Guyana Telephone and Telegraph Company (GT&T) and Digicel Guyana. The two companies are currently the only two entities providing telephone services in Guyana.

Once the Telecommunications Bill, which was first tabled in the National Assembly in August 2011, is made into law, it will effectively ensure that no company is able to monopolise the sector.

Moreover it will cater to not only an open communication sector, but also one that is liberalized and competitive.

As such, it speaks clearly to the expansion of telecommunications networks and services into unserved and underserved areas, through the institution of a new universal access/ universal services programme.

Accordingly, it warrants a number of changes in the policies and the operations of the Public Utilities Commission (PUC), which as a result called for an Amendment to the PUC Act. Head of the Presidential Secretariat Dr. Roger Luncheon had informed that when the telecommunications legislation is enacted it would revolutionize the current terms and conditions of the agreement signed some two decades ago with the then People’s National Congress administration.

The legislation, he asserted, is one of the

pledges made to the people of Guyana to open the sector to more competition, therefore the terms and conditions of the GT&T agreement will no longer be in existence.

Currently, GT&T has exclusive rights to install and operate landlines and also to control international calls, since it is the only licensed body to facilitate such undertakings.

The dominating impact of GT&T had evoked the ire of U-Mobile which once operated here and subsequently Digicel, which has been seeking for a number of years to operate on par with GT&T. Digicel has over the years been seeking to expand its mobile operation, even reaching to several remote parts of Guyana. However, without the Telecommunications Act in place, the mobile company is forced to route its international calls through GT&T. As such the Bill, once passed, is expected to break the monopoly of GT&T and open the market for competition from other companies, a move which Digicel has been lobbying for, for some time now.

The legislation will seek to craft a new set of telecommunications regulations based on those found in other countries, including other Caribbean territories, geared at ensuring that there is transparency and non-discrimination in the issuance and monitoring of licences and authorisations to use the spectrum of seamless interconnection and access between and among telecommunications networks and services, and price regulation where required, to ensure competition and protect consumers.

In fact, the initial action that the legislation requires is the formulation of a Telecommunications Agency into which the National Frequency Management Unit

- Consultation with service providers necessary - PM will be incorporated.

This Agency will function under the supervision of the Minister, who will serve as the technical regulator of the sector, and is responsible for regulating licensing, the spectrum and other technical matters, as well as for administering the new universal access/universal services programme.

A Director of Telecommunications, a Deputy Director of Telecommunications and such Heads of Division as may be designated by the Minister and administrative staff, will govern the operations of the Agency.

The members, who are all to be appointed by the Minister, are all expected to be full-time employees, who cannot hold

office for a period exceeding three years and cannot be allowed to hold any other position in the Government while they are in the employ of the Agency.

According to the explanatory memorandum of the Public Utilities (Amendment) Bill, this legislation is designed to effect two types of related amendments.

First, it removes telecommunications undertakings from the principal Act’s provision on rate-setting and quality, development and expansion of services and facilities which are more appropriate for the regulation of monopolies and not an open, competitive communications sector.

Under the

Telecommunications Bill and comprehensive regulations anticipated to be promulgated upon enactment, prices will be set in most instances by the market place. However the Commission will continue to regulate the prices changed by telecommunications service providers that are capable of controlling the market (either alone or jointly with another provider) or that engage in anti-competitive conduct.

The memorandum also explains that the commission will continue to enforce the quality of service provided to consumers, as well as consumer rights, with regard to telecommunications services and the confidentiality of all users of such services.

In addition, the Telecommunication Bill and anticipated regulations will address deficiencies in the Principal Act by giving the commission ne w e n forcement powers to

ensure competition i n telecommunications services and the integrated functioning of the sector.

While continuing to require the commission to give effect to the terms of a licence issued to a telecommunications undertaking and any agreement between the Government and a telecommunication undertaking, this Bill eliminates from the Principal Act, similar provisions regarding agreements between the Government and an investor in relation to the privatisation or capitalisation of a telecommunications activity.

These amendments coordinate with the standardisation of the terms of licences provided for under the Telecommunications Bill and are essential to achieving the level playing field that is the hallmark of an open, c o m p e t i t i v e telecommunication sector, the memorandum adds.

Page 12

Kaieteur News

Friday November 09, 2012

$$M in overpayments to contractors in Region One The Auditor General’s Report 2011 revealed that a number of contractors executing roads, bridges and revetment projects in Region One were overpaid, even though the projects remain incomplete or in some cases, never began.

In several instances, no effort was made by the Regional Administration to recover the monies and no sanctions made against the contractors.

According to the Auditor General, the sum of $72M was allocated for Public Works in Region One. A Contingencies Fund Advance Warrant of $8M was received, bringing the total revised allocation to $80M. And, as at December 31, 2011, amounts totaling $75.029M were expended.

The Auditor General’s Report highlighted millions of dollars in overpayments to contractors, poor monitoring of projects and inadequate records-keeping in the Region.

A contract totaling $18.949M was awarded for the construction of a bridge and revetment from Oronoque Community to Port Kaituma Water Front. The report said that physical verification of the project revealed that works were

- AG’s Report incomplete and overpayments totaling $8.317M were made to the contractor. Apparently, the contract ended on August 31, 2011, but no action was taken by the Region against the contractor in relation to liquidated damages that would have accrued to $1.895M as of December 9, 2011.

In response to this project, the Head of the Budget Agency said that works were still ongoing under the contract, and measures will be taken to improve documentation.

Nonetheless, the Budget Agency Head was unable to provide similar responses for the other projects.

Another project executed that saw overpayment was the construction of gravel surface road from CoCo to Hymaracabra. A total of $12.997M was expended on the project. Though works were completed under this project, the contractor, according to the Auditor General, received $1.018M in overpayment.

The report also disclosed that a contractor was awarded a contract totaling $9.363M to

construct a gravel surface road at 11 Miles Manawarin.

A 40 percent advance, instead of the contract-stipulated 30 percent, was given to the contractor. Of the $3.745M advance to the contractor, works completed by the contractor were valued at $1.062M, hence an overpayment of $2.683M. Meanwhile, a contract for the empoldering of 250 acres of farmland at Waini was awarded in the sum of $7.878M. The report stated that as at December 31, 2011, an advance payment of $2.757M was made to the contractor, but a physical verification showed that no work was done.

The advance payment represents 35 percent of the contract sum, while the contract had stipulated that the advance payment should have been 10 percent.

In fact, the contractual completion date for the works expired since October 19, 2011, and no approved extension of time was noted.

The report further stated that based on the completion date, the maximum liquidated damages totaling $787,800 would have accrued since January 27 this year. But, no action has been taken against the contractor.

Carvil Duncan returned as FITUG President Carvil Duncan has been returned as President of the Federation of Independent Trade Unions of Guyana (FITUG) during the body’s 4th Conference held Wednesday at Regency Suites, Brickdam.

According to the umbrella union body, Duncan, who leads the Guyana Labour Union (GLU), will have Komal Chand as the First Vice President. Also elected to the FITUG’s Executive Council were Sherwood Clarke, Second Vice President; Kenneth Joseph, General Secretary; Seepaul Narine, Treasurer; Derek Thakur, Organising Secretary and Aslim Singh, Education Secretary and Committee Members: Narda Mohamed, Elmy Ishmael, Jagdeo Paul, Bhagmat Hochand, Savitri Thomas, Michael Stephens, Winston Joseph, Floyd Thompson and Althea Lindo.

According to FITUG, the 4th Conference was concluded with the full participation by its affiliates – the Guyana Agricultural and General Workers Union (GAWU), the Guyana Labour Union (GLU), the National

Association of Agricultural, Commercial and Industrial Employees (NAACIE) and the Clerical and Commercial Workers Union (CCWU).

The Opening Session, which was chaired by FITUG’s First Vice President, Komal Chand, was attended by 80 delegates representing the affiliated unions, a number of special invitees including prominent Ministers of Government, members of the Diplomatic Corps, representatives of business organizations and other distinguished invitees. A sixperson delegation from the Amalgamated Transport and General Workers Union (AT&GWU) also graced the opening session.

President Donald Ramotar, who delivered the Conference’s feature address, invited the trade union movement to have dialogue with him to ensure there is always a realistic labour perspective in existence, and which his Government will uphold.

The conference concluded with the charge being delivered by Ashton Chase, S.C., O.E., who reminded delegates of that all

Carvil Duncan FITUG’s President unions must be concerned with what is happening in the country and society and that the right to protest and assemble must be done within its limitations and not to obstruct and destroy.

According to FITUG, while the conference was deliberating, it received a letter from the Caribbean Congress of Labour (CCL) confirming that it was accepted for affiliation to that body.

“It follows that the GTUC’s affiliation to the august body was rescinded in order for FITUG’s affiliation to become a reality.”

Friday November 09, 2012

Kaieteur News

Chinese contractor advanced US$10M for Marriott Hotel

The planned Marriott Hotel

The Chinese contractor involved in the Marriott Hotel was advanced US$10M (G$2B) last year, despite ongoing objections to the project by the opposition parties in Parliament.

According to released audited financial statements of Atlantic Hotel Incorporated (AHI), the special purpose vehicle (SPV) established to own the hotel project, 20% advance payments was made to Shanghai Construction Group (SCG) Trinidad Ltd, the contractor.

The amount stated in the report is $2,036,724,516.

It is unusual for contractors to be paid more than 10% of the contract cost as an “advance”.

This latest disclosure is made despite a total lack of details as to who the investors are. Neither the Government nor NICIL released any feasibility studies for the project.

This project has been severely criticized for its lack of transparency and the alleged use of taxpayers’

money through the unaudited NICIL books. The project is also criticized by hoteliers who have argued that there is unused capacity in other hotels. The main criticism is the Government’s intended competition with the private sector.

Days before the General and Regional Elections last November, the Bharrat Jagdeo administration turned the sod signaling the start of the project at Kingston, west of the current Pegasus Hotel.

The land in Kingston is

being cleared and camps have been built by the Chinese company.

The money would be taken from the accounts of NICIL, the same company which is charged with managing undisclosed state assets worth billions of dollars.

On November 16, 2011, a ‘design and build’ contract was executed with SCG and AHI to the value of US$50.9M. It will see the delivery of a 197-room facility built on a turnkey basis.

Page 13

Miner killed in accident A 26-year-old miner was pronounced dead on arrival at the Linden Hospital Complex on Tuesday after being involved in an accident at Granny Backdam Trail, Omai, Essequibo.

According to reports the incident occurred at about 18:30 hours on Tuesday and the dead man has been identified as Ryan Alleyne of 22 Callender Street, Albouystown.

Reports are that Alleyne and three other men were in the tray of a motor lorry GLL 4502, driven by Quacy Valentine, and which was proceeding along the trail.

The driver reportedly lost control of the vehicle, causing it to topple, pinning Alleyne.

The injured man was rushed to the hospital where he was pronounced dead on arrival.

Meanwhile, the dead man’s mother, Joan Telford, told this publication that she received the news on Tuesday evening. The

Dead: Ryan Alleyne woman said she last spoke to her son last week Thursday night.

The grieving woman said she pleaded with her son not to return to the interior.

“He just waiting for he driver’s licence. He do the test and I got a car to give him.

But he doing the porkknocking work long, so he love the work and he go back in,” Telford said.

Page 14

Kaieteur News

Friday November 09, 2012

CJIA expansion…

AFC calls on Govt. to “come clean” on area of residents’ relocation

By Zena Henry The Alliance for Change (AFC) has asked the current administration to come clean and reveal the relocation plans slated for residents of Timehri North. Government has indicated that the residents will be relocated to facilitate the $130M Cheddi Jagan International Airport expansion project.

Despite numerous statements, specifically by Minister of Public Works Robeson Benn, that Government officials were in talks with the Timehri residents (squatters), there has been no official word on the relocation arrangements, and the residents insist that the claim of talks with the community was untrue and misleading.

AFC Leader Khemraj Ramjattan said that coupled with other discrepancies coming out of the airport expansion project, the situation is suspicious. He cited “the questionable background of the Chinese contractor” in relation to a World Bank ban placed on the organization for corruption.

“We find that the project is very suspicious. It has a huge amount of characteristics about it.”

Ramjattan reiterated the parliamentary opposition’s

position to have the details of the airport project aired in the House for scrutiny.

