Sitting under a tree in Woodford Square, Port-of-Spain, secretary of Fisherman and Friends of the Sea (FFOS) Gary Aboud made a tearful plea to Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar to mediate with the Highway Re-Route Movement (HRM), insisting that its leader Dr Wayne Kublalsingh will die at anytime. He also urged citizens to come out in their numbers to the square at 11.30 am tomorrow to support good governance.

Surrounded by a handful of supporters Aboud, who is recovering from Chik V and openly cried, said: “We are issuing an SOS to all citizens who are in favour of humane governance, who are in favour of prime ministers with conscience, who are in favour of integrity and good public administration, who believe that the Prime Minister has the key to the solution to save Dr Kublalsingh’s life... all people against all the bad things in the country come to Woodford Square.”

Aboud, who recently visited Kublalsingh at his home at D’Abadie, said he was saddened at the environmentalist’s deteriorated state. He said should Kublalsingh die that would be a stain on every right thinking citizen because Kublalsingh had lived a “pure life” and neither his integrity nor his goodwill could be questioned. “He has saved this country a colossal waste that the last government would have caused with the threat of building five aluminium smelters and he as saved the Claxton Bay fisherfolk.

“Madam Prime Minister too many questions are being raised and all of the answers are in your lap. As our leader you have the key to the solution,” Aboud said. He said Kublalsingh must not be allowed to die and his requests “may or may not be reasonable” but the answer is mediation. “Many religious and independent bodies are looking at this matter and cannot understand where are you. We ask that you come to meet with him and discuss the solution.

“If Dr Kublalsingh does not make it... his impending death must not be permitted under your guided hand.” He said no “amount of advertisements in the newspaper” would relinquish Persad-Bissessar’s responsibility in finding a solution to this matter.

No charges are to be laid against the doctor who failed to report to police he had removed cocaine pellets from a patient's stomach during an emergency procedure late last year at a private hospital. So said acting Police Commissioner Stephen Williams yesterday during the weekly media briefing at the Police Administration Building, Port-of-Spain.

Saying the matter had been “thoroughly investigated over several months, Williams said the decision was made on advice from the deputy Director of Public Prosecutions Kathy Ann Waterman-Latchoo. He said during the investigation, several people were interviewed, including the doctor, patient, nurses and other hospital personnel and records also were collected from the private hospital.

“However,” he said, "there is no evidence at this point in time which can be used to pursue prosecution against the surgeon or the patient.” But Williams said the police were continuing to “explore investigations.” The investigation was launched after an article published in a daily newspaper in January gave details of the emergency procedure which was allegedly done in December 2013.

At the time, police questioned the circumstances and legality of the procedure, as well as the doctor's failure to report the removal of the illegal drug. The patient, 34, from Arouca, reportedly swallowed 20 cocaine pellets in a bid to smuggle the narcotic. He was later taken for medical attention after he began complaining of stomach pains and bowel obstruction.

On December 21, 2013, he had a laparotomy, a surgical incision into the abdomen, and the drugs were removed during a three-hour operation at the hospital. The man remained warded there until December 30, 2013 when he was transferred to the Eric Williams Medical Sciences Complex, Mt Hope.

Missing Mason Hall Secondary School student Shenel Forbes returned home on Tuesday night. Forbes, 14, a Form Two student, said she was at a friend’s house. She was reported missing since Monday afternoon. Forbes left her Darrell Spring home at 6.23 am for school but never arrived there. But her schoolmate Shulease De Gale, 12, who went missing last Monday, still has not been found. 

Anyone with information on De Gale can call 341-2595, 631-0606 or the Old Grange police at 639-8888.

The nude body of a man found floating at Cap-de-Ville beach on Sunday has been identified as psychiatric patient Kevin John. Police said John, 29, of Baptiste Road, Point Fortin, was identified by his fingerprints yesterday. It was confirmed by his mother, Margaret John-Springlers, who told police he was an outpatient of the Psychiatric Ward of the San Fernando General Hospital.

Police said there was no missing person’s report for John as they were told it was customary for him to wander off and come back after weeks. A preliminary examination of the body could not suggest a cause of death and police will have to await an autopsy today.

Six illegal guns were seized by police during two anti-crime exercises in west and central Trinidad between Tuesday night and yesterday morning. Five of the weapons along with a quantity of ammunition and illegal drugs were recovered as Western Division police, led by Senior Supt Ishmael David, searched several homes in Petit Valley early yesterday morning. Police said they found a 9mm Glock pistol, three kilos of cocaine and a quantity of marijuana at a house at Hibiscus Drive, Petit Valley.

At Cameron Hill, Petit Valley, police said they found two home-made shotguns and a .38 revolver hidden in a house. Less than an hour later, a fifth gun and two pistol magazines were seized at a house at Pioneer Drive, Petit Valley. No arrests were made during the raids but investigators said arrest warrants are expected to be issued for the owners of the respective properties.

The guns were taken for forensic testing to determine if they had been used in recent shootings in west Trinidad. In a separate exercise, around 6.30 pm on Tuesday, officers of the Central Division Task Force were on patrol at Union Village, Felicity, when they stopped two men travelling in a white Nissan Bluebird Sylphy. A loaded 9 mm pistol with 15 rounds of ammunition was found in the trunk, police said.

