Guyana chronicle e paper 12 06 2017

Budget caters for key Moruca bridge, radio station Page 23

No. 105118

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 6, 2017

Price: $80 (VAT Inclusive)

‘No Cabinet blessings’

… Min. Harmon shocked at laying-off of Rose Hall workers … stresses fair treatment, adequate notice Pa8ge

‘People before profits’ …Pres Granger tells UN forum

Page 3

President David Granger addressing the high- level event on Combating Pollution in the Extractive Industries at the United Nations Environment Assembly in Nairobi, Kenya, on Tuesday (UNEA photo)

Guard admits killing West Berbice woman Page 3

Big push for telecoms liberalisation …ministry preparing foundation Page 9

for new regulatory regime

Linden fire leaves 10 homeless Page 23

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Turn aspirations into actions’

GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

–President urges UN Environment Assembly

PRESIDENT David Granger on Tuesday said that if the theme of this year’s United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA), ‘Towards a Pollution Free Planet’ is to be achieved then world leaders must find a way to translate aspirations into actions.

The Head of State, during his address to the High Level Segment Opening of the Third Session of

the UNEA, which is currently underway in Nairobi, Kenya, proposed a four pronged approach, which focuses on (1) information, education and communication, (2) cooperation, (3) international organisation and (4) legislation and regulation.

Pointing out that small states are limited in size, human resources, technology and capital, the President said that they cannot effec-

tively eradicate pollution on their own. Small states, therefore, he said need the support of international organisations to propel the processes of public education, international cooperation and capacity-building necessary for ensuring people’s entitlement to a clean and healthy environment.

President Granger said that the Assembly must be cognizant of the fact that not all states are created equal and their different endowments must guide the fourpronged approach.

The first approach of his proposed four pronged plan calls for a focus on information, education and communication that extended through a sustained campaign aimed at raising awareness on the urgency of eliminating pollution at the level of citizen, household and community in all countries. “It is not to be assumed that peoples everywhere are aware of the consequences of contamination and pollution.

Poverty reduces peoples’ range of choices. Persons in remote areas might be ignorant or uninformed, leading to risk-taking or recklessness,” he said.

Secondly, the President said that cooperation should be strengthened to ensure that states, particularly small states, can benefit from the transfer of technologies and can access international financing to support programmes to reduce

pollution. Thirdly President Granger called for an international mechanism, which drives an organised approach to building partnerships and matches small states with the resources they need to fight pollution. “The world needs an international organisation to drive cooperation, collaboration and coordination to ensure a pollution free-planet. The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) is that organisation. UNEP must be supported by all members of the United Nations, in fulfilling its mission,” the President said.

But more importantly, the President said that legislation and regulation to promote environmental security must be comprehensive and be backed by robust enforcement. “Much of the pollution in the mining and forestry sectors takes place in remote areas, away from the main population centres. This isolation can conceal lawlessness.

It makes it difficult, also, to enforce environmental laws. Given the transnational potential of pollution, municipal laws must reflect the principles of environmentalism contained in international agreements and conventions. A sustained public information and education campaign, the intensification of cooperation, a strong international environmental organisation, and the robust enforcement

of environmental laws form the bases for ensuring a safe and healthy environment for all of earth’s citizens,” he said.

To this end, the President said that as Guyana embarks on its journey to becoming a ‘green state,’ it recognises that “… a life of dignity and well-being” is linked to the protection of the environment.

“Guyana is setting aside an additional two million hectares of its land mass for conservation, bringing the total protected area system to 15 percent of the country’s territory. Guyana’s ‘Constitution’ provides that: “Everyone has the right to an environment that is not harmful to his or her well-being.”

Conservation is a vital tool in preserving and protecting biodiversity, freshwater sources and the integrity of ecosystems.

It promotes the production of environmental services which support life on earth,” he said.

The ‘green state’, he said, can become a model of environmental stewardship. He noted that it can show how small states can play a big role in protecting the world’s air, water and land from the threat of pollution. “A pollution-free planet is consistent with people’s entitlement to live in a clean and healthy environment. It promotes the environmental security of small states. That en-

President David Granger titlement can be realised through support for an extensive information, education and communication campaign aimed at raising awareness of environmental responsibility, international cooperation, international organisation and legislation aimed at giving effect to principles of international environmental law,” President Granger said.

The Assembly, which commenced on December 4, 2017, will run until December 6, 2017.

According to the UN’s website, this year’s UN Environment Assembly will be a sustainable and climate-neutral event that aims to deliver a number of tangible commitments to end pollution in all its forms. (Ministry of the Presidency)

‘People before profits’

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GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

… Pres. Granger tells UN forum citizens must be at heart of development of natural resources

PRESIDENT David Granger has reiterated that citizens must come before any profits as the world’s natural resources are the patrimony of all humanity. He was at the time addressing the high-level event on Combating Pollution in the Extractive Industries at the United Nations Environment Assembly in Nairobi, Kenya.

The Guyanese leader also used the opportunity to propose a three-pronged approach, which can help primarily small states with their fight against pollution and protection of the environment. “People, therefore, must be at the heart of the development of our natural resources. People must come before profits. The pursuit of profits has been accompanied, over the past century, by an exponential increase in extractive industries. This expansion, however, has aggravated environmental damage, which can have a long-lasting and harmful negative impact “…on human dignity and well-being”,” the President said.

The Head of State said that pollution in the extractive industries threatens environmental security and it increases human vulnerability to human-induced

environmental degradation and impacts on human security. While extractive industries have made inestimable contributions to the economies of low-income and middle-income countries, the President said that these measurable economic benefits are associated with air pollution, biodiversity loss, freshwater and oceanic contamination, greenhouse-gas emissions, land degradation and resource depletion.

“Pollution, within extractive industries, threatens human well-being and life.

It can undermine production, impair human health and damage the physical environment. Environmental security, therefore, is a cross-cutting concern with economic, political and social implications. Combatting pollution in extractive industries requires a holistic response,” he said.

On this note, the Head of State said that Guyana is prepared to play its part and is pursuing a holistic approach to the exploitation of its natural resources. “Guyana’s ‘Green State Development Strategy’ will become our blueprint for moving towards becoming a ‘green state.’ The ‘green state’ will exemplify the policy of placing people before profits. The ‘green state’ will

President David Granger is accompanied by President Uhuru Kenyatta of Kenya (centre) and President Anthony Carmona of Trinidad and Tobago (right) at the United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA) in Kenya (UNEA photo) demonstrate how our extractive industries – bauxite, diamond and gold mining and logging – can be aligned with the protection of our environment, the preservation of our biodiversity and the promotion of the generation of energy from renewable sources. The ‘green state’ will become a model of

environmental stewardship.

It will demonstrate the signal role which a small state can play in protecting the world’s air, water and land from the threat of pollution,” he said.

President Granger reminded that Guyana cannot do it alone and requires international cooperation,

Guard admits killing West Berbice woman A WATCHMAN of No.4 Village, West Coast Berbice has admitted to killing waitress, Marrissa Fraser whose multilated body was pulled from a trench in the area on Monday, police have confirmed.

“Please be informed that one of three suspects who are in custody for the murder of Marrisa Fraser of 47 #4 Village,West Coast Berbice, has since admitted to investigators of having

committed the heinous crime. He is 38 years,a watchman by profession and resides at No.4 Village, WCB,” the police said in a terse statement.

Police said their investigation into the murder of the 22-year-old woman will continue. Residents said the woman was murdered and her body dumped into the canal. Her body bore several stab wounds.

Marissa Fraser

international organisation and information, education and communication. “International cooperation should be strengthened to ensure that states, particularly small states, can benefit from transfer of technologies and access to international financing to support programmes to reduce pollution. Guyana looks forward to increased international cooperation between large and small states in combatting pollution. Guyana recognises the need for an international organisation to drive greater international cooperation, collaboration and coordination to ensure a pollution-free planet and Information, education and communication must be extended through a sustained campaign aimed at raising awareness of the urgency of eliminating pollution at the level of citizen, household and community,” he said. Guyana has already

begun taking steps to reduce the level of pollution in its extractive industries. In September the Head of State travelled to Geneva, Switzerland, for the first Conference of the Parties (COP) to the Minamata Convention, where he reassured the international community that Guyana will not only reduce its use of mercury in the mining industry, but will work to eliminate the practice.

The United Nations Environment Assembly is not only the highest authority on the Environment within the United Nations. It is also an ideal platform for bringing together different stakeholders: Governments, Civil Society/Major Groups, Science and the private sector to enable them to work together to tackle the shared and unprecedented challenges the world is facing.

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GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

police revolt Switzerland to return Honduran --amidst tension over election ‘Abacha loot’ to Nigeria THE Swiss government has announced that it will return $320M (£240M) of the money allegedly stolen by Nigeria’s late military ruler, Sani Abacha.