“The whole project ought to be brought to the attention of parliament so we can see both the socio-economic impact assessment it will have and the actual capacities of the contractors since they were blacklisted by World Bank officials.”

Ramjattan proposed to the Government that until the project is actually brought to parliament, all details concerning the airport expansion and the relocation plans for residents must be delivered.

“Until the project is brought to parliament for parliamentarians to scrutinize the entire project - like we are going to bring a motion in parliament for the scrutiny of the Marriott project - we need to see that one coming forth from the Government.”

The AFC leader noted that his party is “in full support” of the Timehri residents in ensuring that they retain their existing properties. He however said that if the construction, rehabilitation and expansion work is fulfilled, “There must be what is called a full appreciation of those who will be affected, and there must be qualitatively identical homes given to residents in the

AFC Leader Khemraj Ramjattan Government’s displacement plan.”

The AFC also stressed its position in relation to the residents, “One, it must be determined if the residents moving is necessary. Two, a full assessment must be done in relation to those affected.”

This, the party said, includes not only persons’ homes; but livestock, plants and business places.

The AFC concluded that the Government has plans and has signed a major deal pertaining to the airport, but has not made it clear to the nation the details of the deal and the related programme.

The party called on the administration to “be responsible and handle the Timehri situation correctly”.

House lot fraudster may have fled country on brother’s passport Police are still to apprehend the alleged mastermind behind the recent $80M house lot scam, and officials at the Housing Ministry have received reports that the suspect has fled overseas.

A Housing Ministry official told Kaieteur News this week that the ministry has received what appeared to be credible reports that t h e a l l e g e d mastermind slipped out of the country while using a brother’s passport.

The sibling reportedly lives in Canada and is said to bear a striking resemblance to

- Housing Ministry official the suspect.

Officials from the Housing Ministry were informed that the alleged fraudster collected the passport from a female acquaintance of his brother who had visited Guyana.

The suspect, who had lived at Grove, East Bank Demerara, was fingered in a scam involving the sale of bogus house lots, which were purportedly located in Diamond and Grove Housing Schemes. He narrowly escaped from police last

October. A warrant was subsequently issued for his arrest.

Kaieteur News understands that the man later contacted some of his victims by phone and promised to reimburse them.

His gang allegedly convinced victims that they had connections within the Housing Ministry and one female member allegedly pretended to be a Ministry staffer.

Police have since charged a 19-year-old clothes vendor and a 25-year-old laboratory technician in connection with the scam. Their trial is scheduled to commence on November 19.

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Friday November 09, 2012

Kaieteur News

Teen, boat captain still missing As ranks from the Coast Guard continue to search for two missing fishermen, relatives are becoming even more suspicious about claims that the victims were attacked by pirates.

Missing and feared dead are Ramkissoon Sukhan, a boat captain of Anna Catherina, West Coast Demerara, and 17-year-old Vickram Harrynandan, called ‘Andrew’, of Mon Repos, East Coast Demerara.

Relatives said that they have received reports that pirates attacked the five-man fishing crew in Suriname waters last Monday. They said that the three survivors alleged that Sukhan was beaten, shot and dumped overboard while Harrynandan drowned after the pirates ordered the remaining crew members to jump from their vessel.

Denise Singh, the teen’s mother, told Kaieteur News yesterday that she last saw her son about nine days ago when he left for sea. She was told that the boat, with four other fishermen, departed from the Meadowbank Wharf.

Ms. Singh said that last Tuesday, the wife of one of the fishermen visited her home and asked her if she ‘had Limacol.’

Singh said that the question puzzled her and she responded in the negative.

The woman left the yard, but returned shortly after and told the family that 17-yearold Vickram had perished at sea.

The distraught mother said that she refused to believe that her son was dead, but the following day the woman’s husband visited her and also claimed that the teen had perished.

According to Singh, the fisherman claimed that pirates had attacked the crew near Suriname. She said that the

- Relatives suspicious about ‘pirate attack’ reports

Missing: Ramkissoon Sukhan

Missing: Vickram Harrynandan

fisherman claimed that pirates took the captain into the cabin and that they could hear him screaming as he was beaten. He was reportedly then shot and thrown into the river.

Ms. Singh said that the fisherman also claimed that the pirates then ordered him and the other survivors to jump overboard.

According to the distraught mother, the man said that he assisted another fisherman in k e e p i n g Singh’s son afloat, since the teen was a poor swimmer. The fourth crew member, known as ‘Crabbie’, allegedly swam off in another direction.

Kaieteur News was told that the man alleged that he swam away from the teen and the other fisherman, in an effort to retrieve a bucket for them to cling to. Ms. Singh said that the man claimed that when he returned to where they were, he was told that the teen had drowned.

She related that the man said that they were eventually “rescued” by the same pirates who had attacked them.

The woman said that she went to the Meadowbank wharf the following day and was told by a fisherman that one of the men on the boat her son had worked on was overheard arguing over money.

This report had added to her suspicion that she has not been given an accurate account of her son’s fate.

Relatives of missing boat captain, Ramkissoon Sukhan, are also suspicious about the reports of his demise. They were told that Sukhan was hauling in the day’s catch when the gunmen allegedly struck. They were told that Sukhan was shot and thrown overboard.

It is alleged that the gunmen fled with the crew’s valuables but returned and took the victims to another boat which then took them to land. However relatives of the missing man said they do not believe the crewmembers’ story.

“If people attack you boat they don’t come back to you to help you. We want the police to investigate this matter properly,” one relative said.

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Caribbean fisherfolk to benefit from EU project Thousands of fisherfolk from across the Caribbean are poised to benefit greatly from a unique and timely Euro 117,956 (US$150,000) project which will help them develop a more sustainable and professional industry, and improve their quality of life as well as the nutrition they obtain from seafood.

The project, entitled Implementing the Caribbean Community Common Fisheries Policy: Positioning and Engaging Fisher Folk Organizations, is to be undertaken through Caribbean Regional Fisheries Mechanism (CRFM), which has recently been awarded a 12-month contract by the Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation ACP-EU (CTA).

The agreement was signed in mid-October.

Through the project, Caribbean fisherfolk will be continuously engaged with decision-makers, as they increase their participation in the formulation of key regional fisheries policies.

The partner

organizations, CRFM and CTA, have been working together in the support of the dynamic process initiated by fisherfolk groups to create a Caribbean Regional Network of Fisherfolk Organizations (CNFO), which was established in 2009. The direct beneficiaries of this new project will be the national fisherfolk organizations (NFOs). Today, fishers from across the region grapple with limited opportunities to engage policymakers, inadequate networking at national and regional levels, as well as a limited capacity to advance their interests as stakeholders in the industry.

This new project will help to address these problems by engaging the various parties in a one-week consultation on the implementation and mainstreaming of regional fisheries policies into smallscale fisheries governance arrangements in the Caribbean.

Via this process, fisherfolk organizations are expected to come up with common

positions on the finalization and adoption of the Agreement Establishing the Caribbean Community Common Fisheries Policy, the Castries (St Lucia) Declaration on IUU Fishing, and other relevant fisheries agreements.

The CRFM-CTA project will engage executives as well as members of national fisherfolk organizations in 15 ACP member countries who are part of the CRFM/ CARIFORUM group, as well as representatives from partnering organizations.

Fisherfolk will, through this process, build insight into fisheries ecosystems and the likely impacts of the fishing techniques they use on various ecosystems, while expanding their knowledge on common fisheries management tools which take into account climate change and disaster risk reduction.

The project is also expected to positively contribute to sound, key regional fisheries policies that take into account small-scale fisher folk positions and their proposals.

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‘Party-goers’ accuse police Kwakwani received no Govt. of taking their money funds after replacing IMC - AFC A Durban Street resident is calling on the relevant authorities to take action against police officers who he said robbed himself and a friend as they awaited a taxi to attend a farewell celebration at a popular night club.

The man, Wesley Philroy Martin, said the police took $10,000 each from himself and a friend after accusing them of being involved in robberies.

Martin, a father of two, told Kaieteur News that around 00:30hours Wednesday, he and a friend were standing on the corner of Broad and Ketley Streets, Charlestown, awaiting a taxi to go to a nightclub where they were scheduled to celebrate another friend’s imminent migration.

Martin said whilst he and Chris (the only name given), stood on the road corner, a police jeep with about five officers pulled up and told them that a lot of robberies were taking place in the area.

Martin said that the police asked if they knew about the robberies and they both denied; while he (Martin) told the officers that he works and has two children to maintain.

Martin claimed that the officers, after disembarking their vehicle, asked him and his friend to go into the van.

Prior to that, he said the police conducted a search of his person and the friend and found him (Martin) with $27,000 and the friend with over $40,000 along with two cell phones.

Martin said he explained to the police that his friend

Wesley Martin was going away the next day and they were going to celebrate. He said one policeman’s reply was, “Oh, this one going away? Y’all is thief.” Martin recounted said that was when they were placed to lie down in the back of the van.

He continued that while in the vehicle the police roughed him up and slapped him around. He said he told the police that he was uncomfortable and one rank replied, “When you in police vehicle you can’t mek yuhself comfortable.” That same rank, Martin said, then placed a boot on his face as he lay in the back of the police vehicle.

The police, Martin continued, said they were going to take him and his friend to the Diamond Police Station and on Monday they would be going on an identification parade. Martin said although he pleaded with the police, explaining that he was a hard working father of two, the police continued to

tell them that they were thieves.

For some time, Martin explained, the ranks drove around until they finally stopped at the back of Parliament Buildings in the vicinity of the Linden bus park and asked, “Wha’ pocket ya’ll got? Wha’ y’all gon do fuh y’all self?” Martin said he of course understood the police “language” but told the ranks that he had nothing (no money).

The police he said reiterated that they were going to arrest them and later took $10,000 from each of them. After that, Martin said the police let them out of the vehicle and ordered them not to call anyone and not to take any taxi. He said the police told them to walk up Hadfield Street and then go on their business.

Yesterday morning, Martin said he went to the Tactical Services Unit at Brickdam where he claimed he saw the head of TSU and related his story. The Officer, he said, told him to return to TSU this morning and relate the story before the ranks the allegation is levied against.

The man said he wants his $10,000 back along with that of his friend. He said he works for small wages and $10,000 is a lot to lose, especially having to take care of two daughters.

When Kaieteur News contacted the TSU Enquires Office, they were unable to say whether a report was indeed made by Martin.

Numerous calls to TSU Head Lyndon Alves’ office were unanswered.

Health Science Division focusing on expanding tutorial staff at nursing schools Health Minister Dr. Bheri health science tutors to Ramsaran yesterday - Dr Ramsaran produce competent submitted in the National Assembly that the Division of Health Science is currently focusing on increasing the tutorial staff of its schools of nursing by using some of the 29 recently trained clinical instructors to assist with conducting tutorial sessions to re-enforce content taught.

The Minister was responding to Alliance For Change (AFC) Member of Parliament Valerie GarridoLowe who sought his response on the shortage of lecturers at the various levels of the nursing programmes.

Lowe had also questioned the absence of clinical instructors, outdated textbooks, lack of internet/ research facilities, unsanitary conditions and limited classroom facilities for the nursing programme, and charged that the lack of availability of these is likely

to produce nurses of very poor quality.

Responding to issue of the shortage of lecturers, the Minister submitted that the three nursing schools have 24 full-time tutors on staff, and that based on current student population an additional 21 tutors are required.

The Minister, however, wrote that the full-time staff are being assisted by 52 parttime tutors who are allied health professionals and possess similar competencies.

Staff will soon be augmented with the 29 trained clinical instructors.

According to the Minister, to boost the capacity of the teaching staff, a basic education course was developed in collaboration with Guyana Division of Health Science Tutors (DHSE) and ITECH for the

graduates. The incumbent (Acting) Director of the Division also benefitted from a short curriculum development course in Seattle, USA. Ten tutors from the three government schools of nursing also successfully completed training courses for Health Science tutors, and will soon graduate, whilst another second bath of nurses and allied health professionals commenced training as Health Science tutors in September 2012.

The Minister stated that the combined efforts are directed towards increasing the quantum and quality of educators in nursing and other allied heal t h disciplines and that in the coming years, their introduction will remove the need for part-time tutors and the improvised use of clinical (Continued on page 19)

By Zena Henry Three months after Kwakwani residents selected and voted in a 15-man team to represent the community on local government issues, the area has received no funding from the government.