The two suspects are expected to go on several identification parades before they are charged for possession of an illegal gun later this week. Cpls Persad and Bassant and PC Baksh were involved in the exercise. 

UNC deputy leader Dr Roodal Moonilal has challenged PNM leader Dr Keith Rowley to say who paid for his overseas trips this year, claiming there were 15 trips and he has information on that. He made the call yesterday after PNM general secretary Ashton Ford said the UNC must be asked when it was having internal elections and if it held executive meetings, instead of calling for the PNM to say who paid for its convention at the Hyatt. 

Ford responded after Moonilal said the PNM, as an alternative government, should, in the interest of transparency, say who paid for the Hyatt for its convention last weekend. Moonilal claimed the Government was aware a prominent businessman did so and wanted five ministerial appointments in return. This drew several PNM protestations, including Ford’s, but PNMites declined to say who paid for the Hyatt venue.

Yesterday UNC chairman Kadijah Ameen said the PNM should see to its own lingering issues after its May internal election, instead of “hounding” the UNC about internal polls, since the UNC’s executive, constituency and women’s arm elections were held on time. She said the only UNC election outstanding was for party leader and currently there was no challenge to Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar’s leadership. 

There could be no rush to that election, she said, as the UNC’s constitutional reform process had to be completed first because its proposals were critical to positioning UNC for the present political climate Moonilal claimed: “I will like Dr Rowley to say who paid for his 15 trips overseas this year, which he has not denied, and if he won’t say, I am prepared to say who has been paying. 

“My information is he has sold out the Opposition which is now controlled by a single financier who is demanding more than his pound of flesh. “This is why PNM meetings for the big guns of the party won’t be held at Balisier House.” 

He added: “I found PNM chairman Franklin Khan’s view that the Hyatt was best for their meeting, as it was an ‘intellectual one,’ quite shocking and insulting to the memory of PNM founder Dr Eric Williams and former leader Patrick Manning, who held many intellectual symposia at PNM’s Balisier House and the Chaguaramas Convention Centre.” Moonilal said the PNM’s action showed it viewed Balisier House as “for the plebs.” 

He added: “They will also be putting their members in the hot Queen’s Park Savannah for the next convention leg but they think the air-conditioned Hyatt is for intellectuals.” 

Peter Minshall 

I give you Gandhi and I give you Selwyn, Ralph and Raoul, and I give you Wayne, all in the same breath. “Many people, especially ignorant people, want to punish you for speaking the truth, for being correct, for being you. Never apologise for being correct, or for being years ahead of your time. If you’re right and you know it, speak your mind. Even if you are a minority of one, the truth is still the truth.”  Gandhi.

Mr Ryan, you were incorrect to state that I was equating Wayne with Gandhi in my original use of this quotation from the great Mahatma. I have an anathema to the deification of any man. I myself, from long practice, have learned well how to duck the word “genius” whenever it’s tossed at me. We all put our pants on one leg at a time. I am too well acquainted with the terror of a blank sheet of paper when a pencil is poised in my hand to make a mark upon it. This has to do with integrity.

Gandhi was the breath that I gave you, his breath, his own words, which precisely describes Dr Kublalsingh in the current state of punishment and siege that he endures. Gandhi gave you Wayne, not I. Nor did I equate Wayne with Gandhi. Nor am I equating you and your colleagues with Gandhi, in the same quote, repeated above, in the same breath.

You are merely three of “many people, especially ignorant people,” to whom Gandhi refers, who would punish and prey upon Wayne, he being the singular and lonely voice of one, the “minority of one” to which Gandhi also refers, the voice of truth.

I am astonished at the extraordinary coincidence of the three of you in chorus coming down in meticulous pickiness upon the character and integrity of the solitary Kublalsingh. What crime has Wayne Kublalsingh committed? What has he done that he should be publicly tried and harangued and picked to pieces by three such good wise men as you? Unless of course, you be mice, not men. What is your obsession with him, the man, the person? 

The man is simply a messenger. His message is that a great wrong is being perpetrated by the people’s representatives, which involves the people’s money, their land and homes, and their mobility. I have suggested, by referencing the wise words of Gandhi, that Kublalsingh is right, and that he knows it, and that, as a consequence, he must speak his mind. Even if he is a minority of one, the truth is still the truth.

Why don’t you examine the message, seek to question or confirm that truth, rather than harangue the messenger? Mr Pantin, why are you so credulous about the claims in the paid advertisement, and so sceptical of Kublalsingh? Surely your long experience of life has taught you that it is those with power, those who have money and seek more, who are more likely to distort the truth.

A hunger strike has always been, historically, the last resort of the powerless. When those in power hold all the cards, when the law is toothless and its processes are in the interests of the powerful, when the cause is just and the recourses are few to non-existent, only then will the extraordinarily committed choose to starve himself in protest.

Gentlemen, why isn’t your attention focused on that message? Kublalsingh’s work was done with the first hunger strike. It is you who have not done your work since then.

Look at you. I’ve known you gentlemen all my life. At various moments in our history you have been perceptive, analytically astute, and courageous, on the side of truth. Mr Maraj’s summation of the first hunger strike is deeply moving. But it seems of late you have fallen prey to our society’s compulsion to focus on personality at the expense of substance. Now more than ever it is the substance that must be explored. 