The money was frozen in 2014 by a Swiss court after a legal procedure against his son, Abba Abacha.

Originally deposited in Luxembourg, it is a fraction of the billions of dollars allegedly looted during his rule from 1993 to 1998.

Recovering the “Abacha loot” has been a major priority for Nigeria.

President Muhammadu Buhari made the recovery of stolen assets a major part of his 2015 election campaign, and this will be the largest yet.

Although an agreement to repatriate the money was signed in March, the Nigerian Ministry of Justice, the World Bank and Switzerland have been grappling with legal complications surrounding the return of the money, says the BBC’s Stephanie Hegarty in Abuja.

However, an agreement setting out how the money would be repaid was signed on Monday by the three parties at the Global Forum on Asset Re-

covery (GFAR) in Washington, which means the funds will finally be sent back to Nigeria.

The Swiss government has paid $700M of the “Abacha loot” to the Nigerian government in the last 10 years; the outstanding $320M is the last of the money on Swiss soil,

Sani Abacha

and will be remitted in the next two to three years, Ambassador Roberto Balzaretti, head of the Swiss delegation to GFAR told BBC’s Gbolahan Macjob in a telephone interview.

“The money will be transferred to the Bank of International Settlement in Basel (Switzerland) into the Nigerian government account,” he said.

“It will be used to finance projects that will strengthen social security for the poorest sections of the Nigerian population.”

The money will be paid

in instalments and in small amounts, specifically to finance the National Social Safety Net projects, which would be agreed with the Nigerian government under the supervision of the World Bank with regular audits.

If the first instalment is not properly accounted for, subsequent payment will be halted. This is to prevent the funds from being stolen again, Mr Balzaretti said.

“It is the first time we are having this sort of trilateral agreement, and we feel confident that it will work. Plus, we signed it in the spirit of trust that the money will be put to good use,” he said.

Switzerland said the agreement was in line with its policy on returning illegally acquired assets, and would set a good example for future cases, according to a statement from the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs.

“The fight against corruption is one of Switzerland’s priorities,” Swiss Foreign Minister Didier Burkhalter said, adding that the move should “strengthen social security for the poorest Nigerians”, AFP reports.

(BBC)

HUNDREDS of members of the Honduran riot police force, known as Cobras, refused to carry out orders to enforce a night-time curfew on Monday.

The curfew was imposed in the wake of a bitterly disputed presidential poll.

About 200 Cobras gathered at the police headquarters and announced they were no longer willing to confront protesters, arguing that it amounted to “taking sides” in the political battle between Mr Nasralla and President Hernández.

strating in the streets in defiance of the curfew.

They were cheered by the protesters, some of whom held up signs reading, “I love the police!”

Reports are that police in other cities also joined their Cobra colleagues in the strike.

Earlier, election monitors from the regional body, the Organisation of American States, said that “irregularities, errors and systematic problems” with the presidential election on November 26 meant they could not be certain of the result.

The head of the observer mission, Jorge Quiroga, also urged the Honduran authorities to carry out a wider recount of ballots.

Electoral authorities carried out a recount of about 6% of the votes on Monday, and have not ruled out a wider recount.

President Hernández has called for “brotherhood, for sanity, for national unity”.

Unlike in previous public appearances, the president did not claim victory on Monday.

The electoral tribunal website suggested that with 99.98% of the votes counted, President Hernández had a lead of 1.6 percentage points over Mr Nasralla. (BBC)

The Cobras out on the streets of Tegucigalpa, the Honduran capital, on Tuesday

The electoral authorities say incumbent Juan Orlando Hernández has an unassailable lead, but have not yet officially declared him the winner.

Rival candidate Salvador Nasralla has cried foul, and his supporters have been on the streets protesting. At least three people were killed as protests turned violent last week.

“We are rebelling; we call on all the police nationally to act with their conscience,” one masked officer told Reuters news agency.

“Our people are sovereignl we cannot confront and repress their rights,” another officer said, reading from a statement.

Some of the striking police joined supporters of Mr Nasralla, who were demon-

Spanish police go bananas --make big cocaine bust on shipment from Medellin

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ALMOST six tonnes of cocaine have been found hidden among bananas on board a ship in the port of Algeciras, in southern Spain.

The seizure by police and customs officers is one of the largest of the drug to be made in Europe in the last two decades. The stash is estimated to be worth $249M (£185M).

The shipment came from the Colombian city of Medellín, and was headed for the Spanish port city of Barcelona.

Police have not revealed what raised their suspicion about the shipment, but after unsuccessfully searching two containers, the third one they opened yielded the cocaine.

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Spain’s Guardia Civil paramilitary police said three people have been arrested: A Spaniard who is believed to be the ringleader of the drugs gang, a Honduran national and a Portuguese citizen. Two more people are also being investigated.

The find is the second largest cocaine seizure to be made in Spain. In 1999, 7.6 tonnes were found aboard a trawler manned by a crew of Russians and Belarussians.

In 2016, 171kg of cocaine were found inside fake bananas in the same port, but this time the cocaine was hidden among real bananas.

Smuggling cocaine among bananas also went wrong for one drugs gang in 2010, when neatly packed parcels of the drug were found by a worker stacking fruit in a supermarket in Madrid. (BBC)

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GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

PMA crafts new social EU makes new Caribbean blacklist media guidelines --for Caribbean journalists

BRIDGETOWN, Barbados, CMC – New social media guidelines for Caribbean journalists and media practitioners were launched on Tuesday, with the United Kingdom-based Public Media Alliance (PMA) warning that social media can no longer be ignored.

The PMA, which is the largest global association of public service broadcasters, launched the “Social Media guidelines” in collaboration with the UNESCO Caribbean Cluster Office.

“Social media can’t be ignored, and it can no longer be an afterthought; it is now an integral part of the output for any 21st Century media house,” PMA said, adding: “Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, WhatsApp, are all platforms where citizens seek information and news.

“To survive and thrive, established media companies need to embrace social media platforms as an intrinsic part of their daily editorial, production and commissioning processes.

“Public broadcasters and

established media houses have a reputation for trust and credibility. These new guidelines ensure that journalists use the same principles when using social media platforms.”

Among the PMA’s membership are those organisations that communicate daily, and free of charge, through television, radio and online.

The PMA, formerly the Commonwealth Broadcasting Association, has a long tradition of producing editorial guidelines for broadcast journalists.

It said many of the basic rules still apply to social media, but that New Media technologies also require new rules and guidance.

With funding from the UNESCO Caribbean Cluster Office and the Jamaica-based RJR Gleaner Communications Group and support from the Barbados-based Caribbean Broadcasting Union (CBU), the PMA said it worked with media professionals in the Caribbean to develop the new guidelines for social media use by professional journalists.

“These new Social Media Guidelines were initially developed during a three-day workshop, supported by the UNESCO Caribbean Cluster Office, with inputs and feedback from media professionals and organisations in the Caribbean.

“Adopting a clear set of agreed and published guidelines will aid in the protection of media professionals, media companies and social media users.”

The PMA said that it has frequently been asked for guidance as new technologies are evolving the way public service broadcasters communicate with their audiences.

“It is to meet this demand that these guidelines have been produced. The hope is that the guidelines will help new and existing broadcasters in the Caribbean to identify the essential ways in which public service broadcasting and its characteristics can be preserved and strengthened, within the context of emerging technologies and social platforms.”

BRUSSELS, CMC – Four Caribbean Community (CARICOM) countries were named Tuesday in a new list of global tax havens released by the European Union.

EU finance ministers said that Barbados, Grenada, St. Lucia, and Trinidad and Tobago were among 17 countries on the blacklist of tax havens, after 10 months of investigations by EU officials.

Caribbean countries have, in the past, been very critical of being included on these lists, insisting that they have done everything as outlined by various European organisations like the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

The finance ministers, who met here on Tuesday, also named American Samoa, Bahrain, Guam, South Korea, Macau, Marshall Islands, Mongolia, Namibia, Palau, Panama, Tunisia and the United Arab Emirates among those countries that have been blacklisted.

They said the countries on the blacklist were not doing enough to crackdown on offshore avoidance schemes.

Potential sanctions that could be enforced on members of the list are expected to be agreed in the coming weeks.

The list excludes a number of British Overseas Territories such as the Cayman Islands and Bermuda that were on a previous EU blacklist from June 2015.

Complaints about the methodology of that last list saw it being scrapped and replaced with the new register.

The new list was drafted by the European Council’s Code of Conduct (COC), a group comprised of finance ministers from EU member states. Countries’ inclusion is based on whether a State gives preferential treatment to companies, enabling them to move profits to avoid charges.

Another 47 countries have also been included in a “grey” list of countries not compliant with EU tax standards, but have committed to change their rules.

“This initiative is already proving its value, as numerous countries have worked to meet the deadline for making commitments on the basis of our criteria,” said

Toomas Tõniste, minister for finance of Estonia, which currently holds the European Council presidency.