It was understood that since the elections held in September this year, the $3M Government funding has been cut.

The Alliance for Change (AFC) has described the Government actions as, “A total disrespect for local democracy.” Parliamentarian David Patterson told media operatives on Wednesday, during the party’s weekly press briefing, that the people of Kwakwani had a right to elect who they wanted to represent them.

He stated that it was wrong for the Government to impose an Interim Management Committee (IMC) on the residents.

According to the party member, the residents held their elections and had identified the 15 persons they wanted to act as their representatives.

The

Government has however given no recognition to those persons.

Patterson said the Government has instead, withheld the $3M funding that was going to the community. He however noted that the small sum was not significant and the community has proceeded with fund-raising activities.

Patterson also revealed that the majority of IMC members, having noticed that they were not popular among the community members, have since withdrawn themselves. Patterson has thus called for the Government to recognize the “duly elected” community members or call local government elections.

Party leader Khemraj Ramjattan stressed on what he said was the improper action of the Government. He opined that the administration would like to install an IMC of their “favourites, friends and flatterers.”

“The task of Kwakwani’s selection of its officials to conduct, even if temporarily their affairs, was made easier for Government when the

people went forward and had duly constituted elections and named their 15 appointees,” Ramjattan said.

He continued: “Why then, could the Government not see that it was a democratic thing the people did, and then go and start speaking with this 15-man duly elected team?”

The AFC leader concluded that “The Government has put forward that they will not hold those elected in any esteem; they’re (Kwakwani residents) on a frolic on their own and they’re (Government) going to deal with the IMC.” Residents of Kwakwani were up in arms last August when the government decided to establish an Interim Management Committee (IMC) in that Upper Berbice River, Region 10 community.

The residents claimed that they were cheated by the Ministry of Local Government which ‘secretly’ established the IMC. As a result, the residents held elections and elected their own leaders.

Local government elections have not been held since 1994.

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Cacique Palace and Banquet Hall remains on the market A buyer for the incomplete Cacique Palace and Banquet Hall has not yet been secured, but the ‘sales team’ is currently in contact with three prospective purchasers.

This disclosure was made

by Keith Burrowes, who is acting on behalf of Government in overseeing the sale of the property, in collaboration with the original investors. According to Burrowes, an American company with Guyanese connection, and two locals, have expressed interest in purchasing the entity.

Currently, the ‘sales team’ is going through due diligence for prospective buyers.

He noted that other businesses or individuals wanted to purchase the hotel but were not pleased with the terms and conditions.

The str u cture located

The incomplete Cacique Palace and Banquet Hall

aback of Princess International Hotel at Providence, East Bank Demerara, was supposed to have been completed in time for Cricket

World Cup 2007. However, that did not occur and the structure remains incomplete.

Work on the hotel, originally slated as a US$3.5

million (G$700M) project, began at the end of January 2006, and was to have been completed by the end of the same year. At the time of the

construction, the government facilitated $30M from the Consolidated Fund. That money was turned over on the agreement that it was an advance payment for rooms, but with no business being conducted, the money will be repaid when the structure is sold. The Cacique Palace was supposed to have offered, in addition to the scores of rooms, a banquet hall that could cater for about 700 persons; three catering restaurants, a storage room, a second-floor pool, 21 suites (including two with presidential facilities) and tuck shops.

The property boasts land measuring approximately 226,512 square feet with two buildings comprising 45 apartments, conference facilities, a catering centre, restaurant, swimming pool and recreational facilities.

The ‘sales team’ has for

more than three years failed to secure a buyer willing to pay the reportedly US$5M (G$1B) being sought.

Burrowes declined to comment on the amount being sought for the structure, but assured that the bidding process is transparent.

He noted that persons interested in purchasing the entity have to deposit their bids in an already indicated Post Office Box, and from there discussions are held.

However, after a buyer is selected, the final decision has to be approved by Government.

Burrowes stressed that the ‘sales team’ will not sell the structure at a loss. He said that the money obtained would have to repay Government its investment and ensure the proprietor receives money even after clearing liabilities.

(Keeran Danny)

Swindler in custody after using ad to fleece victims A man is in custody at the Providence Police Station after being caught red handed yesterday with marked money he collected from a Diamond resident, under the guise he was from Public Service Co-operative Credit Union Ltd. Reports reveal that the man used a photocopied version of an advertisement placed in the newspapers last weekend, to gain information about his intended victims’ names, occupations and addresses.

The ad in the Newspaper stated “The following persons, amongst others, whose names will be published, are hereby requested to make contact with the Guyana Public Service Co-operative Credit

Union Ltd.” The swindler would then visit various people’s residences and confront them as being a representative of the credit union. He then proposed to his victims that he would be taking them to court, and if they were not in a position to pay, they would be imprisoned for three months.

However, the man would make a proposition to be in the capacity to extract the docket from the court and “duck the charges”. He would then request a fee for his action. This raised the suspicions of one Diamond, East Bank Demerara resident who called in the police. The man was nabbed after he collected several marked thousand-dollar bills.

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Gunmen target Agricola teen dead, three Vreed-en-hoop paint store critical in Providence crash Police on the West Coast of Demerara are looking for two gunmen who were involved in a daring daylight robbery yesterday morning at R.H. Persaud Paint Store, at New Road, Vreed-en-Hoop.

The bandits, who posed as customers, entered the business place at around 11:15 hours yesterday. Owner of the business Mr. R.H. Persaud said he noticed a car in front of the store, but paid no mind, since he thought that the occupants were regular customers.

“Two men came out the car and then the car drove off and one of the men sat in the chair and asked the price for a gallon of paint while the other just stood by watching on,” Persaud related. He added that when he quoted the price for the paint to the ‘customer’ the man simply replied ‘it’s the same thing it selling for in town so it’s best we buy it here’.

“Even at that point I believed that these men were genuine customers as the boy paid for the paint, and I passed it through this small window and then his friend asked for a large bucket of putty, which obviously couldn’t pass through the window.”

Persaud said he told the friend the price for the putty and like the first customer, the man paid, but was instructed to go around to a side gate to

collect the putty.

“When I reach around to the side gate to give the man the putty he pulled out a gun and grabbed me, telling me don’t make noise. But I had to make noise, because my wife was inside and my daughter was upstairs.”

Persaud said he began screaming as he held onto the man, preventing him from entering the premises.

“While I holding him he trying to duct tape my mouth and his partner coming running and push us aside and enter the building and then run straight into the house,”.

According to Persaud, one of the men then confronted his wife who was sitting in the kitchen.

The businessman told this publication that his wife quickly ran out of the back door and locked the gunman in the house. By that time the woman had raised an alarm and tried to get the attention of her immediate neighbours.

However, before fleeing the house, the woman shouted upstairs to her daughter instructing her to shut the inside door leading to the top flat of the house.

“My daughter didn’t hear exactly what her mother told her, but she heard the commotion and she came downstairs and saw one of the men still fighting with me to duct tape me.”

Persaud said while he was wrestling with one of the men, from all indications the other one who was in the house, emptied a drawer which had cash from the morning’s sales.

Persaud recounted that shortly after, the men calmly walked out of his house as his daughter kept shouting at them to leave her father alone.

“These men just walk out and the car come back and three of them jump in the car.

It was only then we know there was a third man acting as the lookout man.”

Persaud said it was only after the ordeal he learnt that a man who heard the noise and was entering the yard to assist was stopped by the ‘lookout’ man.

“A man was weeding with a brush cutter next door and he heard the screams and was coming, but when he reach at the bridge the ‘lookout’ man stop him and start gaffing like normal, and it was only after the car come then everybody knew a robbery had happened,”.

The men made off with $60,000 in cash.

Meanwhile this publication was told that the car which was used to drop off the gunmen was subsequently located and impounded by the police.

There are also reports that one man was arrested in connection with the robbery.

Health Science Division focusing...

(From page 17) instructors to deliver tutorials.

Responding to the questions posed on the absence of clinical instructors; the Minister stated that the ministry, through the DHSE, in 2011, developed a basic clinical instructor training programme for nurses and other health science educators and 29 clinical instructors received training and are providing clinical guidance and tutorial support. The Minister stated that 30 instructors as of October 2012 are being trained from two of the institutions where current clinical instructor training is absent. A special clinical instructor course will be held for public health staff from Regions 3 and 4 and a total of 15 health centre leaders will be trained to provide support to students on public health rotation at selected health centres.

The Ministry is constantly expanding its stock of text books in all three of the schools of nursing, the Minister wrote, in response to the questions of outdated texts.

Older texts are currently

replaced and the ministry expects to buy the remainder soon and also additional volumes. Thirty-five essential texts are expected to be purchased to augment the current 300 in the system. In addition to the text books, the students have the benefit of the GPHC Medical Services Library and the virtual library.

Expansion work is carried out on all three of the institutions to accommodate the increase in the student population and special attention is placed on

expanding class space and sanitary facilities, especially in the case of the Georgetown School of Nursing, the Minister stated.

Maintenance of the facilities appears to present a challenge, he said. According to the Minister, the Georgetown School of Nursing will be shortly expanded to accommodate additional classrooms, a sanitary block and a recreational area for students.

The Kingston Annex is also soon to be rehabilitated.

An Agricola teen is dead and three others critically injured after a late night crash in front of the National Stadium, Providence.

Reportedly dead is Kerwyn Andrews, age 16, of Brutus Street, Agricola.

The badly injured are Christopher Chung, 19, and Steve Fraser, 18, also of Agricola.

Firefighters battled from almost 90 minutes to remove Fraser and a Mocha female, whose name was given Mathilda, 20, who was also admitted to the hospital, from the mangled remains.

Eyewitnesses recalled seeing the car speeding, around 23:30 hrs, heading north along the western carriageway when somehow it lost control.

It rode up on the median and wrapped itself around the pole.

It was unclear who was driving but drivers who stopped to render assistance reported seeing one man hanging from the driver’s side. A relative of the Mocha girl said she was picked up from home. There were

Reportedly dead: Kevin Andrews

Injured: Steve Fraser, 18 several bottles in the vehicle, which was separated into two, suggesting that drinking may have been involved.

The car reportedly belonged to a Plaisance resident but was lent out, Kaieteur News was told.

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Argentines prepare for huge anti-government march

Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — Thousands of people are using social networks to mobilize a huge march last night against President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, organising what they hope will be the country’s biggest antigovernment protest in more than a decade.

Angered by rising inflation, violent crime and high-profile corruption, and afraid Fernandez will try to hold onto power indefinitely by ending constitutional term limits, the protesters plan to

bang pots and march on the iconic obelisk in Argentina’s capital. Protests also are planned in plazas nationwide and outside Argentine embassies and consulates around the world.

The protests known as cacerolazos hold deep symbolism for Argentines, who recall all too well the country’s economic debacle of a decade ago. The “throw them all out” chants of that era’s pot-banging marches forced presidents from office and left Argentina practically ungovernable until Fernandez’s late husband, Nestor Kirchner, assumed the presidency in 2003.

The current president’s supporters sought to ignore two of the protests this year, but with the latest effort promising to turn out huge numbers, her loyalists have come out in force. They dismiss the protesters as part of a wealthy elite, or beholden to discredited opposition parties, and misled by news coverage from media companies representing the country’s most powerful economic interests.

“The people don’t feel represented by anyone. It’s a complaint everyone has. The people are begging for the opposition to rise up, and for the government to listen,” said Mariana Torres, an accountant and mother of three who is among the leading organisers of the protests.

Fernandez has suggested that too much of Argentina’s political rhetoric masks darker motivations that few want to openly express.

“No more lying,” she said during a speech Wednesday.

“It’s all that I ask of all the Argentines, that we speak the truth.”

Polls suggest neither side has a firm grip on people’s sympathies.

Fernandez was re-elected by a landslide of 54 percent over a divided opposition just a year ago but saw her approval rating fall to 31 percent in a nationwide survey in September by the firm Management & Fit. The survey of 2,259 people, which had an error margin of about 2 percentage points, also said 65 percent of respondents

disapproved of her opponents’ performance.

Crime is the biggest concern for many marchers.