Yet now I might satirically liken you to a trio of little old ladies knitting away, clickety-clack, knit one, pearl two, peering through the jalousies, eyes glistening, beady, hungry, squinting to see what’s happening over in the neighbour’s yard to salivate and gossip about, while meantime the whole town is burning down behind you.

Well, gentlemen, neighbour Kublalsingh has done his utmost.  It’s time for you to do your bit, don’t you think? Get the fire brigade out, boys. Your country needs you. There are lives to be saved. Are you able? Are you mice or men?

We need you to do more and to do better. You have allowed yourselves to be distracted, or perhaps it is too much trouble actually to research and investigate, and so you merely comment on what is in front of your face. You have dropped the ball. It is this indolence, this armchair pontificating, and this ignorance, as Gandhi rightly states, that has landed us in this pretty mess.

Where is your sensibility about our islandness? What is your opinion about this wonder of the world, this minuscule nine miles of tropical highway that is costing $5 billion, which per single square foot is more expensive than any square foot of road anywhere else on the planet? We’re not building the Golden Gate Bridge or the Great Wall of China.

We’re just making a little piece of highway on an island. Nor are we paving it with the gold of El Dorado. Shouldn’t the excessive cost of an ordinary highway be obsessing you more than the irritating nuisance of a man starving himself by the roadside? It’s our money that’s buying the damned thing, but do we know anything about it? At all?  

We are told that the highway is good for us exactly as is, and that we must be well behaved, obedient little boys and girls, because Mama Kam and Papa Ram know what’s best for us. Do they indeed? 

Well, I don’t think for a moment that Mama and Papa know better. I think they know what is best for themselves. It is yet another manifestation of the Governor General Syndrome, with which the three of you would be well familiar. All power at the centre. Let no damned dog bark. 

Patrick Manning practised it, and this lot is more of the same, only bolder and better at it. When we elected this so-called People’s Partnership we expected a break from that past. But the Prime Minister and her Attorney General have betrayed that expectation, betrayed the basics of responsibility to the people whose partnership empowered them in the first place.

We want to know how and why our money is being spent. Who is making the profit on the $5 billion? We don’t see it in the plans. And Mama and Papa refuse to sit at the table with us and tell us. Are transparency, truth and trust too much to ask for? Open your eyes, you three blind mice. Readjust your sights. Instead of picking Kublalsingh apart, let’s see a character analysis of Persad-Bissessar and Ramlogan for a change. It would certainly be more relevant to our well-being and needs as a people.

Kamla is the Mama of Mamaguy. Her recent sanctimonious statements and hypocritical prayers for Wayne's welfare were a stream of morbid, sentimental slush; mawkish, maudlin and vapid in the extreme. She invokes God’s guidance with the saccharine ease of sliced white bread saturated in sweetened condensed milk. So much froth and empty posture. Pure professional Kamla blah.

Ramlogan meantime is the living Mancrab. It is unbelievable. He used to be such a principled, promising, bright young lawyer. He has become a monster. The metamorphosis is total and complete. He now uses the law like a bludgeon, to bully and beat the smallest whisper of opposition or dissent into total submission. 

At Divali celebrations the other night he claimed that his gods have given permission and encouragement to man to exploit the environment. Oh dear. The problem is that the ancient venerated Hindu gods of India may well have advised that, but they were giving that advice in good faith to a humankind that then toiled and tooled with ploughshares, with bullocks, horses, mules and donkeys, and with elephants. Technology has changed the rules and the balance of power between man and nature forever.

Man’s greed, his love for money and his lust for power, is now enabled as never before by technology. Mancrab reigns supreme. And when King Mancrab reigns he takes Queen Kam’s divisive multiculturism and turns it into apartheid, Trinidad style, pitting South against North, simply to cover his a--e and take your eye off the ball.

Pure wickedness.
Well, good gentlemen, or gentlemice, you’d better watch the ball more carefully, lest you get your tails cut.
Three blind mice,
three blind mice,
See how they run, 
see how they run,
They all ran after 
the farmer’s wife,
Who cut off their tails 
with a carving knife,
Did you ever see 
such a thing in your life,
As three blind mice?

This little nursery rhyme has come a long way since Bloody Mary. You should check it out. Amazing origins. Google it. You’ll find that our Prime Minister would certainly not be the first woman in history to turn a blind eye to a good man’s death, in God’s name no less, were it in her interest and to her advantage. Wayne Kublalsingh is a good man.

On the other side of the street, evil and corruption ooze out of every pore and orifice of the comatose body politic of the Island Republic.  Prove me wrong and I’ll eat my black hat and change my name to MacFarlane.

The day after the acting Police Commissioner said no charges would be brought against the doctor or patient involved in the removal of cocaine pellets from a man’s stomach last year, the pressure group, Fixin’ T&T, is calling for the legal advice given to the police to be reviewed. Acting CoP Stephen Williams said the police had been advised by deputy Director of Public Prosecutions Kathy Ann Waterman-Latchoo.