“But it is also important that we closely monitor the implementation of commitments made by our partners around the world.

“This is not just a oneoff process; we will regularly review and update the list in the years to come. Our aim is to ensure that good tax governance becomes the new norm.”

Members of the European Parliament have criticised the absence of certain countries from the list, with Sven Giegold, economics spokesperson for the Green group, noting that “not one of the most important tax havens has been put on the list.

“The list is politically biased, as relevant financial centers like the United States of America are missing.”

The announcement comes less than a month after the publication of the Paradise Papers, a global leak containing information about individuals and companies holding offshore finances.

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Editorial

GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

First Daniel Williams?

OVER the last two years, Daniel Williams has become Guyana’s most consistent athlete on the track, earning on the international stage his silver medal in the 400M at the 2017 IAAF World U18 Championships, the world’s premier ‘show’ for junior athletes. His achievements should be taken for more than its ‘face value.’

Williams is 17-yearsold (September 2, 2000) and attends the Mackenzie High School (MHS) in Linden, and in 2015, he found success at the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) Examinations, gaining a Grade One pass, four Grade Twos and three Grade Threes in his eight subjects.

Williams would later move to Sixth Form at the same institution, where he completed Unit One at the Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examination (CAPE) and is now in the process of completing Unit Two and also has an

aspiration of studying Mechanical Engineering.

Just to briefly reflect on his last two years on the track: 2016 South American U18 Championships in Athletics – Argentina (400M Silver, 200M Bronze, High Jump silver. He was the only athlete at the games to win three medals). 2017 South American U20 Championships in Athletics – Guyana (400M Silver, High Jump Silver, 4X100M silver). 2017 IAAF World U18 Championships, Nairobi, Kenya (400M Silver).

In 2016, Williams came second to Jamaica’s ‘next Usain Bolt’ Christopher Taylor in the 400M at the CARIFTA Games, but was disqualified for stepping on the line, coming off the turn on the final straight.

Williams is also the most decorated athlete at the National Schools Championships, owning records in the High Jump, 100M, 200M and 400M, competing in the U12, U14, U16 and U18 categories.

Some pundits believe

that this could be the most rounded athlete Guyana has produced in ages, but they are also more concerned about his future and whether his fate would be that of the many who have had similar success stories on the track.

Several colleges on the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) have since come calling, after noticing his growth, especially in the 400M, where his 46.72 seconds was the second fastest in the world.

In fact, Williams, in less than a year, has shaved nearly two seconds off his times in both the 200M and 400M. In 2012, at the IAAF World U20 Championships, held in Spain, Kadecia Baird, competing in the 400M, ran 51.04 seconds to finish second behind Americas Ashley Spencer, but ahead of Erika Rucker (USA). Baird would be the perfect example to use if anyone wants to know what it looks like when a promising athlete lacks the support of the

Athletics Association of Guyana (AAG), the Government of Guyana and the Guyana Olympic Association (GOA).

The American Spencer, since winning gold ahead of Guyana’s Baird, went on to grab gold in the 400M at the World Indoor Championships (2013), gold in the 4x400M relay at the 2013 World Championships, and bronze in the 400M hurdles at the 2016 Olympics in Brazil.

When Baird won silver in 2012, Shaunae Miller of The Bahamas came fourth in the same race.

In 2013 at the CARIFTA Games, Baird was third to Miller in the 400M, and in 2014, the Guyanese won the 400M and was second in the 200M at the games in Martinique.

Today, Miller, 23, is the 400M Olympic Champion, while Baird, 22, is still competing on the NCAA level after transfer to Texas A&M from Nebraska over a year ago. Not since her last showing at the CARIFTA

Games has Baird competed for Guyana on the International stage. To be fair, she has had a spell of injuries, but had rebounded to be fit enough to at least make a Commonwealth Games appearance.

The system in Guyana, especially the GOA, has failed Kadecia Baird.

Just like Daniel Williams, after, competing on the IAAF biggest stage for junior athletes, she caught the eyes of the world, but, while the people she defeated at the youth level had moved on to Olympic stardom, she (Baird) was robbed of her chance because of the lack of

exposure while she was world-rated. It is imperative that Williams be given the exposure now and not fall prey to the same fate of others. Usain Bolt was 18-years-old when he competed at the Olympic Games in 2004.

He was the world’s fastest Junior athlete at the time in the 200M. The Jamaica Olympic Association (JOA) knew Bolt would not have medalled, but, they ensured that he (Bolt) was given the platform to introduce himself to the world and set the tone for the man we celebrate today as the fastest in the world.

Sugar workers need to dump the PPP if Guyana is to move forward Dear Editor, ONE of Guyana’s biggest hurdles to political reform and economic progress is sugar workers seeming blind and unstinting support of the PPP in the face of all available evidence that the PPP is a rogue organisation, and the fact that the PPP essentially crippled the lives of sugar workers themselves.

Sugar workers need to recognise that they have been used by the PPP. This is evident in the fact that it was sugar workers who consistently provided votes for the PPP to remain in office during its 23 years in office, and it is also the sugar workers who suffered much and probably more than most Guyanese, under the PPP’s

terms in government. They were systematically abused by the PPP for political gains, the abuse beginning with the manipulation of the leadership of the union representing sugar workers.

Notwithstanding the fact that the majority of sugar workers did not enjoy any kind of welfare to speak of, discussions with a number of individuals revealed that a large majority of sugar workers were deprived of a proper primary and secondary education, leaving them for the most part without the skills to seek alternative job opportunities, incapable of appreciating what was happening to them, understanding Guyana’s own economic and political problems, and how they were effectively being maintained by the PPP,

even with the use of taxpayers’ dollars just to secure their votes at election time.

Sugar workers need to seriously examine what they get from working in the sugar industry. They have to consider whether cutting cane is a viable career, or how they would like to spend the rest of their lives earning their keep. Are they satisfied with the life of a sugar worker? Is this something they would recommend to their children? Are their jobs secure? Is there much scope for advancement? And, can they see themselves being able to buy a house or car, or look after their family in times of need and send their children to university? If not, then they need to seriously consider alternative ways of earning a living.

Sugar workers and their families have been plundered by the People’s Progressive Party. They have borne the brunt of much political manipulation by the Peoples Progressive Party at the expense of their welfares.

They need to be treated more fairly. The PPP has never done this.

Sugar workers must first recognise that they were engineered to their current predicament by the PPP. The passage of two-plus years of the Coalition’s administration would not have improved their situation had the PPP been in government, except, that a PPP government would have kept the estates open at the expense of billions of taxpayers’ dollars, and as they did to the Diamond

Estate, gradually close out the severely distressed estates when it was politically expedient to do so.

Sugar workers must understand that Guyana’s sugar industry is coming to a close, and the most they can do is see what they can get at the negotiating table. They also need to thank the People’ s Progressive Party for effectively reducing their lives and available opportunities to next to nothing, when they had the opportunity to do much more than sink US$200 million into Skeldon, which marked the beginning of the end of the industry.

The PPP did not save them then, and they will never be able to provide alternative options for sugar

workers, because if they did want to, they would have done so when they had the chance. Sugar workers can expect nothing from the PPP except another 23 years of using.

Sugar workers must understand that there is no such thing as an educated sugar worker. They also have to understand that the sugar industry was founded on the exploitation of sugar workers, and this will never change. It is unreasonable to support a political party or government that is responsible for destroying your lives.

I submit that Guyana can only move forward if sugar workers dump the PPP. Regards CRAIG SYLVESTER

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GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

NTC should get bigger budget Dear Editor,

THE NTC (National Toshaos’ Council ) executive recent press conference has opened the doors to an expansive debate on the proposed $16M subvention that is supposed to “self-sufficiently” fund the representative body of Indigenous Peoples for the Year 2018.

The atmosphere under which the sum has been considered, speaks volumes of how the present administration, like its predecessor, is trying to financially stifle and control the NTC. The NTC, is a constitutional body and must not fall prey to those who wish to control it for their own political purposes. It is with com-

passion and support for the NTC that I raise these concerns to the persons responsible for this prejudiced situation. One can fully tell that the proposed allocation was pre-meditated and cleverly manipulated by those responsible. The main purpose was for the NTC to be dependent on the Government. Over the years, numerous calls have been made for the NTC to exercise its independence.

How can 16 million be sufficient to fund a body that represents over 200 Indigenous communities with a combined population of over 70, 000 Indigenous peoples in the hinterland regions and on the coastlands? The chair of the NTC, had made it quite

clear that it cost almost four million dollars to hold a quarterly executive meeting. Funding is limited to cater for four quarters and outreaches to communities that continues to face turbulent situations.

The Government is well aware of these many aching situations, including the Tasserene community that is still waiting on a ministerial visit but when? I, would strongly advice the NTC to visit the community and get a firsthand look at what is happening there.