Argentine newspapers and television programs provide a daily diet of stories about increasingly bold home invasion robberies, in which armed bands tie up families until victims hand over the cash that many Argentines keep in their homes. Many people stopped putting money in banks after the government froze savings accounts and devalued the currency in 2002. Adding to frustrations, the vast majority of the crimes are never solved, while the death toll is rising.

Inflation also upsets many, as the government’s much-criticized index puts inflation at about 10 percent annually, or as little as a third of the estimates of private economists. As a result, real estate transactions have slowed to a standstill, given the difficulty of estimating the future value of contracts.

And unions that won 25 percent pay hikes only a few months ago are threatening to strike again unless the government comes up with

more.Many Argentines are worried mostly about their pocketbooks, angry that government decrees designed to maintain the central bank’s dollar reserves and combat tax evasion have made it all but impossible to legally trade their inflationary pesos for safer currencies.

“If you go to the march you won’t find only middleclass people,” Torres said.

“You’ll see everything from a professional to a low-wage worker to retirees on minimal pensions.”

Sen. Anibal Fernandez, who was the president’s Cabinet chief and now leads the governing party’s legislators, called the idea of general discontent “an invention of one faction of the ultra-right.” He accused organizers of being funded by wealthy landowners and supporters of the 1976-1983 dictatorship.

Pro-government voices say what’s really at stake is the model of social inclusion that the Kirchners pursued, such as providing cash payments to the poor and unemployed, and directing billions of dollars from the nationalized pension fund to

social welfare projects.

The model puts Argentina’s development needs ahead of international commitments, and has made sure that the country’s statecontrolled oil company and airline respond first to the needs of its citizens, government supporters say.

President Fernandez called for an honest debate about her policies rather than protests.

“The only thing I ask of each one of the Argentines, and mostly of political class, is that each one says what they really think and want for this country, with sincerity, and that no one will be offended,” she said.

But the president also issued a warning to those gathering Thursday night: “Don’t anyone think that I’m going to go against my own politics, those that I’ve defended since I was 15 years old. These are the politics I believe in and this is the country I believe in.”

In a speech on Thursday, Fernandez didn’t directly refer to the protest but she defended policies that she said helped rescue Argentina Continued on page 23

Barbados Nation - A political scientist says that instead of selling their shares in Republic Bank (Barbados) Limited, Government and the National Insurance Scheme (NIS) should try to take over the former state-owned entity.

Senior research fellow at the Cave Hill Campus of the University of the West Indies, Dr Don Marshall, told the DAILY NATION there was an important role for a national bank or a development bank.

“If we are talking about developmental projects,” he said, “then you must know that since Barbados does not benefit from angel investors – that we have closed the Barbados Development Bank (BDB) years ago – then you have to maintain an interest in a national bank, and I am saying the a national bank is needed for the fledgling industries like the solar and alternative energy sector to realise the real innovations

for which inventions will be the hallmark of this enterprise.”

“The lie has gone out that the sale of the Barbados National Bank (BNB) was the best thing to happen. Now, we are bereft of any kind of venture capital agency or bank to which the state can incentivize or direct to lend in a particular direction. We now have to await Trinidadians to make that decision in Port of Spain.”

‘Don’t sell – take over bank’

Friday November 09, 2012

Kaieteur News

Crime Stop getting more tips via the Internet

Chairman of the LIME Foundation Errol Miller (right) hands over a cheque for $1.4 million to Private Sector Organisation of Jamaica President Christopher Zacca for the Crime Stop programme. Chairman of the organisation’s National Security Committee Peter John Thwaites looks on. (Photo: Aston Spaulding) Jamaica Ovserver - More members of the public are using the Internet to report criminal activity to Crime Stop.

Chairman of the Private Sector Organisation of Jamaica’s (PSOJ’s) National Security Committee, Peter John Thwaites, made the disclosure at the PSOJ’s head office in Kingston Wednesday, shortly after the

LIME Foundation handed over $1.4 million in continued support for Crime Stop.

“This is a dynamic change that has been taking place,” Thwaites said, adding that one of the reasons for persons using social media who have been sending in worthwhile leads for the solving or investigation of serious crimes, including

murder and drug dealing, was that they were confident that their anonymity would remain intact.

Chairman of the LIME Foundation Errol Miller, who reflected on the fact that the identities of callers to Crime Stop have never been compromised since its inception in 1987, said the use of social media by Crime Stop

From page 22 from its worst economic crisis a decade ago and buoyed it during the 2009 world financial downturn.

“During boom times it’s easy to run a country but try running when its crumbling down as it was during 2003, 2008 or 2009,” Fernandez said asking Argentines to continue to support her struggle to get them improved education, industry and housing.

“Never let go, not even in the worst moments,” she said.

“Because it’s in the worst moments when the true colors of the leaders of a country come out.” Argentina’s opposition parties remain weak and

balkanized and face a credibility crisis, having lost control of Congress and nearly every other institution capable of restraining the government.

Instead, much of the opposition has coalesced around social media sites created by Torres and attorney Marcelo Moran, who insist they aren’t affiliated with any political organization. The eight sites and accounts they manage claim more than 200,000 followers.

Torres dismissed most opposition politicians as having lost touch with Argentines, and said she expected some of them to try to piggyback on the marches.

March organizers aren’t

the only ones spreading their opinions through social networks. Writer Ivy Cangaro and business consultant Juan Carlos Romero launched a counter-campaign, “8-N I won’t go,” which has more than 27,000 followers.

They too say they don’t belong to any particular political platform, but support Fernandez. Cangaro said the march is misguided.

“The premises are false and have been imposed by the media through fear. The people assume it’s real and so feel the need to go out and protest against it, but it has nothing to do with what’s real and tangible.”

Argentines prepare for huge anti-government...

made the foundation even more passionate about its continued financial support.

Thwaites, meanwhile, said public support for Crime Stop and financial support from the LIME Foundation — totalling $20 million in eight years — were the main drivers for the success of the private sector-led anti-crime programme.

PSOJ President Christopher Zacca thanked the foundation for its unwavering support and reiterated that despite the organisation’s intense focus on the economy, crime was still a major concern to its members.

Besides financial support, the LIME Foundation continues to support Crime Stop with donations of telephone systems, computers and generous discounts on telephone services.

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T&T Govt. move for increased broadcast time up in the air Trinidad Guardian - After a two-hour meeting with Communication Minister Jamal Mohammed on Tuesday, media managers and journalists continue to disagree with a proposed move to have the broadcast time for government programming increased two hours a day. This was revealed by president of the Media Association of T&T and editor of the T&T Guardian Suzanne Sheppard.

Mohammed, however, commented: “We are all on the same page now and I am very happy about today’s meeting.” President of the T&T Publishers and Broadcasters Association (TTPBA) Kiran Maharaj and her team invited Matt representatives, Sheppard and the organisation’s vice-president Judy Raymond to attend the meeting.

It took place at the Communications Ministry at Nicholas Towers, Port-ofSpain. Mohammed was accompanied by Justice Minister Christlyn Moore, Science and Technology Minister, Dr Rupert Griffith, CEO at the Government Information Services Ltd (GISL) Andy Johnson and director of information and communication (OPM) Dennis McComie.

Sheppard said one of the major issues discussed was Mohammed’s request a few weeks ago to have the Government utilise the maximum time allocated to it under the broadcast licences issued to media houses. Over the past several years, the maximum time has not been used.

Sheppard said: “The fact of the matter is that both the Matt and the TTPBA have concerns.”

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Kaieteur News

Friday November 09, 2012

U.S. Northeast digs out from snow, gas rationing spreads

Snow masks much of the damage done to the New Dorp section of Staten Island, yesterday. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig) (Reuters) - New York City and much of the U.S. Northeast yesterday dug out from a snowstorm that hammered a region still struggling to recover from the devastation of Superstorm Sandy, as local governments expanded gasoline rationing in the face of shortages that may last for weeks.

The unseasonably early

winter storm dumped more than a foot (30 cm) of snow on parts of Connecticut on Wednesday and slapped the region with 50 mph (80 kph) winds, plunging 300,000 homes and businesses back into darkness.

Bitter cold, rain, snow and powerful winds added to the misery of disaster victims whose homes were

destroyed or power was knocked out by Sandy, which smashed ashore on October 29 and caused widespread flooding, leading up to as much as $50 billion (31.3 billion pounds) in economic losses.

The snowstorm created another commuting nightmare for a region whose transportation system was already under repair because of the hurricane. New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg said the city would begin an indefinite program of gas rationing Thursday, modelled on one New Jersey implemented last week.

“It now appears there will be shortages for possibly another couple weeks,” Bloomberg said, later adding “if you think about it, it’s not any great imposition once you get used to it.”

Neighbouring counties would implement a similar program, he said, in an effort to cut down lines that ran for hours at local filling stations following Sandy. The city’s iconic yellow taxis are exempt from the new regulation, which allows drivers to fill up on alternating days depending on their license plate number.

New Yorkers, never known for holding their tongues, let their exasperation with the bad weather show.

“God hates us!” the New York Post said in a front-page headline. Some 3 to 6 inches (8 to 15 cm) of snow fell on the city, which enjoyed dry, sunny weather on Thursday.

Residents at Waterside Plaza, an apartment complex built over the East River on the Manhattan shore, had their power restored on Wednesday - temporarily, anyway. “Then the power went and failed one more time, then came back again, then failed in the evening, then came back again, then failed again this morning and hasn’t come back,” said Josh Bright, a 39-year-old photojournalist, as he climbed the stairs to his apartment on the 26th floor to feed his cats.

Sandy’s death toll in the United States and Canada reached 121 after New York authorities on Wednesday reported another death linked to the storm in the hard-hit coastal neighbourhood of the Rockaways, a barrier island facing the Atlantic Ocean.

“Can you believe this?

Enough is enough,” said Cindy Casey, whose Belle Harbour home one block from the beach in the Rockaways was swamped by Sandy, as she looked out at the snow blanketing the neighbourhood devastated by flooding and fire.

Sandy surrounded Casey’s home with six feet

(two metres) of water and sparked a fire that destroyed at least 20 houses in the neighbourhood before stopping short of her own.

“I said, ‘I’m going to die,’” said Casey, who does not know how to swim but vows to learn. “It was non-stop. I just felt hopeless. There was nothing I could do. ... At least I still have a house.”

The storms have also battered New Jersey’s shore, a summer tourist haven where hundreds of beach-front homes were destroyed by Sandy’s record storm surge.

“I thought I was lucky when power was restored last Thursday, but last night it went out again,” said Michael Platt, 49, an electrician from Toms River, New Jersey, who estimated a foot of snow fell in his area. “The kids have been home for nearly two weeks and I’m not working, and when I’m not working I’m not making any money. This hasn’t been easy.”

N e w Yo r k C i t y o n Friday will open a vehicle tunnel linking midtown Manhattan to Queens, which would restore all of Manhattan’s bridges and tunnels except for the tunnel linking lower Manhattan to Brooklyn.

All of the region’s major airports experienced cancelled flights and delays on Wednesday from the storm.

Four companies told the United States they intended to take advantage of a rare waiver allowing them to use foreign-flagged ships to

transport oil products to the storm-hit region.

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, who said estimates put the damage and economic loss for the region at $50 billion (including $33 billion in New York state), turned his ire on the power utilities, which he said had failed consumers by taking so long to restore electricity.

Some 715,000 homes and businesses in the region were without power, a net increase of nearly 43,000 from Wednesday night after the nor’easter knocked it out to more customers following those who had lost it from Sandy, the U.S. Energy Department said.

The storm damage exposed deep flaws in the structure and regulation of power utilities that will require a complete redesign, said Cuomo, who oversees the state-controlled utilities and appoints the members of the Public Service Commission, which regulates investorowned utilities such as Consolidated Edison.

“This is a 1950s system with these utilities that are regulated by the state theoretically. But they are bureaucracies that are in many ways a monopoly,” said Cuomo, frequently mentioned as a possible presidential aspirant in 2016.

“It is nameless, faceless bureaucracy that is a monopoly that operates with very little incentive or sanction. ... They have failed the consumers.

Iran’s Ahmadinejad says anyone stockpiling atom bombs “retarded” NUSA DUA, Indonesia (Reuters) - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said yesterday the age of nuclear deterrence was long gone and any country still stockpiling nuclear weapons was “mentally retarded”.