In an open letter to the CoP yesterday, the group wrote “it is at odds with opinions in law of both the late Dana Seetahal, SC, and the United Kingdom-based Medical Protection Society (MPS). Further we seek to ascertain if said advice was verbal or written.” During the weekly police media briefing on Wednesday, Williams said there was no evidence which could be used to prosecute either the surgeon or the patient. This was although interviews were recorded with the doctor, patient, nurses and other hospital personnel. 

Fixin’ T&T is also urging the Police Complaints Authority (PCA) to review the investigation by the police. The PCA currently has no director, as its former head, Gillian Lucky, is now a High Court judge. Fixin’ T&T said neither the doctor nor the hospital (both named in the release) had denied allegations that cocaine pellets had been removed during an emergency operation there.

Attorney General Anand Ramlogan will ask the acting Commissioner of Police to continue investigations into the case of a private nursing home patient who had 20 cocaine pellets removed from his stomach, despite the recent revelation that no charges can be laid against the doctor who failed to report the incident to police, or against anyone else involved. dsdsdsddsSpeaking at yesterday’s weekly government press conference at the Prime Minister’s Office, St Clair, Ramlogan added: “I find it an entirely unsatisfactory and unacceptable state of affairs that such an event could have occurred. “So I would ask the Commissioner of Police to continue the investigations with the advice they had received from the Director of Public Prosecutions but not allow T&T to become a laughing stock because that is exactly the kind of absurdity it would result in.”

The patient, 34, from Arouca reportedly swallowed the cocaine pellets in a bid to smuggle the narcotic and was taken for treatment at the hospital after experiencing stomach pains. 
The drugs were removed during surgery and the man was later transferred to the Mt Hope Medical Complex. Acting Police Commissioner Stephen Williams said on Wednesday the matter had been investigated thoroughly and the decision against laying charges was made on the advice of deputy Director of Public Prosecutions Kathy Ann Waterman-Latchoo. Williams said there was no evidence which could be used to pursue prosecution against surgeon or patient.

But Ramlogan said yesterday if a doctor used the doctor-patient confidentiality provision as a shield for a criminal situation, that must be a cause for concern not just for citizens, but also for the law. Ramlogan said his understanding of the law was that doctors were obliged to repfort criminal offences and that was well understood, whether it was a case of a child rape incident or the physical abuse of a child or whether cocaine was removed from someone’s stomach. In such situations, professional responsibility involved informing the police and retaining possession of the foreign substance/particles/bags of whatever was removed, for due process to take its course, he said.
He asked: “There are many unanswered questions in this matter, starting with the patient entering the nursing home. What did they do when they removed the foreign substance? What was the nature of the patient’s complaint; was there full and frank disclosure made by the patient to the doctor on the true, genuine purpose of what they were seeking medical attention for, etc.
“And when it was removed and there was clear grounds to suspect there was in fact, illegal drugs digested with the intention to be expelled and sold as part of drug trafficking, if so, then surely the doctor and the nursing home should have been red-flagging this matter.”
Ramlogan said the staff should have been on high alert to notify the police so the patient could immediately be arrested or watched, not allowed to walk out of the nursing home.
“Instead,” he added, “it would seem here, there was a complete abdication of responsibility and professional responsibility to duty and responsibility in accordance with the law, and I am gravely concerned and extremely disturbed at what occurred. And we are now being told no one can be held responsible, far less culpable as a matter of law.”
He said while he respected the DPP’s advice, it was advice which must be contextualised.
He noted: “It is advice based on evidence the investigations unearthed and put to the DPP’s office but quite separate and apart from that, one would have expected that the Medical Board would have by now treated this matter with the urgency it clearly requires and steps to ascertain if there was misconduct in accordance with the law, something that needs to be investigated as matter of urgency.” 
Ramlogan stressed: “This matter sets a most dangerous precedent for a country as it (ingestion) is a known medium and method of transporting drugs—for people to ingest it, whether they put in a condom and dip it in honey and swallow it, or use it as a suppository.
Ramlogan said he could not accept that concern about reprisals, which may have occurred after Dana Seetahal’s May murder, was ample justification for what happened in the situation. He said that sort of excuse would result in collapse of law and order and disintegration of society.

Citizens are free to express their views once they are not in breach of the law. So said Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar in response to questions from reporters on advertisements in the newspapers in support of the Debe to Mon Desir segment of the Solomon Hochoy Highway extension. She was questioned by reporters after yesterday’s ceremony to present house keys to T&T’s second Olympic gold medallist Keshorn Walcott, at East Grove, Valsayn. The issue of the advertisements, placed by a group calling itself “Citizens 4D Highway,” first arose two weeks ago when one ad described hunger-striker Dr Wayne Kublalsingh as a human lizard.
 
The PM said she had read the first advertisement “and I think they are free as any other citizen to express their views, in the same way that others have expressed their views.” There was no problem, she said, “as long as they act within the law and as long as they do not defame anyone.” Kublalsingh is protesting the Debe to Mon Desir segment of the $7.5 billion Solomon Hochoy Highway extension from San Fernando to Point Fortin. His Highway Re-route Movement has raised questions about who was really behind the ads and who was funding them. It claims the Government was behind the ads. Asked if the Government was linked to the ads being placed in the media on the Kublalsingh issue, Communications Minister Vasant Bharath said yesterday he had no knowledge of them but had noted they carried the tag “Citizens 4D Highway.” Subsequent ads have attacked the print media for refusing to carry further advertisements calling for “freedom from the press” and criticising those newspapers that have refused to publish any of the related ads. 

