On behalf of all the angry people that clamoured for this to be exposed, let me lay it out at the outset: The Ministry of Culture needs properly to account for the distribution of tickets for the main stage events of Carifesta, which was ill-considered, unfair and discriminatory. That each …

Events that rock us into further consternation about the state of our country and whether ‘we gone through’ are occurring with increasing frequency. Sadly, the responses of our rulers are superficial. The event that dominated the news cycle last week was the arrest of Marlene McDonald on significant fraud charges …

Approximately one year ago, shortly after his appointment, Commissioner of Police, Gary Griffith likened the criminal elements to ‘cockroaches’ and added that those cockroaches should be ‘crushed’. The Commissioner has company. The following report appeared last week in the UK Guardian newspaper: “Brazil’s far-right President, Jair Bolsonaro, has said he …

“With so much of everything how do we leave with nothing?” This question is asked in a multi layered (adults only) song called the ‘Blame Game’, a collaboration between John Legend and Kanye West, released in 2010. I came across this last Sunday on one of those Sunday mornings when …

We are all acquainted with the expression 24/7 meaning continuous shifts or round-the-clock service. Sadly, our country is now a country of murder 24/7. Underlining that fact, we actually managed to have 24 murders within a seven day period, causing Guardian media to assert in a page one editorial on …

I have emphasised in these columns that we cannot expect our country to come out of its steep, continuous and frequently murderous decline if we continue, as I recently put it, with ‘poor governance, pursuit of failed policy, inability to vary something that is not working and official petulance when …

Last week I examined the promise of Minister of National Security, Stuart Young, that there will be charges and “big fish being taken down in the next set of operations before year’s end.” I expressed skepticism about this promise for two reasons, one of which was my concern that the …

Last week, in the course of the latest Parliamentary debate on crime, talk of ‘big fish’ came up again in the speech of the Minister of National Security, Stuart Young. First, let’s set out the context. The terms of the Opposition motion for debate asked the Senate: “to take note …

The Evil Queen in the story of Snow White repeatedly asks the magic mirror: “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all.” The mirror would invariably give the mamaguy answer ‘you are, my Queen’. In Shrek when the magic mirror is brought to Lord Farquaad, he …

It is readily apparent that, as predicted, the registration process for migrant Venezuelans is taking the Government and people of Trinidad and Tobago into much deeper commitments than those anticipated. Credible estimates put the number of Venezuelan migrants here at 40,000. A 14-day registration process—if well patronised by half that …

“Why is a Government which says it is committed to transparency proposing to make it more difficult for citizens to access information from official sources? “[…] [And] why, at a time of economic belt-tightening and obviously rising unemployment—whatever the official pronouncements on that issue—does the government consider it a good …

There is considerable confusion about the status of fleeing Venezuelans crowding into Trinidad and Tobago with more confusion to come. Some have gained entry through legal points of entry, but many have breached the conditions of their permitted admission, such as by working without the appropriate permit or overstaying the …