He again denied Iran was trying to develop nuclear weapons, a day after the reelection victory of U.S. President Barack Obama, for whom Tehran’s disputed nuclear programme will be one of the thornier foreign policy issues of his second term. “The period and era of using nuclear weapons is over ... Nuclear bombs are not anymore helpful and those who are stockpiling nuclear weapons, politically they are backward, and they are mentally retarded,”Ahmadinejad told reporters at a forum to promote democracy on the Indonesian island of Bali.

“The Iranian nation is not seeking an atomic bomb, nor do they need to build an atomic

bomb ... For defending ourselves we do not need a nuclear weapon,” said Ahmadinejad.

He added that representatives of any government or agency could visit the Islamic Republic to verify that it was not developing nuclear weapons.

Iran says it is enriching uranium only for peaceful energy purposes but it restricts access for U.N. nuclear inspectors and concealed some sensitive sites from them in the past.

The West has imposed increasingly harsh and farreaching sanctions on Iran over suspicions it is trying to design a nuclear weapon in secret.

Sanctions include curbs on imports of the OPEC member’s oil and on its sources of financing, battering its economy this year and putting Ahmadinejad under pressure.

The hardline conservative president said he was open to talks with Obama on forging peace around the world and

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called for the dismantling of all U.S. military bases abroad.

Obama’s re-election may open an opportunity for new negotiations with Iran on agreeing constraints to its nuclear programme, with sanctions piling economic pressure on its theocratic leaders.

Obama’s Republican rival in the presidential election, Mitt Romney, had pledged a more hawkish approach to Iran had he won.

Friday November 09, 2012

Kaieteur News

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Call to remove VAT in phases Trinidad Guardian Removing VAT from some 7,000 food items should either be done in phases or the proposed date — next Thursday — should be pushed back. That was the recommendation Wednesday as stakeholders in the food industry said they were faced with a herculean task, come November 15, to make the necessary price adjustments.

At a stakeholders meeting at Capital Plaza, Port-of-Spain, Wednesday, members were concerned the Government had yet to supply the list of food items to them and to the Customs and Excise Division to begin removing tariffs and other taxes.

The decision to remove VAT was announced by Prime Minister Kamla PersadBissessar in September at a pre-budget rally organised by the United National Congress (UNC) at Mid Centre Mall, Chaguanas.

Among those who attended Wednesday’s meeting were Vernon Persad, president of the Supermarkets Association; Marc Mouttet, chairman of the Food Distributors Association; Wendy Lee Yuen, chairman of the Prices Control Council and supermarket owner Balliram Maharaj.

Saying the concerns raised were legitimate Mouttet added: “On the day we are told to take the VAT

off food items we will take the VAT off but I am concerned it is a lot of work to be done in a short period of time.

“I am concerned that the Government, as well as the supermarket trade, though they will be supported by us, can turn the clock of time to immediately show the effect in one day and my advice would be... those who have to do the implementation... let’s ask them, ‘can you achieve the full turnaround in one day?’”

He said if that was not possible, another option would be to implement the initiative on a phased basis.

Asked whether he believed Government might be too hasty with the plan, Mouttet said he was heartened that Government was trying to lower food prices. “I think the Government is very encouraged in trying to bring as much relief to the consumer as possible. I just think it’s a herculean task. It will be done but there will be errors and there will be gaps,” Mouttet added.

Saying it was very difficult to “remove VAT today and reflect that change 100 per cent tomorrow, Mouttet said that burden was placed directly on the supermarkets. He added: “There are also questions in terms of gazetting of these new laws and the VAT coming off these tariff numbers. The Government

DPP wants more power to fight lottery scam

Paula Llewellyn KINGSTON, Jamaica – Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) Paula Llewellyn has called for the implementation of an Advance Fee Fraud Act which would help to clamp down on persons involved in the multi-million dollar lottery scam.

The Advance Fee Fraud Act is currently used in Nigeria to combat criminal activities which are similar to the lottery scam.

Llewellyn, who was speaking at a forum on the lottery scam Wednesday, also disclosed that currently there is no criminal charge that specifically refers to the scam. Persons suspected to

be involved in the lottery scam are largely charged under the Larceny Act, the Unlawful Possession of Property Act, and the Proceeds of Crime Act (POCA).

The DPP also hit out at professionals in the society, who she says help to facilitate lottery scammers.

“Very often you find that the scammers are in league with professionals in the system, bankers, maybe some lawyers, police officers, business people who will all walk around looking like the exemplars of probity and what somebody having a good moral compass should have.

But when you go below the surface, the only way that the scammer is able to achieve success and actually launder their monies is to be in conspiracy with these other professionals.”

She welcomed plans by the government to introduce amendments to the Evidence Act, which would provide for video links to be used in court.

(Jamaica Observer)

has significant amount of work to do.

“If the Government and the supermarkets believe it should be a phased basis, we will support it as we can.” He said the removal of VAT was not a silver bullet that would save the nation from increased food prices. Saying price increases were a part of life, Mouttet added his association was not absolved from global conditions which ultimately affected the cost of food.

He said it was a misconception that when

VAT was lifted, the consumer would enjoy a 15 per cent reduction on the food bill.

“That is an inaccuracy. There are 60 to 70-odd basic food item groups (and) many different brands in those groups. “Extrapolate that figure up to 700 items that are currently VAT-free in the supermarket... so there will not be on November 15 or 16, a reduction of those items as a result of VAT and that is something we need to understand,” Mouttet said.

Consumers could expect an overall five per cent relief

on their grocery bills but that would greatly depend on the items they purchased, he added. Mouttet said there was also a misconception that VAT was compounded along the food chain.

Consumer items that carry no VAT at present include: • Unprocessed food • rice • flour • milk in any form, including processed and tinned milk • baby formulas and baby milk substitutes • margarine, fresh butter,

salted butter, ghee • bread • cheese and curd • corned beef • curry • peanut butter • tinned sardines, smoked herring, herring, tuna, mackerel • pasta • cane sugar, icing sugar • coffee • orange juice, orange drink, grapefruit juice, grapefruit drink • soya-bean oil, maize (corn) oil, sesame oil • cornflakes

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Kaieteur News

Friday November 09, 2012

China’s Hu says graft threatens state, party must stay in charge

Hu Jintao BEIJING (Reuters) President Hu Jintao warned China’s incoming leaders yesterday that corruption threatened the ruling Communist Party and the state, but said the party must stay in charge as it battles growing social unrest.

In a state-of-the-nation address to more than 2,000 hand-picked party delegates before he hands over power, Hu acknowledged that public anger over graft and issues like environmental degradation had undermined the party’s support and led to surging numbers of protests.

“Combating corruption and promoting political

integrity, which is a major political issue of great concern to the people, is a clear-cut and long-term political commitment of the party,” Hu said.

“If we fail to handle this issue well, it could prove fatal to the party, and even cause the collapse of the party and the fall of the state. We must thus make unremitting efforts to combat corruption.”

He promised political reform, but only to a degree, saying: “We will never copy a Western political system.”

“We will neither walk on the closed and rigid road, nor will we walk down the evil road of changing (our) flags and banners,” Hu said.

He also stressed the need to strengthen the armed forces and protect sea territory amid disputes with Japan and Southeast Asian nations.

Hu was opening a weeklong congress at Beijing’s Great Hall of the People that will usher in a once-in-adecade leadership change in the world’s second-largest economy.

Despite the high profile of the event and the focus on sensitive issues like reform and graft, the comments were

not considered unusual since they mainly reinforced existing ideas and themes. “It was a rather conservative report,” said Jin Zhong, the editor of Open Magazine, an independent Hong Kong publication that specializes in Chinese politics. “There’s nothing in there that suggests any breakthrough in political reforms.”

The run-up to the carefully choreographed meeting, at which Hu will hand over his post as party chief to anointed successor Vice President Xi Jinping, has been overshadowed by a corruption scandal involving one-time high-flying politician Bo Xilai.

The party has accused him of taking bribes and abusing his power to cover up his wife’s murder of a British businessman in the southwestern city of Chongqing, which he used to run. While Hu did not name Bo - a man once considered a contender for top office himself - he left little doubt about the target. “All those who violate party discipline and state laws, whoever they are and whatever power or official positions they have, must be brought to justice without mercy,” Hu told delegates, one of whom was

his predecessor, Jiang Zemin.

“Leading officials, especially high-ranking officials, must ... exercise strict self-discipline and strengthen education and supervision over their families and their staff; and they should never seek any privilege.”

The New York Times said last month that the family of Premier Wen Jiabao had accumulated at least $2.7 billion in “hidden riches”, a report China labeled a smear.

Hu entered the venue accompanied by Jiang, 86, signaling the former president still wields influence in the party and in the secretive deliberations to decide on the new leaders. As Hu delivered his speech under a massive, golden hammer and sickle, a healthy-looking Jiang sat flanked by senior members, party elders such as Li Peng and incoming leaders such as Xi. The congress ends on November 14, when the party’s new Standing Committee, at the apex of power, will be unveiled. Only Xi and his deputy Li Keqiang are certain to be on what is likely to be a seven-member committee, and about eight other candidates are vying for the other places. The congress also rubber-stamps

the selection of about two dozen people to the party’s Politburo, and approves scores of other appointments, including provincial chiefs and heads of some state-owned enterprises. “We must uphold the leadership of the party,” Hu said. He also named health care, housing, the environment, food and drug safety and public security as areas where problems had “increased markedly”.

The meeting is a chance for Hu to cement his legacy before retirement and ensure a smooth handover of power, and his prime-time speech was a chance to push his achievements and perhaps help steer a course going forward. While Hu promised “reforms to the political structure” and more encouragement of debate within the party, he gave no hint that China would allow broader popular participation.

“We should ... give full play to the strength of the socialist political system and draw on the political achievements of other societies. However, we will never copy a Western political system,” said Hu, who mentioned “socialism with Chinese characteristics”

no less than 78 times in his speech.

While Hu will step down as party leader, Xi will only take over state duties at the annual meeting of parliament in March.

Just weeks after antiJapan riots swept city streets following a row over disputed islands, Hu also said China should strengthen the armed forces, protect its maritime interests and be prepared for “local war” in the information age.

“We should enhance our capacity for exploiting marine resources, resolutely safeguard China’s maritime rights and interests and build China into a maritime power,” he said. China is also locked in dispute with Southeast Asian neighbours over areas of the South China Sea. Relations with the United States have been bogged down by accusations of military assertiveness in the region from both sides.

The government has tightened security in the run-up to the congress, even banning the flying of pigeons in the capital, and has either locked up or expelled dozens of dissidents.

Friday November 09, 2012

Kaieteur News

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Guatemala scours for quake survivors, death toll expected to rise

Women stand outside a house damaged.

REUTERS/Jorge Dan Lopez SAN MARCOS, Guatemala (Reuters) - Rescue workers yesterday carted out dead bodies found under rubble in the aftermath of Guatemala’s most powerful earthquake in decades, while others cleared wrecked cars and collapsed buildings as they searched for survivors.

At least 52 people were killed in the 7.5 magnitude quake on Wednesday, many of them crushed under debris in San Marcos state, a mountainous region near the Mexican border.

Nearly two dozen people were still missing and President Otto Perez forecast that the death toll would climb.

“Sadly we expect the number to keep rising,” Perez told reporters in Guatemala City, adding that 22 people were missing and around 200 injured.

Emergency workers said they pulled seven people alive

from rubble at a construction site on the outskirts of San Marcos city.

Lying in a hospital bed in obvious pain, Jesus Ramirez recounted how he tried to rescue his nieces and became trapped.

“My mother shouted to me to go and see my nieces ...

I wanted to pull them out, but couldn’t because the wall of my house fell on them and on me too,” he said. “I lost my leg, they amputated it.”

His mother and two nieces were later found dead.

On the outskirts of San Marcos city, rescuers stepped up efforts at a collapsed construction site.

Emergency workers in white hard hats used tractors and trucks to shift debris blocking roads. Cars were crushed, highways were peppered with gaping cracks and modest homes had crumbled.