Walcott Grateful
Receiving the keys to his converted $2.7 million Housing Development Corporation home, Walcott said he was thankful for it. Two houses were converted for him after he said he wanted to live in the east instead of Federation Park, Port-of-Spain, where he was originally given a condominium. He said he preferred the Valsayn area and choosing East Grove was “a great decision.”
Walcott, the javelin gold medallist at the 2012 Olympics, said he intended to plant some mango trees in his backyard so he could continue practising. He reportedly acquired some of his javelin-throwing talent by pelting mangoes as a boy. He also signed the deed for a parcel of land in his hometown of Toco yesterday, explaining that the land was his gift to his parents who still liveds in Toco. “I am just glad that they have something up there to call their own,” he told reporters.

PM: Other things more important 
On another issue involving Kublalsingh—his call for her to ask in writing for his medical records after his stay at St Clair Medical Centre earlier this month — Persad-Bissessar said she had more important matters of state to deal with than to respond to Kublalsingh. Health Minister Dr Fuad Khan said then that after more than three weeks of his hunger strike, the leader of the Highway Re-Route Movement looked strong after collapsing at Maracas beach. 

Khan denied he had access to Kublalsingh’s medical records, as Kublalsingh’s family claimed. The PM said: “Those matters are not important to me. I have a country to run.”  Asked if she was no longer concerned with the issue, she responded: “Those matters are being dealt with by the relevant line minister and Nidco president Dr Carson Charles.” She said she would have no further involvement. “Not at this time, no,” she added.

Persad-Bissessar declined to respond to comments by masman Peter Minshall, who supports Kublalsingh and who said the PM was the “mama of mamaguy.” The PM said she had not heard his comments but added: “He is a great man and we are also very proud of Peter Minshall and the work he has done in our country.” Attorney General Anand Ramlogan yesterday also skirted comment on statements by Minshall about the Government, saying he did not want to comment on Minshall’s comments as he had not seen them. Minshall’s statement on the issues raised by the Point Fortin Highway extension and the protest led by Kublalsingh appeared in yesterday’s T&T Guardian. Ramlogan said Minshall had contributed to culture and Carnival and he would “continue to enjoy Tan Tan and Saga Boy and their creator.”
 

A 34-year-old police officer was killed instantly in a road accident in Chaguanas yesterday which left another man seriously injured. Special Reserve police constable Daniel Ramsaroop of Hendrickson Street, Tunapuna, suffered severe head injuries after a Suzuki Jimny, driven by Vijay Ramcharan, crashed into a car on the Old Southern Main Road, Enterprise.

Police said that around 1 am, Ramsaroop and Ramcharan were driving along the road when on reaching Lendor Village, the vehicle began to swerve. Eyewitnesses said they saw the vehicle speeding around a bend before flipping several times and landing on a car. Chaguanas fire officers had to use the jaws of life to free the men from the wreck but only Ramcharan survived.

The driver of the car, Patricia Williams, of Mendoza Drive, Philippine, was shaken up but escaped serious injury. Ramcharan, of David Toby Road, Chin Chin, Cunupia, was taken to the Chaguanas District Health Facility and transferred to the Eric Williams Medical Sciences Complex. Investigations are continuing.

One woman was shot dead and another found with her throat slit and a plastic bag over her head in separate incidents on Wednesday. The body of Florentine Arneaud, 62, from St Vincent and the Grenadines, was found at her Valencia home. Relatives had earlier gone to her home shortly after 8 pm, found a door open and her television and DVD player missing. Her body was later found in the house. Arneaud was last seen alive on October 26, police said.

In the second incident, 36-year-old Indra Diaz was killed moments after sharing a meal with her husband Shawn Khan at their Madras Road, Cunupia, home around 9 pm. Police said the couple were having an outdoor dinner at the back of their house when a gunman approached and shot her. Khan, a maintenance custodian with the Airports Authority, told police he heard a loud explosion and then saw his wife drop to the ground. The killer escaped by running through the bush at the back of the house. Central Division head Senior Supt Johnny Abraham told the T&T Guardian a relative was assisting the police with their investigations.

In a third incident, police said Marlon Charles was found dead around 5 am yesterday with bullet wounds to the back of the head in a white Nissan B-14 near the Caroni cremation site. Charles was a nurse at St Ann’s Psychiatric Hospital and was returning home from a birthday party hosted by his colleagues. He would have turned 36 yesterday. Police say they believe Charles was robbed before being shot. The latest killings have taken the murder toll now to 343, 17 higher than for the same period last year.

A three-man commission of enquiry, headed by retired Justice Mustapha Ibrahim, into the PNM administration’s Las Alturas project will determine if there are grounds for criminal or civil action concerning the dead-ended $40 million project, says Attorney General Anand Ramlogan. At yesterday’s weekly government press conference at the Office of the Prime Minister, St Clair, Ramlogan said the other two appointees were structural engineering expert Anthony Farrell, who is a past president of the Association of Professional Engineers, and structural engineering consultant and retired UWI lecturer Myron W Chin.