However, I am sure that due to budget constraints, they will never be able to step foot on Tasserene’s soil.

Apart from this questionable proposal, we

Give some awards to the Georgetown City Council Dear Editor, WITH the conferring of awards being undertaken over time to well-deserving persons in Guyana and also in many countries abroad, both to civilians and to persons in the military and paramilitary to recognise their achievements and contributions to society, I believe it would be remiss of us if there wasn’t the creation of special awards explicitly created for and bestowed upon the hardworking officials of the Georgetown Municipality. Some of these awards can include the following: ‘The Country Hopping Trophy’ that should be presented to the Queen of the City for her diligent effort to visit every continent on the globe in her two-year term at the expense of the citizenry, without returning with anything tangible for Georgetown; ‘The Cunning Linguist Award’ that ought to be awarded to a senior staffer of the Engineer’s Department, who spends long hours and late nights in their boardroom only to be found doing nothing but having

boxed lunches; ‘The Birds of a Feather Medal’ which will certainly be earned by the Fantastic Four whose members have hijacked the Council, making all of the decisions for the rest of the helpless councillors and administrators, and who together foisted the notorious Parking Meter albatross upon the necks of the citizenry; ‘The Having it All Prize’ must be given to the special contractor known as `Brother’, `Puri Man’ and `Loan Shark’ for having earned hundreds upon hundreds of millions of dollars over the last two and a half years, without out ever having to bid or tender for the contracts he was awarded; ‘The Wine to the Side Cup’ must go to the Sardine Police; ‘Sally in the Alley Plate’ for their official mouthpiece who seems to always be high on something, sailing around on Cloud Nine, not knowing what is going on in the municipality or in the city, but who seems to be only too ready sign off and have dispatched the recurrent letter that appears in the dailies.

‘The Down to the Wire Certificate’ a must for the City Treasurer’s Department, for ensuring that the

Council is always broke, that they owe every single person and company that they can, in the country, amounting to billions of dollars and who are routinely failing to pay their staff on time and sometimes not at all; ‘The Come for the Cash, Stay for the Lime Accolade’ is well earned by the nearly 200 friends, relatives, church pals and mistresses of the Big Enchiladas of the Council who have been capriciously employed, driving the payroll costs to well over a 100 million dollars a month, with little or nothing to do on a daily basis; and `The King of Illusion Prize’ should be grabbed by the Town Clown, for his illusions of grandeur believing that he is someone of importance thus requiring bodyguards, for planning unrealistically to have modern shopping malls, petting zoos, having an eye in the sky with drones and converting Georgetown into the Green City.

Regards MAGAGULA JACKSON

have also been calling on successive governments to revise the Amerindian Act. This process seems like it will also be dependent on the directions of those at the helm of the administration and the advice of a very controversial figure. This pro-

cess needs to be fair and transparent and not misguided by those with their own political agendas.

Editor, one can only hope that the persons responsible for the budget, are guided by their conscience and do the honorable thing by correcting this

adverse proposed subvention for the NTC and in the mantra of the present administration “ a good life for all”. After all, 16 million dollars is petty cash for some ministers.

Regards DWIGHT LARSON

‘No cabinet blessings’

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GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

… Min. Harmon shocked at laying-off of Rose Hall workers

… stresses fair treatment, adequate notice

By Svetlana Marshall MINISTER of State, Joseph Harmon expressed shock and disappointment at the Guyana Sugar Corporation’s (GuySuCo) decision to issue redundancy letters to sugar workers, saying that Cabinet was not informed but Agriculture Minister Noel Holder said the decision was in keeping with the White Paper presented the National Assembly earlier this year.

For Holder, GuySuCo is duty-bound to do what it has to do. Last week, GuySuCo reportedly started issuing redundancy letters to sugar workers from the Rose Hall Estate in East Berbice, close to a month after government announced that the scheduled year-end closure of the Rose Hall and Enmore estates will be delayed until 2018 since no system is in place for the sugar workers following the closure.

Speaking during the break of the budget debates in Parliament on Tuesday, the Minister of State said he, like thousands of Guyanese, read about GuySuCo’s active decision in the press. According to him, Cabinet was not informed of the decision.

He said though GuySuCo is a corporation, government has a responsibility. “…of course the Government, because of its responsibility to always provide bailouts for it (GuySuCo) and the fact that we have a bigger responsibility of ensuring that there is stability in the nation, that the people of this country, workers in particular are treated fairly, we believe that at least some prior notification ought to have been given of this attempt, this letter that was sent out for these workers,” Minister Harmon told Guyana Chronicle.

He said if Cabinet was notified, and the decision was necessary, measures would have been put in place to cushion the impact. “Having said that I am aware that sometime ago, a long time ago GuySuCo had indicated its intention of taking this course of action but one would have believed that having regard to the several initiatives that are being taken, the fact that the Special Purpose Unit has actually said that they are having some very good responses to their offers, one would have thought that at least they could have dealt with it a little differently,” Minister of State further said.

The matter, he assured, will be discussed at Cabinet and a decision will be made in the best interest of the people.

NO SURPRISE Minutes later, the Agriculture Minister told this newspaper that the decision to release the workers was long in the making, and should not come as a surprise.

He explained that the actions taken by GuySuCo to close the estates are aligned with the State Paper that was presented to the National Assembly earlier in May.

the House that since taking office, the A Partnership for National Unity + Alliance for Change (APNU+AFC) Government has supported GuySuCo with $32 Billion, with a $6.3 Billion allocation in 2018.

Another $2.3 Billion estimated for 2019, he added while noting that capital investment of $12 Billion will be required over the next three years 2018-2020 to ensure that the sugar production targets are met. “Mr. Speaker, despite the magnitude of subsidies there has been no positive impact on the financial state of GuySuCo. The economy simply cannot afford this,” he told the National Assembly.

It was here too that he confirmed that the corporation has commenced the imple-

Minister of State, Joseph Harmon “From the GuySuCo standpoint, there is no cane in the ground, so there is no way you can continue the operation of a factory because the cane has just been finished with the crop. So GuySuCo is duty-bound to do what they have to do,” the agriculture minister stated.

Minister Holder emphasised that the White Paper on the Future of the Sugar Industry clearly stated GuySuCo’s plans to scale down its operations. He said the question now, is, “what happens after January the first?” It was noted that while GuySuCo is responsible for scaling down its operation, the Special Purpose Unit was established to engage investors for the purpose of diversification.

“They are looking at people who are making offers, some people might want to continue the estate as an estate or they might not. A decision is being made that if the people are coming in, they will come in with a new slate, in short, they wouldn’t have to be dealing with the old union, and so on, which is one of the reasons which have contributed to the breakup of GuySuCo…,” Minister Holder posited. He noted that new investors, if needs be, would have to renegotiate with the Guyana Agricultural and General Workers’ Union (GAWU).

Stating clearly that the SPU does not fall under the Ministry of Agriculture, but rather the Finance Ministry, Minister Holder said the unit holds the decision in its hands. For him, at GuySuCo there is no work for the affected. “The problem comes back to what happens after the 31st GuySuCo has no employment for them, that’s the problem.”

Inside of the Parliament chambers, Holder told his colleagues on both sides of

Minister of Agriculture, Noel Holder mentation of the plans for the sugar industry as set out in the State Paper. “The plans call for three estates Albion, Blairmont and Uitvlugt to continue with its canes and sugar operations. Skeldon will be divested, Rose Hall, Providence and Enmore are to be divested or diversified and Wales is scheduled for diversification. In this regard a Special Purpose Unit has been set up to handle the divestment/diversification of these estates,” he reminded the House during the on-going budget debates.

At Uitvlugt cane farmers will account for over 50 per cent of the canes supplied to the factory, Minister Holder pointed out, while adding that efforts will be made to increase on this proportion. “With improvements in productivity, cane yields are expected to rise from the current levels of 55 tonnes cane per hectare to 78.43 tons cane per hectare in 2018, a 41 per cent increase.

The improvement in yields will see the three remaining estates attaining close to their productivity potential.

Sugar production will rise from 115,447 tonnes sugar in 2018 to 145,247 tonnes in 2020, an increase of 26 per cent,” he stated.

CHANGES In its quest to counteract the effects of the changes in the EU sugar regime, GuySuCo is aiming to produce plantation white sugar to sell into the local, CARICOM, and USA markets. With other CARICOM sugar producing countries also planning on producing plantation white sugar, the strategy is to displace the importation of refined sugar regionally.

The application of a CET on extra regional refined sugar would greatly assist in this regard, Holder posited.

People’s Progressive Party (PPP) Member of Parliament Komal Chand, in making his contributions to the debates, bemoaned the state of the Sugar Industry. He said one cannot ignore the plight faced by the sugar workers at the Wales Estate.