“The people of San Marcos are in deep

Iranian warplanes fired on U.S. drone over Gulf: Pentagon WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Iranian warplanes fired at an unarmed U.S. drone in international airspace last week but did not hit the aircraft, the Pentagon said yesterday, an unprecedented incident that triggered a sharp warning to Tehran through diplomatic channels. The Pentagon said the November 1 intercept appeared to be the first time Tehran has fired at an unmanned American aircraft, in this case an MQ-1 “Predator.”

According to details provided by the Pentagon, two Iranian SU-25 “Frogfoot” aircraft intercepted the American drone at about 4:50 a.m. EDT (0850 GMT) as it conducted a routine, but classified, surveillance mission about 16 nautical miles off the Iranian coast.

Little said the aircraft fired multiple rounds at the Predator drone and followed it for at least several miles as it moved farther away from Iranian airspace.

“We believe that they fired at least twice and made at least two passes,” he said.

International airspace

begins after 12 nautical miles and Little stressed that at no point did the drone enter Iranian airspace.

The United States sent Iran a warning through diplomatic channels about the November 1 intercept, saying it would defend its military assets and would keep sending aircraft on such surveillance operations. “There is absolutely no precedence for this,” Little said.

“This is the first time that a (drone) has been fired upon to our knowledge by Iranian aircraft.”

The incident, which follows Iran’s recovery of a crashed CIA drone in its territory last year, was another reminder of how tensions between the United States and Iran could quickly escalate as the West tightens pressure on Tehran over its nuclear program.President Barack Obama has resisted calls from inside the United States and Israel for military action against Iran, focusing instead on crushing rounds of sanctions, which were tightened again on Thursday.

mourning,” said Wilfred de Leon, one of whose relatives was buried by rubble and feared dead.

The quake destroyed roads and forced evacuations as far away as Mexico City. However output and exports of staple crop coffee were not affected, Ricardo Villanueva, president of Guatemala’s national coffee association Anacafe, told Reuters.

Guatemala is Central America’s second biggest coffee producer.

It was the strongest earthquake to hit the Central American nation since 1976, when a 7.5-magnitude quake

killed more than 20,000 people.

Hundreds of people spent Wednesday night in shelters and help has poured in from afar afield as Taiwan, including 44 tonnes of humanitarian aid destined for San Marcos.

Perez flew to Quetzaltenango, the country’s second largest city, to survey nearby damage. He said nearly 3,000 people had been evacuated from their homes, while more than 1 million have been affected by the quake.

“Reconstruction will not be easy because there are homes that are

uninhabitable,” Perez said, adding that the government had set aside $60 million for rebuilding.

He announced a state of emergency in four of Guatemala’s 22 states - San Marcos, Quetzaltenango, Quiche and Huehuetenango.

“When the earth shook, we all left running,” said Policarpia Lopez, 55, housed in a shelter in the town of Laguna Cuaches, in nearby Quetzaltenango state. “Now we have nothing, not even water.”

Local Red Cross chief Carlos Enrique Alvarado said on Wednesday that 75 homes were destroyed in the city of

San Marcos alone.

Authorities said damage to the prison forced them to transfer 101 inmates to another jail.

Perez, who announced three days of national mourning, said he was suspending all vacation time for more than 25,000 members of the national police force, who are being enlisted in rescue and cleanup efforts.

The quake’s epicenter was 26 miles below the surface, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. It was felt in El Salvador and more than 760 miles away in Mexico City, where some people also fled offices and homes.

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Friday November 09, 2012

Friday November 09, 2012 ARIES (March 21 - April 19): If you can't see the finish line in the near distance, don't get frustrated -- turn around! There you will see it, miles behind you. ******************* TAURUS (April 20 - May 20): As clever as they may be, your words will have more power over you than usual today -- so take time to think before you speak. It's one thing to get caught up in an enthusiastic conversation and say something silly, but it is quite another thing to say something you will later regret. ****************** GEMINI (May 21 - June 20): Just like a traffic officer, you'll be in the middle of all the action today. Directing folks to where they need to go and helping create a general sense of order will be challenging, but it's a challenge you have been preparing yourself for, so don't worry. ******************** CANCER (June 21 July 22): A small drama today will be a turning point.

You're headed toward a major transition in your life, and you need to make the most of it. ********************* LEO (July 23 - Aug. 22): It's only natural that different perspectives create different opinions in people, so if you are at odds with a particularly obnoxious person today, keep in mind that their reality is just different than yours. ******************* VIRGO (Aug. 23 - Sept.

22): A new person, introduced to you recently by a friend or colleague, can help you make things happen.

Speed is a priority, so if you understand the possible connection right now, move forward immediately. ********************* LIBRA (Sept. 23 - Oct. 22): Slow down today -- it's not wise to exert yourself too much. There may be some tantalizing social invitations, but be very meticulous about which ones you choose to accept, because a quiet night out could snowball into a foggy morning. ********************* SCORPIO (Oct. 23 - Nov. 21): Tricks may be for kids, but you still have quite a few of them up your sleeve right now -- more than you may even realize. In this round of the game, what you do next can really influence how high the stakes go. ******************** SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22 - Dec. 21): There is a lot of wasted energy in your life right now, and that should be dealt with as soon as possible. .********************* CAPRICORN (Dec. 22 Jan. 19): If you have reached your boiling point with a particularly annoying person, today is the day you will find a reprieve from their boorish behavior. ******************** AQUARIUS (Jan. 20 Feb. 18): Having a strong vision is important for everyone -- it's not just for artists, filmmakers or poets. ********************* PISCE S ( F e b . 1 9 March 20): When you aim at your target today (any target), switch off your emotions. Doubt, fear -- even confidence -- must be pushed aside, or else you may miss your mark.

Friday November 09, 2012

Kaieteur News

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Kaieteur News

Friday November 09, 2012

2012 Neal and Massy Intermediate 50-Over Cricket Competition...

Joemal LaFleur’s 5 for 18 helps Bermine reach Semi-Final Former Guyana under-19 all-rounder, Joemal LaFleur, took 5 for 18 in 6.3 overs to help Bermine gain a spot in the semi-final of the inaugural Neal and Massy Intermediate 50-Over Cricket Competition in Berbice.

In the quarter-final played recently at the Blairmont Ground, Bermine managed to overpower West Berbice by 3 wickets in a tense lowscoring affair.

West Berbice, losing the toss and asked to take first strike, lost an early wicket, Quacy McPherson, falling to former Guyana under-15 pacer, Nial Smith, with only 7 runs on the board. However, former Berbice under-19 batsman, Raffel Estriado, and Devin Singh repaired the damage, keeping Smith and Guyana under-19 pacer, Romario Shepherd- DeJonge at bay. But after they put on a partnership of 45, the introduction of spin into the attack brought a change.

Firstly, Singh ran himself out for a painstaking 8 and then LaFleur, bowling off spin, clean bowled Estriado for 33

Joemal LaFleur and had former Berbice cricketer, Krishendat Ramoo caught for 0 to see West Berbice sump from 52 for 1 to 61 for 4.

With former Guyana under-19 captain, Eugene LaFleur, the elder brother of Joemal, getting into the act also and Joemal going on to pick up three more, West Berbice were never given the chance to recover and their innings ended at 82 for 9 in 22.3 overs with Murphy LaRose failing to show up.

Joemal LaFleur ended with 5 for 18 and Eugene LaFleur 2

for 14 from 3 overs.

When Bermine replied, they got a start of 30 from Joemal LaFleur and Aryton Adams, but the introduction of Ramoo, bowling off spin, brought out results, with LaFleur falling for 16.

Another Former Guyana youth cricketer, Jamally Odle, came in and he and Adams added another 32 to put Bermine in a seemingly sound position. But pacer, Alan Johnson, and Ramoo had other ideas and they both made runs very hard to come by.

Johnson picked up four consecutive wickets to have Bermine falling from 62 for 1 to be reeling at 66 for 5 with Adams going for 17 and Odle for 18. It soon became 71 for 7, but Eugene LaFleur used all of his experience to negotiate the bowling to guide Bermine to 83 for 7 off 21 overs with LaFleur still there with 8 not out and Chris Sulker 2 not out.

Bowling for West Berbice, Alan Johnson took 4 for 25 from 5 overs and Krishendat Ramoo 2 for 16 from 8 overs.

Storm halts world number one, McIlroy’s opening round (BBC Sport): Rory McIlroy’s opening round at the Singapore Open was yesterday cut short by a thunderstorm as Denmark’s Thomas Bjorn set the pace with a five-underpar 66.

The world number one, who is leading the United States’ PGA Tour money list, is attempting to emulate Luke Donald by also winning Europe’s Road to Dubai. The 23-yearold was leveled par after eight holes when play was halted with half of the 156-field on the course.

Last year’s tournament was cut to three rounds because of torrential rain. McIlroy needs a top-three finish in Singapore to win the European money list because his main challengers: second-placed Justin Rose and third-placed Branden Grace are not playing.

They will also miss next week’s event in Hong Kong where McIlroy will be the defending champ with only the seasonending DP World Tour Championship in Dubai to follow.

McIlroy, a Northern Irishman, who on the eve of the tournament defended his decision to miss last week’s WGC Champions event in China, so he could watch his girlfriend, tennis player Caroline Wozniacki, play in the Tournament of Champions in Bulgaria, opened with a bogey.

However, he birdied the fourth and fifth before dropping his second shot off the round at the par-three eighth, shortly before the sirens sounded to end play with dark clouds approaching. Bjorn, who started on the 10th, birdied his opening hole and three of his last six, with his only bogey coming on the parfour third.

He leads three players, including

Rory Mcllroy Singapore Open England’s Simon Khan, by one shot-Khan also holed six birdies but dropped shots on the 16th and 18th stopped him from sharing the lead. Fellow Englishman, Paul Casey, whose last three finishes have been third, fifth and sixth, continued his solid form with a threeunder 68.

The 78 players unable to post a score yesterday are scheduled to resume their opening rounds early today.

EUROPEAN TOUR 2012 MONEY LIST 1. Rory McIlroy (NI) - 2,813,962 Euros 2. Justin Rose (Eng) - 2,376,628 Euros 3. Branden Grace (SA) - 2,028,216 Euros 4. Francesco Molinari (Italy) - 1,778,944 Euros 5. Ernie Els (SA) - 1,756,971 Euros

Friday November 09, 2012

Kaieteur News

K&P Project Management Co. pledges support for Banks Beer Ko Cup

K&P Project Management Co. (a Civil Engineering Firm) through its recent munificence became the most recent addition of corporate entities to embrace the Georgetown Football Association (GFA)-organised Banks Beer Knockout Cup when Civil Engineer, Dwayne John acting on behalf of the Company, handed over $100,000 to Manager of the GDF team, Dwain Moses recently.

The presentation was done at the Company’s Head Office fellow employees

Page 33

Alicia Hoppie, Natasha Persaud, Melinda Franklyn and GFA’s Assistant Secretary Treasurer Charmine Wade, who represented the GFA. Moses in his remarks thanked the entity for its support for the tournament and promised a high standard of football over the duration of the competition.

The tournament carries prize monies in excess of $9million and is expected to last for eight playing days commencing on December 16 and concluding on January 1 with matches being played, at

the GCC and GFC grounds.

The winning team will receive $4Million, runner-up$2.5M, 3rd place-$1.5M and 4th place-$1M with outstanding individual performances to benefit from additional incentives.

The clubs confirmed for participation are Houston Stars, GFC, Riddim Squad, GDF, GPF, Fruta Conquerors, Camptown, Banks All Stars, Georgetown Masters, Nothern Rangers, Black Pearl, Flamingo, Beacon, Santos, University of Guyana and Charlestown United.

BCCDA 10/10 Presentation Ceremony to be held today

In photo, staff of KP Engineering, Alicia Hoppie, Charmine Wade (GFA Asst. Secretary), Natasha Persaud, Melinda Franklyn make the presentation to manager of the GDF Team, Dwain Moses.

The Presentation Ceremony for the third edition of the Berbice Chamber of Commerce and Development Association (BCCDA) Corporate Business in Sports (CBIS) InterAgency Softball Cricket Tournament, Fun Day and Exhibition games for corporate entities in Berbice will be held today at the Republic Bank Tennis Court from 5pm.

The winning GuySuco Cricket team, who won the 10/10 cricket competition, which was held at the Albion Sports Complex on October 27, will be awarded along with runners-up Neal and Massy, while other outstanding teams GPL and Demerara Bank are also expected to be recognised along with all the other

participating teams.