Ramlogan said: “Justice Ibrahim has over 51 years’ legal experience, Mr Farrell has 46 years’ experience in his field and Dr Chin 51 years’ experience as a structural engineer and retired lecturer. Combined, they have 150 years of collective experience.” The Prime Minister recently announced there would be a commission of inquiry into the project in Morvant, which was built during the PNM’s tenure and subsequently had to be demolished owing to structural problems.

The AG said the commission’s terms of reference included enquiring into the relevant facts and circumstances to determine whether grounds existed for either criminal or civil liability. He added: “Almost $40 million of taxpayers’ money has almost disappeared. “This is a fiasco of gargantuan proportions... it must be painful for the public to see the two towers constructed and they now have to pay to have it demolished. There are many questions we hope this CoE will answer for the public.” 

On the inquiry being initiated just before an election year, Ramlogan said no government could ignore the expenditure of tens of millions to construct two towers for citizens who then had to turn around and pay again for them to be demolished.  “It’s scandalous,” he added. The hearings will be held at the Caribbean Court of Justice, Port-of-Spain. Ramlogan also said the report from the Clico commission of enquiry was expected around Easter next year. The Hindu Credit Union report has been received.

Former Australian Olympic sprinter Nova Peris, now a senator, said yesterday the story of her alleged affair with former T&T Olympic sprinter Ato Boldon in 2010 was part of a plot by someone seeking to embarrass her family and extort money from her.

Speaking to her colleagues in the Australian Federal Senate, Peris, who fought back tears throughout her presentation, said the e-mails, which Northern Territory (NT) News political reporter Christopher Walsh based his story on earlier this week, were leaked to him as part of a long-running family dispute. 

She said she was told in 2010, via a “representative”, that an “aggrieved party” who had the leaked e-mails was prepared to take action that would “only result in trauma for everyone, especially the children, and damage the reputation of some stakeholders.” 

She said she was contacted again on October 9 this year and read the correspondence in the senate. “The first line read ‘I am sending this communication to you today to ensure there is no mistake as to who is responsible for releasing the information in relation to you,’” Peris read.

She said NT News was aware the e-mails were part of the family dispute when it published the story which alleged she used taxpayers’ money to facilitate Boldon’s trip to Australia for a youth athletic training programme so she could pursue him romantically. “The release and publication of these e-mails (was an) attempt to extract money from me and embarrass me and my family,” she said.

Peris told her colleagues, however, that she did not have a copy of the e-mails and could not comment on their authenticity. Both Boldon and Peris have denied the allegations and threatened to sue NT News over the article but Walsh is standing by his story and has promised to reveal more details.

A government minister has thrown his support behind Gary Aboud’s plea to Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar to mediate with the Highway Re-route Movement (HRM). Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Dookeran, in a phone interview yesterday, said he would support any call to mediate in the matter as it was a step in the right direction.

Aboud, the secretary of the environmental group, Fisherman and Friends of the Sea (FFOS), made a tearful plea  on Wednesday during a press briefing at Woodford Square, Port-of-Spain. He said he believed HRM leader Dr Wayne Kublalsingh, who is on hunger strike, was dying.

Aboud said he expected a large turnout for a gathering at the square, called for 11.30 am today, after urging people to come out in their numbers in support of good governance. He added: “It does not matter whether 10,000 people come out or not. A leader is twiddling her thumbs while a good man dies. History will bear testimony to the callousness of her conduct and we are appealing to people to change for compassionate leadership.”

He said today’s gathering was also expected to include members of the Inter-Religious Organisation (IRO). Aboud stressed the event was not politically motivated, saying it was merely a call for citizens to stand up against injustice. “We are not asking people to leave their jobs or to stop working. If they can spare their lunch hour, come sit with us in solidarity in the square.  “We want to send a signal to the Prime Minister that we want a leader with a conscience and compassion. This has nothing to do with politics,” Aboud said. 

Harris: Issue beyond Kublalsingh
RC Archbishop Joseph Harris, who also had called previously for mediation, said that was the most critical aspect of the entire scheme of things as it went far beyond Kublalsingh’s dying.
Harris said while the health of the HRM leader was another issue by itself, which was also significant, the pertinent issue was being able to dialogue and reach a consensus as a society.
“I think the call to mediate has to be far beyond whether Kublalsingh will die or not because we, as a people, need to seek ways of building consensus. We need to be a people who are willing to dialogue,” Harris urged.

On Monday he was given a letter by members of Project 40, a group supporting the HRM and mediation. Saying he had read the letter and was impressed that young people were willing to take such a stand, Harris added: “I think the country needs people like that. I see they may also be talking to the President and I don’t know what he is going to say but there are people who are willing to try their best to bring about some level of peace and harmony in the country.”

Fasting High Re-route Movement leader weak
Kublalsingh, who said he has been mostly confined to bed, said he still was feeling weak and experiencing shortness of breath. He completed Day 44 of his strike yesterday in protest against the Debe to Mon Desir portion of the extension of the Solomon Hochoy Highway to Point Fortin. “I continue to feel very weak, dehydrated and exhausted now. I am getting shortbreath a lot. I never expected my body to go this far as it was a lot weaker than when I started the last hunger strike but for some reason my body just keeps going. “I would love to attend the gathering but I am simply too weak,” Kublalsingh added. He was visited at his D’Abadie home yesterday by some members of the Presbyterian Church who prayed for his health.

