“[…] school authorities have not been processing refunds for lab and other fees duly paid by students this year. They also failed to deal with the urgent and legitimate questions about obtaining accurate transcripts, timely refunds or assisting students to graduate…” The following letter to the editor about the close …
Read More »Daly Bread: Bake, dumpling, cereal and banking czars—a people out of touch
As a small boy, I grew up knowing that my single parent mother was in a sou sou. Many decades later I have lived to read that the current governor of the Central Bank was surprised to learn of the extent of the practice of sou sou. The czars of …
Read More »Curriculum starts between 7-14 Sep with SEA results on 8 Oct, 65,000 can’t access online learning
Minister of Education Dr Nyan Gadsby-Dolly confirmed today that the school curriculum will begin between 7 and 14 September, as Trinidad and Tobago prepares to enter a phase of remote learning. Schools closed to students in March, due to the novel coronavirus, with learning since then reliant on the resources …
Read More »Rowley’s Cabinet: Young, Imbert, Deyalsingh retain portfolios; Gadsby-Dolly, Pennelope get education and housing
People’s National Movement (PNM) political leader and Diego Martin West MP Dr Keith Rowley was sworn in as prime minister for a second successive term this afternoon while Faris Al-Rawi retained the portfolio of attorney general and is also minister of legal affairs. Other high profile returnees were: Port of …
Read More »Terrible Thursday? Queen Terri tells old-stagers to share tricks of calypso trade
Calypso needs to get its act together! Minister Nyan Gadsby-Dolly did not think very much of TUCO’s handling of calypso in 2020 and she pulled no punches in letting the world know. Her unflattering comments on TV6 revealed disapproval of the decision to keep Kaisorama and the art form’s Carnival …
Read More »Time to scrap Dimanche Gras! Best suggests Culture Minister take page from Machel and Kees
An Open Letter to Culture Minister Nyan Gadsby-Dolly Dear Madam, It’s over, madam. Dimanche Gras is dead. Like the numerous, onerous pretty costumes the Pegasus Fancy Sailor and Tan Tan and Saga Boy relegated into irrelevance, the show is arguably now exposed as a creaking, antediluvian anachronism, not merely moribund …
Read More »Bad calypsonomics to blame for tents going bust; Baldeosingh considers impact of State interference
“In a market economy, prices indicate demand which, in turn, affects supply—falling prices indicate lower demand, higher prices reveal shortages and, generally, supply adjusts to meet demand. “[…] The trouble was that State subsidies distorted the market for calypso. So government funding, especially over the past 25 years, concealed preferences—or, …
Read More »Heigh-ho, De Silva, away! Best sees NCC boss chairmanning still, despite quit promise
Five months, four weeks, three days, two hours, one minute, one second, two ticks and one tock. As I begin to write, that’s how long it has been since the last note sounded on Carnival 2017. And at the NCC, Kenny De Silva is still chairmanning. Now let me say …
Read More »Daly: T&T Carnival is becoming the Greatest Pappyshow on Earth
The record breaking success of Full Extreme is thoroughly deserved. I will add to the boiling pot of opinions of why it struck such a deep chord. For me it is a restatement of the saying that laugh and cry live in the same yard. I am otherwise reluctant to …
Read More »Is Greatest Show on Earth not far from finished? Best’s 2017 Carnival post-mortem
A litany of whoa! But we jamming still! Bacchanal, synonym of and the default rhyme for Carnival, has been part and parcel of the national festival for donkey’s years and controversy and comess have been its consistent companions. But this year was ‘diss’ year; everywhere you looked in 2017, it was disaffection, …
Read More »Dimanche not so gras! Best casts critical eye; says why he preferred Karene to Chalkie
Not to take anything away from the 2017 winner, Dr Hollis “Chalkdust” Liverpool, the now record nine-time champion, the results of last night’s Calypso Monarch competition simply do not add up. And as the dissatisfaction with the organisers and complaints about the quality of the show multiply—as they are almost …
Read More »A swansong for Birdsong? Best laments for evicted pan side and national instrument
“Oh gorm,” David Rudder bawl out like Sprangalang. “Shot call!” The feckless, gutless, witless lot who are not “in charge” waited, it seemed, for an edict from the top. It never came. True to form, Culture Minister Dr Nyan Gadsby-Dolly passed the buck. She had heard, said one report, that …
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