Several outstanding individual performers will also be honoured. The Berbice Titans Cricket Team that won the feature 20/20 cricket match is also expected among those receiving awards. At the ceremony, West Indies player, Assad Fudadin and West Indies selectee, Veerasammy Permaul will be honoured.

Also scheduled to be among the awardees are the respective winners of the gate prizes that were on offer, including the winner of the Motorcycle and Cell phones. In all 14 entities participated in the 10/10 cricket competition, which was played under the theme: Unity and Better Relationships.

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Kaieteur News

Friday November 09, 2012

Howard says Kobe should ‘chill-out’ - Lakers continue to struggle early L.A. fell to 1-12 with their preseason record included.

“A lot of the guys look at me and Kobe and they feed off us, so we have to do a better job of keeping our frustrations on the inside and just playing through it so our teammates won’t get down on themselves. So, we just got to do a better job at that” Howard continued.

“I know [Kobe] was a little frustrated tonight. He wants to win just as bad as all of us do, but we just got to stay together, remember it’s a process, and stay focused,” he added.

‘Chill-out Kobe’

(NBA.com): One of the subplots of the Los Angeles Lakers’ acquisition of Dwight Howard was the contrast in personalities between the Lakers’ two biggest stars.

Howard is somewhat of a goofball, easy-going and known to smile on the court.

Kobe Bryant is the exact opposite. The Lakers are as talented as any team in the league, but we weren’t quite sure how it would all come together, both on the floor

and in the locker room.

The Lakers are now 1-4 after Wednesday’s 95-86 loss to Utah; Bryant, expectedly, is ticked. Howard isn’t, as Dave McMenamin of ESPN Los Angeles wrote.

Bryant’s frustration was apparent long before his final exit: He got into it with referee Ed Malloy after being called for a charge in the second quarter; he punched the ball inbounds rather than passed it when there was less than a

second left in the third quarter; and he was caught on camera staring down coach Mike Brown when he was sitting on the bench during a timeout in the waning moments of the fourth.

Howard said after the game the Lakers would be better off bottling up those negative emotions.

“I think sometimes as a team we got to be able to not really show our frustrations that much,” Howard said after

There’s nothing here to suggest that there’s a problem between Bryant and Howard.

But it’s a situation that’s worth keeping an eye on, especially if the Lakers continue to struggle. There’s no easy diagnosis for L.A.’s problems at this point. In previous losses, defense was the problem. But on Wednesday, they couldn’t score against a Utah team that isn’t so great defensively.

We do know that the bench is an issue, as evidenced by the team’s cumulative plus-minus

numbers. The four guys who have started every game— Bryant, Howard, Pau Gasol and Metta World Peace—are a plus-39 together in 124 minutes, strong on both ends of the floor (though those numbers are a bit skewed by Sunday’s blowout of the Pistons).

It would certainly help if Steve Nash was healthy.

Nash not only has the skills to get the offense going, but he has the temperament to provide a bridge between Bryant’s intensity and Howard’s nonchalance.

Banks DIH Inter-Department Football Final set for today

The Banks DIH Inter-Department Football final will be played today at Thirst Park. Sales Department will square off with Distribution Warehouse in the final starting at 7pm under floodlights.

Sales line up will include David Hunte, Ike Garraway, Seon Richards, and John Smartt, while Distribution will have in their lineup Quacy Alleyne, Devon Carter, Devon David and Dexter Layne.

Before the final, Special Events will clash

with Stores in the third place playoff.

Seon McKenzie of Special Events is the leading goal scorer with seven goals followed

by Devon Forde of Sales with five goals, Philip Rowley of Stores with four goals and Seon Richards of Sales with three.

Meanwhile, the final of the Michael Perreira Inter-Department Dominoes will also be played this evening. The competing teams are Maintenance Workshop, Banks Ladies and Stores ‘B’. Double Six time is 6pm.

Friday November 09, 2012

Kaieteur News

Berbice Cricket Board launches Universal DVD 20/20 Tournament The Berbice Cricket Board on Thursday launched its 21st Tournament for 2012 with the official unveiling of the Universal DVD 20/20 first division competition in the ancient county. Twelve teams - Bush Lot United Rising Star, Cotton Tree Die Hard, West Berbice, Blairmont Community Centre, Police, Bermine, Young Warriors, Edinburgh, Albion Community Centre, Rose Hall Town Gizmos & Gadgets, Port Mourant Karibee Rice and Skeldon Community Centre would be divided into two groups of six teams. The top two teams from each group would advance to the semifinals.Chairman of the Berbice Cricket Board Special Events Committee Hilbert Foster at the launching ceremony, stated that Berbice Cricket was enjoying a remarkable period on the cricket field with tournaments being played at all levels on a scale that is unmatched in the history of the game in Berbice. He expressed gratitude to the Management of Universal DVD and Universal Solutions for its continued investment in Berbice Cricket.

Foster stated that the tournament is expected to be of the highest standard as all the county’s senior players like Assad Fudadin, Royston Crandon, Narsingh Deonarine, Veerasammy Permaul, Gajanand Singh, Brendon Bess and Devendra Bishoo would be part of the tournament.

Chairman of the Berbice Cricket Board Competitions Committee, Carl Moore, expressed the view that the tournament would allow the senior players to properly prepare for the upcoming WICB Regional Tournament in early 2013. Moore expressed confidence that the 20/20 tournament would be successful as the first edition which was held in 2011.

Representative of Universal DVD and Universal solutions Ashwin Carpen expressed his Company’s pleasure at being once again associated with the Berbice Cricket Board as it was without doubt the leading Cricket Board in the Caribbean. He called on the twelve clubs to play the game in its traditional way of commitment and discipline.

BK International sponsors uniforms for Guyana women’s...

From page 36 been a long-time sponsor of various sport disciplines, but this is its first relationship with hockey and Manager of the Guyana women’s hockey team, Rawl Davson who was on-hand at the presentation indicated his pleasure at the timing of this support.

The women’s hockey team has been making great strides in recent years and improving at every outing until their current position as one of the teams challenging for one of the three coveted spots in the World League’s second round.

The World League is a new global competition comprising of four rounds where teams qualify firstly out of their region and can go all the way to the Hockey World Cup being held in June 2014 in The Hague, Netherlands.

Office Manager of BK International, Mr. Bazilio, indicated that the company is pleased to be a sponsor of the

women’s national hockey team and gave words of encouragement for the girls to give their best effort to make Guyana proud.

After a busy 2011 where they unexpectedly qualified for the PAHF Cup in Argentina in 2013, the team resumed training in April 2012 with their eyes set on the World League and qualifying to the second round.

The women’s competition will feature top seeded Canada, ranked 23 in the world, Trinidad 27, Barbados 41, Uruguay 50, Guyana 58 and Venezuela also ranked 58.

G u y a n a ’s opening match will see them face off against CAC Champions and hosts, Trinidad on November 11th and will play each of the other teams once in a race towards a top-three finish.

The team departed Guyana this morning (Friday 9th) and is expected to complete the tournament on Saturday November 17th.

Ashwin Carpen of Universal DVD hands over sponsorship to BCB

Page 35

Page 36

Kaieteur News

Friday November 09, 2012

Mayor’s Birthday Inter-Ward football BK International sponsors uniforms to light up Den Amstel on Diwali Night for Guyana women’s hockey team Teams are ready to contest the Mayor Hamilton Green’s Birthday 7-a-side Inter-Ward football tournament starting next Tuesday, November 13, Diwali Night, at the Den Amstel Ground at 5:00pm.

The two day event will conclude on Sunday November 18 at the Georgetown Football Club (GFC) Ground with the playoff games, quarterfinals, semifinals and final.

The opening night will see Bourda vs Grove, Kuru Kururu vs East Ruimveldt, Wales vs Eve Leary, Bagotville vs Thomas Lands, Goed Fortuin (Beavers) vs Mocha, Sara Lodge (Eagles) vs Tiger Bay, Plastic City (Jetty) vs North East La Penitence, Crane (Seawall) vs Kingston, Pouderoyen (Young Achievers) vs Kitty, Stewartville vs Alberttown, Uitvlugt vs Sophia and Den Amstel vs Newtown Kitty.

Action on the final playing day commences from 4pm at the GFC. Attractive cash prizes are on offer. The winner collects $200,000,

Hamilton Green runner-up $100,000.

The games are 20 minutes duration, 10 minute halves, and there will be no offside in this format.

Three substitutions will be allowed during the match. If a match is tied after fulltime then sudden death penalties will be used to determine the winner.

These are some of the rules governing this mode of the game ensuring entertainment for the fans.

This tournament is in observance of Mayor Hamilton Green birthday,

which is today November 9, he is 78 years today. The Mayor’s birthday football tournament started in 1981 by a gathering of friends headed

by Former National player and Coach Lennox Arthur for the then Prime Minister. The event was a success and evolved into the Mayor’s Cup Tournament in 1995 after he became Mayor of Georgetown.

The winners over the years included Thomas United, Victoria Kings, Pele, Conquerors, GDF, Camptown, Western Tigers and Alpha United.

Representative Mayor All Star teams have toured Suriname, Barbados and Cuba over the years.

Among the sponsors lending assistance to the tournament this year are: MACORP, New Thriving, Busta, Nazar Mohamed, Eddie Grant, Chris Fernandes, Patrick ‘Labba’ Barton, Dr. Colin Watson, Col. Larry London, Tent City, Courtney Benn, BK International, General Equipment and Muneshwar’s.

Office Manager of BK International Mr. Bazilio hands over one set of uniforms to Team Manager, Rawl Davson in the presence of national players Gabriella Xavier and Avonda James.

On the eve of the newly created Hockey World League, the Guyana National

Women’s Hockey Team recently benefitted from uniform sponsorship from BK

International.

The construction giants have (Continued on page 35)

Friday November 09, 2012

Kaieteur News

Page 37

IAAF ratifies World Records: MEN Senior 800m: 1:40.91 David Lekuta Rudisha KEN, London, GBR, 9 Aug 12 Previous: 1:41.01 David Lekuta Rudisha KEN, Rieti, ITA, 29 Aug 10 MEN 4x100m: 36.84 Jamaica, London, GBR, 11 Aug 12 (Nesta Carter; Michael Frater; Yohan Blake; Usain Bolt) Previous: 37.04 Jamaica, Daegu, KOR, 4 Sep 11 WOMEN Senior 4x100m: 40.82 United States of America, London, GBR, 10 Aug 12 (Tianna Madison; Allyson Felix; Bianca Knight; Carmelita Jeter) Previous: 41.37 German Democratic Republic, Canberra, AUS, 6 Oct 85 20km Race Walk: 1:25:02 Elena Lashmanova RUS, London, GBR, 11 Aug 12 Previous: 1:25:08 Vera Sokolova RUS, Sochi, RUS, 26 Feb 11 MEN Junior 800m: 1:41.73 Nijel Amos (94) BOT, London, GBR, 9 Aug 12 Previous: 1:42.69 Abubaker Kaki (89) SUD, Oslo, NOR, 6 Jun 08

David Lekuta Rudisha (Getty Images).

Ministry of Tourism among sponsors...

From page 38 have been carded for the day and already over 50 horses have been entered for the big meet.

The feature event for B class horses has an encouraging $1M winner’s money at stake with close to $2M in prize money available overall with the distance being 1700M. The prize money for the 3yrs old race for West Indies Bred horses stands at $400,000 and trophy with the distance being 1600M. The E and lower race winning prize is $350,000 and trophy over 1500M. The winner in the race for the West Indies Bred two year old animals will collect $350,000 and trophy over 1200M. The other events are the G and lower matchup for a pole position reward of $250,000 and trophy also over 1200M. The H and Lower gallop will see the animals competing over 1100M for a winning take of $200,000.

The winner of the ‘I2’ event will take home $150,000 and trophy in the 1200M race. The final race for the day is for animals classified J&K (Division 1 and 2,) over 1200M with a purse of $150,000 on offer.