“I cannot refer to sugar without calling attention to the sad situation that the people of Wales face. The budget avoided mention of Wales. It seems that the Administration wants us to forget about the depression and desperation that it created along the West Bank of Demerara,” Chand told his colleagues on both sides of the House.

“All the glorious plans for non-sugar diversification at the Estate location seem to have evaporated and as we meet here, a number of workers who were retained are being let go, compounding further the misery that has gripped the area,” he added.

The PPP MP used the opportunity to object to the State Paper on the Future of the Sugar Industry, contending that it has not received sufficient Parliamentary attention.

PPP MP, Komal Chand

GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

Big push for telecoms liberalisation

9

– ministry preparing foundation for new regulatory regime

By Ariana Gordon HIGHLIGHTING her ministry’s projections for 2018, Minister of Public Telecommunications, Catherine Hughes on Tuesday disclosed that full liberation of the telecommunications sector will not be achieved this year as negotiations between Government and Atlantic Tele Network (ATN), the parent company of the Guyana Telephone and Telegraph Company (GTT) are yet to be completed.

Minister Hughes was at the time making her 2018 budget debate presentation before the National Assembly. She said her ministry is working on a number of preparatory activities for the commencement of the new regulatory regime given the passage of the Telecommunications Act 2016.

The Public Telecommunication Ministry and the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) have been negotiating with the Guyana Telephone and Telegraph Company (GTT) and Atlantic Tele-Network (ATN), with the aim of ending GTT’s claim to a monopoly over international voice and data transmissions and domestic wireline service. The minister had publicly expressed the hope that the telecommunications sector would have been fully liberalised before year-end.

Hughes said there are two main areas to be focused on, pointing to the ATN negotiations and preparing the regulations which will be managed by the telecommunications agency.

“Preparations for this new agency are moving apace, but as I said before, its ‘birth’ will come about when the negotiations come to a close with Atlantic Tele Network Incorporated, the parent of GTT. To date, we have completed the agency’s structure, job descriptions, financial regulations, staff manual administrative procedures for commencement in the first quarter in 2018,” the minister stated.

Back in October, Government had announced that Cabinet granted approval for the establishment of the Guyana Telecommunications Agency and the commencement of the Telecommunications Act 2016.

The establishment of the agency is the first of two phases that would allow for the full implementation of the Telecommunications Act. “This phase being implemented from October 1 to December 31, 2017 will involve the formation of the agency as a body corporate

in accordance with the Act as well as a number of essential administrative and organisational activities which will include staffing of the agency and the finalisation of licensing procedures in preparation for liberation and new licenses to be issued to telecommunication entities,” Minister of State Joseph Harmon had told reporters.

At the end of that phase, the Telecommunications Agency is expected to be in a position to absorb the functions of the National Frequency Management Unit (NFMU), and to have capacity to deal with the additional regulatory functions mandated by the Act. Moreover, they will soon be subsumed within the Telecommunications Agency, Hughes stated.

She explained that efforts are continuing to ensure that with the merger Guyanese broadcasters are prepared for the analogue to digital transition.

At the end of July, consultations were held with television broadcasters about the transition from analogue to digital terrestrial television broadcasting.

“The NFMU is the ‘driver’ of this process. The consultations were to discuss the “Roadmap” to transition that will guide the conversion process. It is part of the overall strategy to allow Guyana to catch up and keep up with fast advancing technologies being implemented by the countries we are connected with through trade, and otherwise,” said Minister Hughes.

Additionally, the minister said the National Broadband Project, which is a threeyear project estimated at US$37.6M is slated to begin in the latter half of 2018. This project, she said, will upgrade the eGovernment Network to enable equitable delivery of services to citizens in the areas of education, health, security, government administration, business, citizenship and immigration.

An application has since been submitted to the China EXIM Bank for a loan to have the project executed.

Government is currently awaiting approval.

10-YEAR STRATEGY Minister Hughes also spoke to a nationalistic 10-year strategy which is based on two pillars: the growth of ICT as an independent sector and its application as a cross-cutting component in all other sectors.

Those sectors include governance, science, inno-

vation and the creative industries.

“The strategy is well underway and the next stage is to begin the multi-stakeholder consultation process that will include members from all the sectors,” said the public telecommunications minister, who noted that the objective of the strategy is to create jobs for young people, thereby reducing unemployment across the country.

Hughes said too that new legislation will be enacted to address the ‘information age’.

She noted the Intellectual Property Protection legislation while noting that Guyana would be unable to position itself as a credible offshore provider of ICT and other knowledge-based services unless investors and potential clients are certain that their intellectual assets would be protected.

The Ministry of Public Telecommunications along with the Ministries of Business and Education will soon start a review of the existing legislation.

Additionally, the e-Commerce/e-transaction legislation will support the ability of entrepreneurs to transact business in the Internet space with legal protections and validations while a robust Cyber Security policy will support this legislation, the minister told the House during the second day of budget 2018 debates.

Meanwhile, a knowledge-driven, e-ready population with a focus on people in rural and hinterland areas who are usually left out is continuously being rolled out.

Minister Hughes said her ministry in association with the Ministries of Education and Business as well as the private sector will develop comprehensive, agile training programmes to prepare citizens to compete for employment domestically, in the region, and to prepare them to operate their own businesses.

“For Guyana to develop and maintain a competitive edge, the curricula at all of our educational facilities from the primary level must be aggressively strengthened with a technological-focus,” she told parliamentarians.

AWARENESS ACTIVITIES In that regard, that ministry has begun its citizen outreach and awareness activities as part of the overarching plan to develop the ICT sector.

“This involves building

an internal media platform to disseminate information and encourage feedback and collaboration. Our Industry and Innovation Unit has responsibility for management of the ministry’s social media presence,” Minister Hughes explained.

“Our outreach and education services also include capacity building seminars, hackathons and Code 10-year Sprints. The primary purpose is to encourage citizens to get involved in nation building with innovative ideas,” she continued.

Additionally, the ministry intends to seek out an animation expert next year to create an animation and game design curriculum to train local IT instructors in the growing field.

“Well-trained animators should be able to enlarge the animation production group that already exists, and ultimately enable Guyana to offer candidates for CXC’s Animation & Game Design subject at the CAPE level,” the minister posited. She

also noted that a series of hackathons will be hosted next year to identify talented persons who could be pushed to establish their own businesses.

Given the outlined plans, the Ministry of Public Telecommunication intends to have a draft national ICT plan to provide the policy and technical direction for the Government of Guyana which will also see the completion of legislation for electronic transactions and data protection to be submitted to Parliament.

The refined Intellectual Property legislation is also expected to be completed.

Meantime, people in remote communities will be exposed to the benefits of ICT via free, easy access to the Internet and national outreach programmes, Hughes stated.

Additionally, citizens from across the country will be prepared for employment as a result of the short- term training courses to be provided. The minister disclosed

Minister of Public Telecommunications Catherine Hughes too that at least one Coding Academy is to be created with support from her ministry.

A study is to be completed which suggests the terms and conditions and other major components for an ICT Venture Capital Fund while a preliminary design and completed feasibility study for an ICT Park, is expected in 2018.

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GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

The commoditization of our 'Vagina fears'

By Akola Thompson VAGINA. It has always been a word that rolls off the tongue a bit too awkwardly for me.

It has always struck me as an incredibly clinical word – a word you should be ashamed to utter. The word has always been seen as something with negative connotations. It has always been a word you whisper, feeling almost guilty of something for saying it. It has always been a word that would make persons glance at their vaginas and feel ashamed.

This is not surprising. It has a lot to do with the way in which gendered approaches to anatomy have consistently castigated the vagina as something unworthy to be discussed and celebrated.

Twenty-one years ago, Eve Ensler wrote an episodic play dedicated to discussing the vagina. The play displayed a diverse set of women and their vagina-related experiences. Ensler’s The Vagina Monologues, became an important conversation piece in the way women’s bodies, particularly their vaginas, were monitored fiercely. When the play was written, Ensler said that, “it was very dif-

ficult to say the word vagina anywhere.

The public utterance of the word alone was explosive as so much of the truth about what happened to vaginas was repressed, denied, kept secret, and coated in shame and self-hatred.”

It is no surprise then that businesses have always been profiting from the cloak of silence and shame in which our vaginas are tightly wrapped. Snake oil merchants have come up with hordes of ideas to get us to spend money that we do not need to spend. They capitalise on our ignorance of our vaginas by selling us “tightening sticks,” “vaginal steams” and “douches,” just to name a few. Of course, no one openly discusses the vagina, so how should we know that these things are dangerous to our vaginal health? They have monetised our fears regarding our vaginas and continue to sell us “solutions” to our vaginas -- but we do not need solutions because there was absolutely nothing wrong with our vagina in the first place. We have continuously instilled in our girls that vaginal functions, smells and excretions are dirty. As a result, we grow up thinking that we need to mask and tame our

vaginas. We always need to keep it in check, right?