Rosemarie Gomes, manager of Unlimited Travel and Krystal Tours, does not agree that passengers should be penalised for cancelling their reservations on the Tobago airbrige. The penalty should be for people who do not call to cancel, she said. “It is better that these passengers of CAL call and cancel so in that way their seats can be returned to the system and new buyers can purchase those seats. But there are some people who do not even call the airline, they are the ones who must be made to pay.  “Too many people have the idea Tobago is close by and they do not feel obliged to even call to cancel,” she told the T&T Guardian.

United Travel and Krystal Tours are agents for the Port Authority of T&T for the sale of ferry tickets to passengers and vehicles between Trinidad and Tobago, and major cruise lines including Carnival, Celebrity, Royal Caribbean and Holland America. The proposal to impose a penalty on passengers who cancel their bookings on the Tobago airbridge was among several made by a delegation from the Tobago House of Assembly (THA) led by Chief Secretary Orville London when they met with Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar earlier this week. The THA delegation expressed concern about passengers booking flights and cancelling, resulting in Caribbean Airlines (CAL) operating flights that are not full.

Gomes said most airlines have penalties for people who cancel their reservations. “In the case of CAL, for people who do not call and cancel, they could be penalised at the cost of $50. Of course that would be almost the cost of the $150 for a one way flight to Tobago.” she said, adding that this could cause a “stir” because of the heavy travel between the two islands.
“Most Trinidadians go to Tobago for pleasure, while most Tobagonians come to Trinidad for business. “When you have penalties it causes people to think twice when they just do not show up for flights. This would wake people up and make them more responsible,” she said.

Lou Anna Chai-Alves, executive director of the Trinidad Hotels, Restaurant & Tourism Association, agreed that penalties should be imposed on passengers. “A lot of the times we have business travellers in Trinidad from other countries and we encourage them to go Tobago during the weekend. “However, they cannot find spaces yet there are empty spaces from passengers who would have cancelled last minute. There must be some control to prevent this from happening,” she said.

A spokesperson for Blue Waters Inn in Tobago said hotels would be affected if a penalty is charged on defaulting passengers. “It will affect us. If you have to pay a penalty on cancelled tickets, that is more money a person has to pay and it means less revenue for us, if they cannot come to the hotel. “Also, if the customer is already at the hotel and cancelled their flight to stay an extra few days that is more money the person has to pay to CAL and also the person has to pay a fee to for changing the date and extra time spent at the hotel. “All this is not an incentive for people,” the spokesperson said.

A love triangle is believed to be the reason behind the murder of a 33-year-old father of four near his home in Eastern Settlement, Sangre Grande, on Thursday. His grieving father is now begging witnesses to come forward, saying the country’s citizens must help the police fight crime. 

Around 5 pm on Thursday, Marlon Francis, a mason, was plastering a wall when residents nearby heard gunshots and saw him running and clutching his chest. Francis collapsed and was taken to the Sangre Grande District Hospital, but died before getting there. 

Speaking with the media outside the Forensic Science Centre, St James, yesterday, Francis’s father, Cyril, said his son had a court case with a man who had threatened him in the past. The man, he said, reportedly threatened that the altercation “would not end there.”

Francis said his son was before a Sangre Grande magistrate charged with assaulting the man and had moved out of the area, where he had lived with his now ex-girlfriend. He added that he last saw his son alive was on Sunday and his son had dreams to build his own home. “He was a kind guy, soft guy, a friendly guy, but something happen with he and the woman and this is where it turn out and he lost his life. 

“He and the woman and a next man—like he and the man had conflict and some kind of fight and some hitting went on, and my son end up in court. He left the girl and stay by me in Sangre Grande and he left by me Sunday night and I didn’t see him until I see him last night in the hospital bed,” Francis said. He added: “I would like to say to the people of this country, we need to come together and work together, because the police on their own can’t solve everything. 

“We have to see what they not seeing and hear what they not hearing and work together with that, because people see the man who kill my son, but they don't want to come out and say.”  

Relatives of Irma Rampersad, who along with her grandchild and two of her daughters have not been seen since Sunday, are fearing the worst, as they believe their loved ones have been abducted. However, they are appealing to whoever has them to return them home safely. Speaking with the media at their Bleu Road, Brasso Seco, Paria home yesterday, Nicole Gonzales, and her stepfather, Peter Sylvester said Rampersad, 49, would never leave home in her bedroom slippers. 

The fourth of Rampersad’s seven children, Nicole said her mother had one pair of shoes and if she ever left home she would use them. Sylvester said he and his wife had no problems and she had no reason to flee the home or in such a ghostly manner.

Holding one of her two children and forcing back tears Gonzales’ voice cracked as she recalled her last conversation with her mother. She said her mother called her on Monday to say she was taking her sister Felicia Gonzales, 17, a student of the Malabar Secondary School, to the Arima Health Facility. Checks there by relatives revealed they never made it. 

Gonzales added that her sister Jenelle Gonzales, 19, would also never leave home with her one-year-old child Shania Amoroso without packing a baby bag for her, and since all the child’s belongings were still home she believes the family was abducted. Following the murder of Phillip Noreiga, 31, on August 4 in the area, Gonzales said her mother had been receiving threats by people who believe she saw something and was not forthcoming with the information. 