Some of the horses already on the card are The Message, California Strike, Mission King, Who So Ever, Marathon Man, War Craft, Traditional man; The Score Is Even, Savion, Swing East, Celebration Time, The

Bailiff, Doughnut Prince, Te c h n o l o g y, N i g h t Crescendo, Storm In a Tea Cup, Damascus Dream, B r i d a l S t o n e C o r n e r, Majestic, Third World, Windy war, Work Force, Miss Orientate, Celebration Love, Irish Gel, Fairy Landing, Dream Girl, Joyful Victory, Face The Fire, Settle in Seattle, Rock Sonna, Mona Lisa, Silent Night, The Gump, Reina Del café, Hard Runnings, Face the Heat, Royal Time, Funny Side, Ameera Joy, Wicked Intention, Windy Killer, Stormy Lass, Intriguing Account, and Pixie Fire, Party Time, Try Again, The Gap, Bounty Flyer, Silver Kid, Sky and R.J Express are among the early entrants.

Race time is 13:00 hrs.

Outstanding individual performers including top Jockey, trainer and stable will be presented with accolades compliments of the Trophy Stall, Bourda Market and the Ryan Crawford Memorial Turf Club. Interested persons and horse owners can make contact with the club’s office at Number 13, Hermitage East Coast Berbice (#19 Road). Bobby Vaughn can be contacted on telephone number 624-6788 or Larissa Mohabir on numbers 3330290 and 333-0301, and Dr. D w i g h t Wa l r o n d o n Telephone numbers 6230100 or 220-6557.

Entries closed this Sunday, November 11 at the Club Office.

(Samuel Whyte)

Page 38

Kaieteur News

Friday November 09, 2012

Ministry of Tourism among sponsors for Federer through RCMTC&SF/Banks DIH Horserace Classic to semis at ATP - Shariff, Simply Royal Racing stables, Ashmins Trading also on board World A Tour

s race day gets closer a bevy of sponsors have come on board to join hands with the Ryan Crawford Memorial Turf Club and Sports Facilities (RCMTC&SF) for the final leg of its Banks DIH Classic Horserace Meet, which is slated for Sunday November 18 at the Club’s track at Alness Corentyne, Berbice. Headlining the list of new sponsors are the Ministry of Trade and Tourism through the Guyana Tourism Authority.

With this being tourism month, the Guyana Tourism Authority, as part of its tourism drive, has come on board with sponsorship to broaden its spectrum in Sports Tourism. Also

jumping on board are Mohammed “Nankoo” Shariff, General Construction Limited and Racing Stables, Ashmins Trading, Dennis DeRoop and Simply Royal Racing Stable, Delmur Shipping Company, Innovative Construction Company, Yunas Construction and Racing stables, Net Surf Internet Café and Businessman Hookumchand and family.

They join other sponsors already on board that includes; Banks DIH Limited, Jumbo Jet Auto Sales, Trophy Stall, Bourda Market and Digicel.

Close to $7M in cash, trophies are at stake. Eight races (Continued on page 37)

Roger Federer ATP World Tour

(

BBC Sport): Roger Federer became the first man to qualify for the semi-finals of the ATP World Tour Finals yesterday with victory over David Ferrer. The six-time champion ensured he will not have to rely on other results with a 6-4 7-6 (7-5) win.

Federer has had two straight-sets wins and plays Juan Martin del Potro in his last Group B match tomorrow. Del Potro took on Janko Tipsarevic in the second singles match yesterday.

“I thought the match was great, good intensity,” Federer said, adding “I definitely needed a good second serve, especially in the first set. I didn’t have that many serves in play the way I wanted to -either the rhythm was off a bit or I wasn’t pushing enough with the legs, or whatever it might have been.

Asked about his feelings about the ATP World Tour Finals staying at the O2 Arena until 2015, he added: “I’ve loved everywhere I’ve played over the years at the World Tour Finals, but I think this one is obviously special, because it’s in London and the O2 is an amazing venue”.

Federer, winner of this tournament for the last two years, has made typically serene progress at the O2 Arena and, despite Ferrer’s recent winning streak of 11 matches, a head-to-head

record of 0-13 suggested he was always likely to struggle against the Swiss star.

The Spaniard needed every opportunity that came his way, but failed to capitalise with Federer offering up unforced errors and numerous second serves in the opening stages.

After breaking serve at the first opportunity, Federer faced seven break points across three games before a backhand flew long to let Ferrer back into the set at 33. The fourth seed was scrapping hard to stay in touch but Federer has shown he has an extra gear in their previous meetings, and he found it once again.

A brilliant flurry of forehands saw the Swiss accelerate past Ferrer with a love break in game 10 that secured the set, and the 17time Grand Slam champion steadily improved his game from then on. A first-serve percentage that had slumped as low as 34% in the first set hit the mid-60s in the second, helping to fend off two more break points as Ferrer battled to keep his winning streak going.

It came down to a tiebreak-only the second b e t w e e n t h e p a i r- a n d Federer’s now functioning serve proved the dominant shot as he converted his third match point after one hour and 48 minutes. Ferrer was left to rue nine missed break points, saying: “I had a lot of chances to break his serve. I couldn’t do it.”

Friday November 09, 2012

Kaieteur News

Page 39

Narine ready H2O Boy stages U-16 tournament tomorrow to rise to the challenge Four football teams, Kayo’s Football Academy, Eagles United FC, TOP XX FC and Netrockers FC are scheduled to compete when the H2O Boy stage a youth U-16 quadrangular tournament at the Linden Technical Institute (LTI) tomorrow at 9am.

Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of H2O Boy, Bernard Couchman, revealed that the tournament forms a part of a project that creates a conduit for young people with lots of idle time to utilize that time engaged in productive activity.

Couchman further said that another objective of this community development project is to show that the Linden community is a safe environment following the month of unrest last July. He said that the project had its genesis in 2011 when the organisers conducted activities in Mexico. He also said that his organization will be giving out football gears to all members of the participating teams including footballs,

Sunil Narine trains, Mirpur, November 7, 2012 (Bangladesh Cricket Board).

DHAKA, Bangladesh – Sunil Narine said there was little mystery about how to achieve success for West Indies in their upcoming two-Test series against hosts Bangladesh.

T h e o ff - s p i n n e r i s expected to be a trump card in West Indies captain Darren Sammy’s arsenal during the series, particularly on surfaces that could favour spin bowling.

Narine has made a name for himself in the shorter versions of the game, helping West Indies to win the ICC World Twenty20 Tournament last month in similar conditions in Sri Lanka.

He said his was a simple task and there were simple basics he had to apply to reap success against the Bangladeshis in the longer version of the game.

“I think it is just the mindset that you adopt and the way you go about what you are doing – just concentrate on the areas where you bowl,” he told reporters on Thursday following a training session on the nursery ground of the Sher-e-Bangla Stadium here.

“I think you have to be far more consistent and have a lot more patience. Every game I take it as a new game.

I think I will approach [the upcoming Tests] it the way I approached the last games we played [against New Zealand], so I just have to concentrate and do what I am accustomed doing. “ We h a v e b e e n practising for the last two days and I already have a mindset, and I know what I am capable of doing, so it is just to deliver the goods for West Indies.”

There have been suggestions that the Sher-eBangla Stadium pitch was

favourable to fast bowling during two recent domestic, first-class matches played there.

Narine said he was not concerned about pitch conditions, since the onus was always bowlers to adapt to whatever kind of surfaces they encounter.

“There’s no type of pitch I prefer,” he said. “I just have to concentrate on the areas in which I am bowling, continue working hard on my game, and focus on what my job is to do.

“Any spinner would love to have some kind of assistance from the pitch, but if there is none, you always have to try and do something different. . .I have not set any goals, but I just have to give it my all.”

West Indies continued their preparations for the series yesterday afternoon with a full practice session.

The visitors were due to start a two-day, tour match against a Bangladesh Cricket Board XI today. It was originally scheduled to be played over three days from yesterday.

But the BCB announced that the contest has been shelved due to unplayable conditions at the BKSP Ground in Savar, a town about 25 miles north of the Bangladesh capital of Dhaka.

This followed an inspection of the venue by BCB and West Indies management officials, including Head Coach Ottis Gibson, early in the day, following steady rain over the last week in the country.

West Indies will now use the additional time to get extra practice sessions ahead of the first Test.

This is West Indies’ third full tour of Bangladesh, following trips in 2002 and last year.

jerseys, shorts and hoses.

H2O Boy is a marketing company registered in Canada, owned by a group of Guyanese, and specializes in environmentally friendly and socially conscious products and services. Mr. Couchman said that his organization is currently organizing and running similar activities in developing communities globally, with an aim of creating a conduit to professional sports for the youths and to keep them away from crime and the ills of society.

These events are promoted under the pseudonym ‘La Fe (Spanish for ‘The Faith’) and local activities will be streamed live to a global audience directly from Mackenzie, Linden.

Additionally, the footage from this tournament will be combined with the footage from La Fe Mexico, to create a proposal to present to FIFA and the UN to Partner with H2O Boy for future growth.

t r o Sp Ali expects to win, despite Little graduating to higher class mystery, much Australia vs South Africa, first Test, Brisbane...

anticipation

Roshan Ali

H

is graduation f r o m t h e R o o k i e s Category was never in doubt after dominating the division for almost five years, capturing the Championship Driver

honor on each occasion in the process, and even though he has now stepped up in a higher class, Roshan Ali said he will pose a formidable challenge to anyone.

So confident is he that he is predicting good results on

Sunday when the final leg of the Caribbean ‘Race of Champions’ Meet is staged at the South Dakota Circuit.

Ali will be competing in the Group 2A and B categories and is expected to pilot two cars, a Toyota

Levin which he will use in the Group 2A and the fast and relaible Toyota Starlet in the Group 2B. Driving under Team Fullworks banner, Ali disclosed that all two machines are in fine mettle and he is rearing to get on the track and showcase his skills in front of what is anticipated Michael Clarke and Graeme Smith with the to be a sell out crowd.

ICC Test Championship mace ahead of the first “Everything in place, the Test in Brisbane © Getty Images copy. cars are working excellent o Australia has a dossier on the South Africa team. and we are looking to So what? One of the trends of 21st Century dominate as we have done in international cricket is that battles between nations the past,” a confident Ali now contain so few elements of the unknown. It should not be said.

Ali, whowas speaking forgotten that these two sides played each other over a pair of from his Fullworks Motor uproarious Test matches only a year ago in Cape Town and Spares and Auto Sales Johannesburg, the series shared 1-1.

Between then and now Australian and South African location at Good Hope, East Coast Demerara, said his players have shared dressing rooms at the IPL and the t e a m o f m e c h a n i c s , Champions League, opposed each other again at the World including himself, Shiraz Twenty20 and tried to prepare as best as they can for a Test Roshandin, Kassim, Naresh series with only one warm-up fixture in most cases.

But the lack of secrets to be divulged ahead of the first Test Ramkellawan and Asad Ali, has worked tirelessly over does not detract from the prospect of another meeting between the past weeks to get the two teams to have produced some of the most memorable Test machines in prime condition encounters of recent times.

South Africa’s first visit to the Gabba in 49 years offers the for the races.

The usually reserved prospect of plenty that is hair-raising, mainly for batsmen up driver thanked his team and against six of the world’s best fast bowlers, but spectators too. staff for the support over the Graeme Smith’s side is settled and well grooved, their XI set in past weeks in helping near enough to stone from the moment their plane touched p r e p a r e t h e c a r s a n d down in Sydney last week.

Smith himself is fired up by the desire to ensure South promised them that he will preserve his status as a Africa’s hold on the ICC’s top spot is not as fleeting this time champion despite competing around as it had been in 2009.

Australia, meanwhile, seek further proof of their in the two divsions for the rejuvenation. The Test team has not played together since first time.

According to him, both April, and they may be forgiven for blinking just as much as c a t e g o r i e s w i l l b e the rest of the world at the fact they have the chance to unseat competitive, citing the likes South Africa from their perch atop the rankings.

The fact they have a chance of doing so is the best indicator of Suriname’s Oliver TjinL i e p - S h i e , S h i r a z of how far the team has developed under Michael Clarke’s Roshandinsaid he expects captaincy since the 2011 tour of Sri Lanka, as over that period b o t h G r o u p s t o b e the team has won three series, drawn two and shown the competitive, but is confident importance of incisive bowling to cover for a top six that on that his preparation and the paper cannot match South Africa’s.

Line these two sides up and the visitors look to have a clear condition of the vehicles will give him the edge over his advantage. But contests between these teams have never been decided that way. rivals.

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