Here’s the thing, vaginal smells do not need to be cloaked. Vaginas are supposed to smell like vaginas. They are not supposed to smell like floral breeze on a calm day. Everyone has their own particular smell and that is perfectly fine.

If you are concerned about your scent, then you can place organic fragrances around, (inner thigh, abdomen etc.) but never on your vulva (outer parts of female genitals) itself. Placing things that contain any kind of chemicals in or around your vulva is a big no-no, unless specifically advised by a certified and competent gynaecologist. Also, the vagina is self-cleansing. Douches and sprays upset the delicate PH balance of the vagina and flushes out healthy vaginal bacteria. This leaves your vagina as a sort of safe haven for bad bacteria that can cause some serious harm.

One of the most popular vaginal myths is that of the “loose” vagina.

There has always been the belief that vaginas get loose after frequent sex or multiple partners. That is a myth that is actually kind of laughable. This myth

most likely stemmed out of society’s need to control women’s sexualities and to ensure chasteness and fidelity.

Age and childbirth are the two things actually responsible for the vagina becoming looser. In the case of age, pelvic floor muscles become looser as you age, causing a looser vagina. In the case of child-bearing, the vagina becomes looser than it previously was given the relaxation of the pelvic floor during childbirth. Vaginas often take up to six weeks to heal after delivery. If you want a safe and actual effective way to tighten your vagina, then Kegel exercises are the way to go. Kegel exercises are honestly the mecca of vaginal health and are extremely fun to do. For those of you who don’t know, Kegel exercises involve the squeezing and relaxing of your vaginal muscles. They help to tighten vaginal muscles and prevent a horde of other things such as leaking, which you absolutely do not want.

As an aside, a loose vagina during sex is actually a really good thing.

When women are aroused, their vaginas become lubricated and looser so as to prepare itself to be entered. So, if it’s the case where the vagina is extremely tight during sex, that might not be a good thing as it may not be aroused enough.

This of course can be uncomfortable, so communicating with your partner/s is very important.

The way, in which we truly take care and control of our lives and bodies, is by educating ourselves on it. A happy, healthy vagina is a big part in having a less stressful life. Do not continue to let big and small businesses alike continue to profit off of your fears that are frankly, not fears you should be concerned about.

Your vagina needs no alterations.

A happy, healthy vagina is a vagina that is left alone.

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GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

Figueira broadsides backbencher –– accuses him of suffering from myopia

By Svetlana Marshall A PARTNERSHIP for National Unity + Alliance for Change (APNU+AFC) Member of Parliament, Jermaine Figueira did not back down on Tuesday when Opposition Member Komal Chand sought to discredit the 2018 National Budget.

As the debates continued on Day Two, Figueira told the National Assembly that it is the Opposition Members of Parliament’s “clouded vision” that is preventing them from thinking rationally; that only an irrational person would deny that the $267.1B Budget is a visionary financial document that contains policies that will positively affect the nation way beyond 2020.

Figueira’s onslaught was triggered by assertions made by Chand, who spoke ahead of him during the debates on Tuesday; assertions to the effect that the 2018 Budget is fraught with anti-people policies.

Chand, a back bencher, told the House that the 2018 Budget is a repeat of the previous year and lacks vision. According to him, the budget largely comes across as a “cut-and-paste document; un-original and un-convincing”.

Said he: “It seems, too, that the government, through the Budget, has gone to great lengths to obscure our harsh realities from the Guyanese people.

“Fanciful, eloquent language has been employed, and lofty declarations have been made, but as the last 30 months have shown there is every likelihood that many of the measures may hardly be translated into any concrete and definitive actions at the end of it all.”

One of his contentions is that little or no emphasis has been placed on

raising the standard of living for the poor and working class.

‘WOEFULLY’ DISAPPOINTED “Today, as the workers look hopefully to the government, they are woefully let down. For the people, there is little inspiration that can be drawn from the budget,” he said.

He said, too, that while the government boasts about the removal of the Value Added Tax (VAT) from Education, it must be recalled that it was this same administration that made the imposition, and that it was the determined actions of the people that led to its removal.

“Also, we should not forget that VAT is still charged on electricity, water, private medical care, medication, school supplies and many essential and critical items,” Chand said, adding: “While many of the massive increases in the cost of government services remain in place, clearly the pressures borne by our ordinary working people are continuing.”

Chand, a veteran trade unionist and President of the Guyana Agricultural and General Workers Union (GAWU), brought up the spectre of sugar workers being faced with the sad reality that their pay rates have remained unchanged since 2014, while that of the public servant has been increased by 50 per cent since 2015.

And the reason they’re being treated so shabbily; left out in the cold, he said, is because the Sugar Industry lacks leadership.

With reference to the government’s decision to scale down the operations of the Guyana Sugar Corporation (GuySuCo) due to the poor state of the

industry, Chand said he is convinced that something can be done to save the industry, and safeguard the thousands of jobs it has helped create.

“As we get ready to celebrate, in a few days from now, Christmas, thousands of sugar workers are being made redundant and must face a dismal future,” he said, voice redolent with despair.

“It is depressing to imagine the situation in the sugar belt at this time; this is a heart-rending situation and will surely be assessed as a defining feature of this dispensation,” he added.

UNWAVERING SUPPORT Taking to the floor, Figueira, who by then had had enough of Chand’s fearmongering, declared his unwavering support for the 2018 National Budget.

In rebutting the claims put forward by Chand, he told the House that the government has long demonstrated its commitment to GuySuCo. “Mr. Speaker, no man in a rational state of being will deny that this government has not demonstrated its commitment to GuySuCo and its workers, with its continued provision of billions in subsidies each year since it took office,” Figueira said.

“The question one should ask, Your Honour, is: ‘When should this end?’ since these demands keep getting greater and greater.”

Speaking from the government side of the House, the Linden-bred MP said it must be recalled that the Sugar Industry’s present conundrum blossomed under the PPP, a fact that the GAWU is fully aware of.

“Honourable Member Chand was always on the PPP’s side; even as GuySuCo fell to pieces. Hence,

he is guilty by association for the present state of GuySuCo’s dilemma. And one only has to look at the cost of work stoppages, he presided over during the last 40 years,” Figueira contended.

He, however, hastened to assure the House that it’s not that he’s not mindful of the plight now faced by sugar workers.

“Mr. Speaker, I am from a place that lived unemployment under the PPP administration, and thus I am qualified to empathise

on issues of job displacement,” he said, adding: “My Region, Mr. Speaker, lost hundreds of jobs in bauxite and gold during the PPP reign; and things were never the same since, but we had to move on.

“The people of Region Ten, despite being beaten to the ground, like the bauxite dust, we still rise without the many options our brothers and sisters of GuySuCo are being offered by this caring government to start anew.”

APNU+AFC Member of Parliament, Jermaine Figueira

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GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

Budget speaks to decentralised governance -Min. Bulkan tells House

MINISTER of Communities, Ronald Bulkan, has rejected claims by Leader of the Opposition Bharrat Jagdeo on the 2018 budget, noting that the budget furthers decentralisation of the local government system.

During his presentation on the 2018 budget debate

on Tuesday, Bulkan said that it has been widely reported that Jagdeo has labelled the budget as lacking vision and uninspiring.

He offered a different view.

Bulkan said that the budget speaks to decentralised governance and empowerment of people to manage their own affairs at the re-

gional, municipal and local levels. He said it places community participation at the fore of development.

He accused Jagdeo of being the main architect of local government stagnation, stifling the local government system and depriving the system of needed resources. He also accused

the opposition leader of advising local leaders from participating in rebuilding of the local government system which he noted will benefit communities.

He said budget 2018 caters for the government vision for local government and makes available the capacity and resources Minister of Communities Ronald Bulkan for people to chart their courses. As he noted, the M$1.6 sum allocated for local government, Bulkan said that in 2018 funds will go towards participation in the process, institutional strengthening and capacity-building, funding for councils, water and housing as well as to the Local Government Commission and 37.9B to regional development.

He said that a new initiative on the regional development is the promotion of the regional agricultural and commercial exhibitions which he noted will be held annually in each region. He said the exhibitions will showcase and promote local products and will be held in conjunction with several other government ministries, the private sector and other key stakeholders.

Admittedly, Bulkan told the National Assembly that indeed the Public Sector Investment Programme (PSIP) has suffered setbacks; he however noted that the overall endof-year projection will see the implementation rate being at 94% as he noted its shortage of reaching its projected aim. To this end he said that government is not shy of acknowledging its shortcomings.

Bulkan said all hinterland regions have enjoyed 10% or more in the 2018 budgetary allocations, as he noted several projects which will see schools and other public facilities being constructed in the country’s administrative regions. The capital allocations for the administrative regions will see an increase of some eight percent in 2018.