She added that she was forced to move out the area for a while after those threatening her mother promised to kill her children and burn their house down. “My mother is a good woman, she don’t lime, she don’t drink nothing and my sisters are good girls., I really need to see my family, that is all I have. “We need to see them. They are peaceful people. That baby innocent, my family not in drugs in guns or anything,” Gonzales said, her voice breaking. 

Gonzales said she heard a baby crying early on Monday, but thought nothing of it. Later that day her sister Jenelle called her and asked whether their home was broken into. She added that after that conversation she tried to call her family members but they never answered. On Tuesday she said someone called her phone from a blocked number, breathed heavily and hung up.  Anyone with information about the location of the family is asked to contact the nearest police station.

What a woman, said Neil Giuseppi, summing up the late Hazel Ward-Redman, a teacher, television producer, presenter extraordinaire, educator, guide, mentor, patriot and wife. Ward-Redman, who died on October 27 at 79, was cremated at  Belgrove’s Funeral Home after a mass at the St Paul’s Anglican Church, San Fernando, yesterday. The Right Rev Rawle Douglin, along with Canon (Emeritus) Dr Steve West, officiated at the mass.

Douglin said Aunty Hazel lived a tremendous life which was characterised by her love for all her fellow human beings through the grace of God, who was always at the centre of her being. 

President Anthony Carmona, San Fernando mayor Kazim Hosein, Minister in the Ministry of the People Vernella Alleyne-Toppin, former PNM minister Pennelope Beckles, and former St Augustine Girls’ High School principal Anna Mahase, as well as a host of journalists, including those from TTT, all turned out to bid Aunty Hazel farewell.

In the first of two tributes, Giuseppi said Ward-Redman was one of the most professional women the Caribbean had ever produced and while we shall all be worse-off for that loss, her friends and relatives are comforted by the knowledge that she is sitting alongside her late husband, Dr Archibald Redman, forever at the feet of the Lord.

Giuseppi traced her life from birth at Fonrose Street, San Fernando, her flair for fashion, to  being one of a team of pioneers who braved uncharted waters to launch Trinidad and Tobago Television (TTT).  For close to 40 years, through TTT, she played an integral part in the development of T&T, moulding the lives of many through her many programmes, designed mainly for women and children.

“Her cultural programmes like Twelve and Under, Teen Talent, and her magazine programmes like Mainly for Women, Centre Stage and Not for Women Only, set standards of excellence that television producers and presenters today would do well to emulate. “She insisted on excellence in everything that she did, She was the consummate professional,” Giuseppi said.

“She was a teacher and mentor to thousands of young people whose lives she influenced positively. She was a guiding light when all around seemed dark and hopeless. To paraphrase the words of the great bard, William Shakespeare, in his immortal work, Julius Caesar, she ‘bestrode the narrow world like a colossus.’” 

In the second tribute, delivered both in spoken word and song, Richard Pierre said all artistes owed a debt of gratitude to Aunty Hazel, who provided them all with a platform to be heard, even those who were not as talented. “You inspired me, you guided me, you were my adviser and mentor. Above all, you were my dearest friend. Thank you,” he said. 

His selection of the gospel song You Raised Me Up was an appropriate sendoff from the many people in the congregation whom “Aunty Hazel” Ward-Redman shaped and moulded during her lifetime.

T&T Publishers and Broadcasters Association (TTPBA) president Daren Lee Sing has called on the group known as Citizens 4D Highway to properly unmask themselves in order to meet advertising standards. In a telephone interview yesterday Lee Sing said the TTPBA would host a meeting with stakeholders on Tuesday as the situation regarding ads from the group seemed to be escalating.

The group has published several ads in the T&T Guardian in October, beginning with a full-page advertisement on October 18 about a “newly discovered species called the Kublal.” “We continue to ask that the Citizens 4D Highway come forward and say who they are so the public could get redress,” Lee Sing said. “The issue at heart is standards and we are striving to meet the proper standards in our industry and to do that we must deal with every issue.”

He said while the TTPBA understands the business aspect, it has sought to speak to its members and get a position once and for all from them. “It could be that we all decide to respect each others’ decision or we could all give a unified approach.” Lee Sing said the Citizens 4D Highway group did not understand that the issue was not about content or suppressing freedoms but about understanding the acceptable standards.

“They see it as being creative. I hope that they are watching the comments on their social media to see the public’s reaction.” A quick check on the group’s Facebook page showed that while some commentators found their posts funny, others said they were distasteful. Minister of Communications Vasant Bharath has refused to comment on the contents of the advertisements but has repeatedly denied Government’s involvement.

Opposition Senator Faris Al-Rawi, who also found the posts distasteful, said they were demonstrative of a lack of courage on the part of the authors. “We note that the UNC (United National Congress) seems to have a very different trajectory and it is curious how quickly anonymous and distasteful material seem to find itself in the public domain in support of any UNC cause celebre.”

He said while the ads may have no connection to the Government, its proximity to the Government through the utilisation of one of its public relations companies caused suspicion. The ads are being placed by the Ross Advertising agency. General election advertising was also an issue of concern to both the TTPBA and the Advertising Agencies Association of T&T (AAATT).