Leader of Government Business Camille Robinson-Regis: “[…] It was within the capacity of the Opposition to request that the prime minister stand down… None of them present said a word… Mr Rudranath Indarsingh, who for some time appeared to be texting, merely continued doing so…” Opposition Chief Whip David Lee: …
Read More »MSJ: Opposition Leader’s attack on health care professionals is ‘dangerous in the extreme’
“[…] Mrs Kamla Persad-Bissessar’s most recent attack on our senior public servants in the health care sector must be condemned in the strongest possible manner. “[…] For the leader of the opposition to suggest that these medical professionals are in some form or fashion contributing to ‘premeditated, state-sanctioned murder’ is scurrilous and …
Read More »Daly Bread: Angry dus’ in we face; unvigilant Dr Rowley’s Easter own goal
In the parliamentary debate held on Monday last, the boastful confirmation from the minister of transport that the air and sea bridges carried 50,000 persons between Trinidad and Tobago during the Easter week came up again. The prime minister reportedly ‘dismissed as a distortion the opposition leader’s reference to the …
Read More »MSJ’s Covid suggestions: Faster test results, Cuban nurses and vaccines, and review home isolation policy
“[…] The process of home isolation needs to be reviewed so that we do not have significant spread in families… It is to be noted that many persons live in circumstances that do not allow social distancing and the isolation of an ill family member. “It may therefore be necessary …
Read More »MSJ: AG gave too much power to police commissioner; amend SoE regulations!
“[…] The police are to ensure that laws are adhered to. The police cannot make laws. If we go in that direction we are creating a police state. “This SoE was explicitly proclaimed by the president to deal with a health crisis… The restrictions—including the hours of curfew—should therefore be …
Read More »Jackassery aside; is T&T being served during the pandemic? Do we deserve to be?
Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley called a state of emergency yesterday afternoon based on the health catastrophe that is the Covid-19 pandemic. The people who were not at his side to explain how we arrived at that momentous decision and what comes next were: the chief medical officer, the attorney …
Read More »Deyalsingh: Sinopharm vaccine passed WHO tests; UNC trying to ‘derail’ vaccination drive
“[…] On the basis of all available evidence, the Sinopharm vaccine efficacy is estimated at 78.1% for all age groups 18 years and over. “The erroneous comments made by MP [Dr Roodal] Moonilal that Trinidad and Tobago will be used as guinea pigs only reinforces the MP’s deliberate attempts to …
Read More »Young is new energy minister, Hinds takes national security post while Cummings gets youth job
Stuart Young, the Port of Spain North/St Ann’s West MP, has replaced the late Franklin Khan as minister of energy and energy industries with Fitzgerald Hinds taking over the portfolio of national security minister. The decision was announced this afternoon via a press release by Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley, …
Read More »Noble: Economic expectations and emotions; T&T’s unique challenges must factor into analyses
The recent utterances of a UWI economist about our economy (‘dire straits’) had me scampering for a Lloyd Best quote: ‘Palpably, we lack the pegs on which to hang ongoing events, and which would allow us to convert arbitrary detail into a systematic pattern, arithmetic into algebra, the specific into …
Read More »Noble: The cost of our polarisation—where ‘do them back’ gets us
In a week shortened by the long Easter weekend, we ended up exhausted and battered. While our neighbours in St Vincent contend with a raging volcano, we wreck our society. They would lose their livelihoods, and some will need to be evacuated outside of the country. We are voluntarily destroying …
Read More »Camille: All mechanisms in Parliamentary Standing Orders remain intact, despite Opposition complaints
“[…] Let me also point out that even though because of the Covid-19 restrictions the speaking time has been reduced, we have not removed any of the mechanisms provided in the Parliamentary Standing Orders—whether it be Questions, Motions, Privileges and the Standing Orders themselves—that regulate the operation of the Parliament. …
Read More »Daly Bread: Jab Zeneca tun’ ol’ mas; how the gov’t botched its ‘vaccine roll-out’
It is now clear that the government was vainglorious in suggesting it had a definite, phased Covid-19 vaccination programme. It used the gift of vaccines, which it so ungraciously accepted from Barbados, to mamaguy us. The extent of the mamaguy was underlined when a television station ran again last week …
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