Addressing regional development, Minister Bulkan explained that the highest allocation of $544M will go to the Region Six, East Berbice-Corentyne,

while the smallest provision of approximately $226M will go to Region Eight, Potaro-Siparuni.

He added that all the hinterland regions will enjoy increases of 10 percent or more in allocation.

Meanwhile he explained that “Proposed recurrent allocations stand at $33.8B, an increase of more than $2B.” Minister Bulkan underscored that in 2017 the Regional Democratic Councils (RDCs) had received government funding of approximately $35.5B; recurrent appropriations-$31.6B and capital investments-$3.9B. Other regional developments achieved in 2017 and highlighted by the minister include the promotion of Regional Agricultural and Commercial Exhibitions (RACE) and the National and Regional Development Consultative Committee (NRDCC). RACE, Minister Bulkan indicated is to spur and support local economic development. Minister Bulkan pointed out that RACE will be held annually in every region and the exhibitions will showcase and promote local products in their respective regions.

The NRDCC, he reminded, the opposition boycotted and declared that “this time we do not expect a repeat of the boycott and we look forward to engaging the regional leadership in issues critical to the development of their respective regions. Regarding the Local Government Commission (LGC) & Guyana Association of Municipalities (GAM), Minister Bulkan indicated that budget 2018 provides $110M and $10M respectively.

Meanwhile, opposition Member of Parliament, Collin Croal, during his presentation called on Minister Bulkan to pay attention to the actions of the Regional Executive Officers (REOs), noting that the officials should be made to recognize that RDCs are the authority in the regions.

Croal, who supported his opposition colleagues in their non-support of the 2018 budget, noted that the opposition is willing to work with government at the level of local government, however he alleged that the opposition- controlled Regional Democratic Councils (RDCs) are being bypassed.

13

Gov’t in talks with CI

GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

–– to help deliver on ‘green’, prosperous-state promise

GOVERNMENT is currently in discussion with Conservation International (CI) on ways the organisation can help it deliver on its Green-State Development Strategy (GSDS) promise.

Minister of State, Mr Joseph Harmon, in his capacity as Ministerial Lead on the Environment, co-hosted a meeting here, on Monday, with Co-Founder and Chair of Conservation International (CI),Mr Peter Seligmann,and Board Member Mr. Bob Walton at the Marriott Hotel.

Also present at that meeting were Minister of Natural Resources, Mr Raphael Trotman and Minister of Indigenous Peoples’ Affairs, Mr Sydney Allicock, along with other stakeholders.

Minister Harmon later told the Guyana Chronicle that the Government of Guyana has already embarked on its Vision 2030 proposal for an inclusive ‘green’ and prosperous state.

“The Green-State Development Strategy (GSDS) and some of the challenges we face were discussed,” he said, adding:“I had also spoken of the need for development as oppose to conservation; we are talking about conservation at a time when you have a poor population.”

What this means, Minister Harmon said, is that Guyanese cannot expand or exploit their natural resources, which presents us

with a dilemma.

“We needed technical and financial assistance from international organisations in that regard,” he said.

Noting that Conservation International has long moved away from strict conservation to managing people’s lifestyle to fit into the ecosystem, Minister Harmon said:“You do not altogether disturb somebody’s lifestyle to protect the environment, and there are no jobs being provided for them. “CI has made some offers and presentations which we can provide to Cabinet, and we are prepared to accept their offer of help.”

He said that not only will the ‘greengrowth pathway’ positively transform Guyana’s economy by helping to maximise potential and develop adequate infrastructure to utilise energy resources, but it will also foster economic diversification,job creation and poverty reduction through the production of higher value-added goods and services, greater resource productivity, improved environmental services, and a minimisation of vulnerability to external shocks such as climate change.

The government, he said, has stated its commitment to conservation in several ways, including expanding the terrestrial area under conservation by an additional two million hectares, achieving sustainable management of forests, reducing the environmental and

Conservation International Chairman, Mr Peter Seligmann (left) and Minister of State Joseph Harmon at the Marriott meeting on Monday human health footprint from gold mining, State Development Strategy’ and the 2018 and transitioning to renewable energy.

National Budget; and He said that the meeting with CI was (3) to discuss how the organisation can organised to achieve three main purposes: improve its partnership with the Government (1) To provide an opportunity for two of of Guyana to deliver on its ‘Green-State’ the world’s leading conservation and busi- vision. ness entrepreneurs to share their views on He noted that at the end of their meeteconomic prosperity; ing, he expects that CI’s Chair will be well (2) to provide an opportunity for min- positioned to endorse Guyana’s GSDS viisters and heads of department to discuss sion, and will work with the government in the Government of Guyana’s commitment partnership towards ensuring its support to conservation as expressed in the ‘Green- is in keeping with its vision.

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GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

Anthony urges more vibrancy from gov’t … lauds proposed expansion of agri, forestry sectors

PEOPLE’S Progressive Party frontbencher Dr. Frank Anthony has called on the government to exude more vibrancy in the execution of its mandates, even as he criticised the budget as being anti-working class and claimed that the administration is incapable of addressing critical national matters.

But he commended the administration for its move to expand agriculture, fishing and forestry, noting that it is a “laudable objective.” Agriculture, he said, employs about 21 per cent of the country’s workforce.

In his 35-minute presentation before the National Assembly on the second day of the budget debate, the opposition

parliamentarian said Finance Minister Winston Jordan has taken citizens on “a very expensive journey,” referring to the $267.1 B 2018 budget.

According to him, when the coalition administration’s five years in office concludes in 2020, the philosophy of ‘the good life’ would only be experienced by a select few.

“Mr Speaker, budgets are supposed to be about people. But where are the people in the 2018 budget?” Dr Anthony asked, while opining that there is nothing tangible in the budget for citizens.

“Whether you are a worker, a farmer or a doctor, there is nothing tangible for you in this budget. If you are a child, a

Opposition MP, Dr Frank Anthony youth or the elderly, there is nothing tangible for you in this budget. If you are a woman, a teacher or entrepreneur, there is nothing tangible for you in this budget,” he declared as the government’s representatives heckled.

Unfazed, the MP continued: “This lacklustre budget offends everyone. In just two and a half years, four budgets later, the minister seems tired and the government seems tired. They badly need a rest and perhaps the people should put them to rest.”

Dr Anthony turned his attention to the 2018 targets as announced by the Minister of Finance. He welcomed the announcement that government intends to expand agriculture, fishing and forestry, noting that it is a “laudable objective.”

Agriculture, he said, employs about 21 per cent of the country’s workforce. Notwithstanding his commendation, Dr Anthony chided the government for what he considers to be “talking up the sector.”

“But while the government is talking up the sector, their actions tell another story,” he stated, pointing to a $1.8B cut in the agriculture budget from 2016 to 2017 and an additional cut from 2017 to 2018. “Agriculture has the distinction of being the only sector that has consistently received a cut in the budget allocations, since the APNU+AFC took office. This clearly shows the government intention of down-sizing deemphasising, and downgrading agriculture,” he posited. Dr. Anthony declared that the coalition government has adopted a “narrow-minded approach to sugar,” which he believes will result in a shutdown of major parts of the industry. “Instead of helping by lending a hand to the industry, they prefer to the people and the industry while they are down,” he opined, questioning “Is this the “APNU+AFC good life”?

Meanwhile, in focusing his attention on health, the opposition parliamentarian commended the Finance Minister for stating that the challenges faced by the public health sector are many and varied. Jordan had outlined the drug shortages and procurement problems, along with health infrastructure deficits and disparities between the hinterland and the coastland. However, despite his candour, Dr Anthony made it clear that solutions must be found to fix the problems in the health sector. He told the House that as he listened to Minister within the Ministry of Public Health, Dr Karen Cummings’ budget presentation on Monday night, he was amused. Dr Cummings during her presentation gave the assurance that Guyanese would benefit from improved health care. “But I disagree with her that by her magical pronouncements last night has fixed the procurement crisis of the ministry,” he declared.

He accused the Ministry of Public Health of being “the leading violator of good tender board procedures and norms,” as he referred to the Auditor General Report 2017. Dr Anthony reminded the House of Dr Cummings’ statement in 2016 which stated that her ministry embraced “a new procurement paradigm called open competitive bidding.” The coalition government upon taking office did indicate that there would be no more single-sourcing of medicines and medical supplies.

But the opposition parliamentarian said “the government’s inaction speaks louder than their words,” while referencing the Sussex Street bond agreement.

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GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

PPP MP caught shopping for duplex

THE Central Housing and Planning Authority (CH&PA) on Tuesday said the utterances by PPP/C parliamentarian Nigel Dharamlall that “the people of this country do not want to live in a half home” does not accurately reflect the preference shown by Guyanese for housing solutions.

Mr. Dharamlall during his parliamentary debate on Monday criticised CH&PA housing solutions. CH&PA, in a statement said Dharamlall’s reference to the duplexes which are being constructed by the agency as a part of a range of solutions to meet the huge demand for housing clearly shows his poor understanding of the project. “It must be noted that the construction of duplexes is deeply rooted in data collected over a lengthy period and through various initiatives by the agency,” the housing authority stated.

It was pointed out that Minister within the Ministry of Communities with responsibility for Housing, Valerie Adams-Yearwood, and a team met with Guyanese of all walks of life who indicated their interest in duplexes.

Since the agency is in the

business of building wholesome communities, decisions are made through a consultative process, it added.

The Guyana Chronicle was reliably informed that Dharamlall’s fellow PPP Parliamentarian Joseph Hamilton has received one of the contracts for construction of the said duplexes. To coincide with Independence 2017, the

despite party's criticism agency held Guyana’s first Housing Expo with a model village which showcased move-in-ready homes. That event served as a forum for instructive data collection and also reflected the fact that duplex is a preferred option for some applicants.

“An invitation was also extended to Mr. Dharamlall for the premier event.

This event gained so much traction, that one of his fellow parliamentarians is working assiduously to aid the agency in meeting the demand for housing by the Guyanese people,” CH&PA stated.

Over the past two years, the agency has been tasked with finding fast and tangible housing solutions for thousands of Guyanese. While it was found that many applicants had letters pending pre-qualification from commercial banks, those who acquired homes under the Thousand Homes Project were stranded with crumbling houses.

“Millions of dollars were spent on extensive consultations countrywide to find ways to remedy the backlog in our system. After taking into consideration the cost of land preparation as well as the low occupancy rate in developed schemes, a decision was made to maximise the use of lands. The construction of duplexes is only one such means to achieve this, and it was met with overwhelming support from many Guyanese,” CH&PA added.

Currently, the agency is working with commercial banks that are fully onboard with this project to see that potential beneficiaries can move into their homes for the Christmas.

Mother pleads for help over missing girl THE mother of a missing 12-year-old girl is appealing to the public to help find her daughter.

Sabiena Sheriff 32, sat in her kitchen floor on Tuesday, clutching a photograph of her daughter with tears streaming down her cheeks, as she spoke with the media appealing to them to help get the word out to everyone to come forward with any information that may lead to the safe return of her child, Devina Outar.

“Please tell everyone if they see my daughter to contact the nearest police station or me on 658-9084. We just want her to return home safely and if she is seeing or reading this we want you to know we love you and will not give up until you are home safe again,” the woman said tearfully. The pre-teen left her grandmother’s home in Angoy’s Avenue, New Amsterdam Berbice on June 16th, to pick up an item at a nearby shop but never returned. Her parents and relatives have been searching since then but to no avail.

Sherriff explained to the Guyana Chronicle that sometime in August, approximately two months after her daughter’s disappearance, a primary school friend of her daughter had reached out to her telling a harrowing tale of her and Devina being kept

Devina Outar, missing since June against their will, bound and abused somewhere in the Berbice River by two brothers. The friend said that she, herself, was abducted by their mother but was rescued by her father and a police after she was brought out from the Berbice River and left at a house at Mara, East Bank Berbice.

The distraught mother said this information was relayed to the Police and Child Care and Protection Agency, however, the teen’s story changed when she spoke with the police after some details were not adding up, and in turn accused her of bribery, to tell the tale so that the police can look for her daughter in Berbice River,

an accusation Sherriff vehemently denied.

“What would I gain from bribing a little child,” she asked. “I did not seek her out, she came forward and told me she saw my daughter and said she was still being kept against her will”. Sherriff is also accusing the `B’ Division police of dragging their feet on the case and are not investigating the matter. “As far as I know nobody was held or questioned for this matter, not the woman nor her two sons that the girl told me about they not investigating at all.”

Meanwhile, in an interview with the Guyana Chronicle, ‘B’ Division Commander Lindon Alves refuted the claims made by the mother and said the investigation is still very active. “Only as recent as Thursday, last, another team went into the Berbice River and Canje Creek, raiding several camps in search for the missing girl. We are not giving up despite going in blind and not having a specific location in which we should focus the search on.” He further stated that the teen has given conflicting reports after a confrontation was held with her, along with her parents and the woman she had previously accused of abducting her.

Despite this, he said the police will continue their search for the missing girl.

PPP MP Joseph Hamilton on the construction site where the duplexes are being built at Perseverance

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GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

Two‘Sagga’murder accused further remanded THE two police officers charged with the murder of 64-year-old Godfrey Scipio called ‘Sagga’ a popular Durban Street, Georgetown businessman were on Tuesday further remanded to prison by Chief Magistrate Ann Mc-

Lennan.

Former ‘Best Cop’ Detective Corporal Derwin Eastman and Constable Jameson Williams are jointly charge with the allegation which stated that on October 12 at Kitty, the duo murdered Scipio during the

course of a robbery.

During the cops’ second court appearance, Williams’ attorney, Dexter Todd requested that all statements in the matter be handed over.

Todd noted that in a joint decision he, along with Eastman’s attorney, Nigel Hughes would be moving to the High Court in relation to the matter.

Police Prosecutor Neville Jeffers pointed out that the file was still incomplete since certain matters needed to be cleared up.

The Chief Magistrate adjourned the matter until December 22.

The allegation levelled against the cops stems from Aubrey Bobb, who is also charged and on remand for Scipio’s murder. Ranks from the Major Crimes Unit were able to arrest the two cops days after the alleged trigger man, Bobb, was placed on remand.

Bobb is reported to have claimed that Eastman was the mastermind behind the businessman’s murder, and that he (Eastman) also went as far as to providing him (Bobb) with the gun to do the hit.

According to information received, police managed to arrest Bobb a day

Dead: Godfrey Scipio called “Sagga” after the shooting and after reviewing the CCTV footage attached to the Kitty hotel where Scipio was shot and robbed. The gold jewellery that was reportedly stolen from Scipio, during the robbery, has not been recovered.

Scipio was shot once, just after being attacked and robbed allegedly by Bobb outside of a Kitty hotel.

He was reportedly leaving the hotel in the company of a female friend, and was about to enter his car which was parked in front of the building when he was accosted by Bobb.

According to the Police, investigations revealed that the suspect “discharged a

Ex-convict, Aubrey Bobb round hitting Scipio in the abdomen, then relieved him of his jewellery and escaped on foot in a northern direction.”

Scipio was rushed to a private city hospital, where he was pronounced dead on arrival.

Reports indicate that the true motive for the killing of the popular businessman appears to be an execution instead of a robbery, as investigators discovered it may be linked to the recapture of notorious prison escapee, Mark Royden Durant, also known as Royden Williams and `Smallie’. Scipio was a popular vendor at the Berbice bus park and the prison escapee was caught in a minibus at Weldaad, West Coast Berbice, on October 9 after joining a minibus at the Berbice bus park.

Eastman who turned himself in at CID Headquarters, Eve Leary, Nov23 had posted on his Facebook page, “Good Day all, God is in charge, all will be well, I am innocent of the allegation.”

GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

Ruling in Freddie Kissoon case on Monday

The defendants: from L-R: Jason Abulla, Kwame McCoy and Sean Hinds COME December 11, City Magistrate Judy Latchman is expected to make her ruling in the matter involving Kwame McCoy, former Liaison Officer under the PPP government; Sean Hinds and Jason Abdulla who are on trial for throwing faeces on newspaper columnist, Freddie Kissoon On Tuesday, attorney Latchmie Rahamat who is representing McCoy; Glen Hanoman who is holding for Abdulla and George Thomas who is representing Hinds made their closing arguments which were then addressed

by Police Prosecutor Shawn Gonsalves.

Magistrate Latchman after hearing both sides adjourned the matter until December 11 for decision.

On May 24, 2010 at around 19:00hrs Kissoon had just emerged from Nigel’s Supermarket on Robb Street and had already entered his vehicle when a man walked up to him and threw the faeces in his face.

Kissoon managed to drive behind the perpetrator, who ran north along Light Street then west into North Road before jumping into a waiting white AT 192 Toyota Carina motorcar and escaped.

A soiled Kissoon tried

to intercept the car, but was forced to back off to avoid a collision.

Police sources have since revealed that McCoy had been identified as the alleged mastermind behind the attack on Kissoon, and that Abdulla

Newspaper columnist, Freddie Kissoon and Hinds confessed to the crime while in custody.

Hinds had provided security services to a number of PPP personalities, while Abdulla also worked at the then Office of the President and is now a functionary at the PPP’s Freedom Radio, housed at the party’s headquarters on Robb Street, Georgetown.

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New UG registry commissioned

By Lisa Hamilton

SOME 8,000 students of the University of Guyana will receive better services regarding the handling of their records with the commissioning

of a new registry building on the Turkeyen Campus.

The $86 million facility, officially declared open Tuesday, will provide services to both students and staff.

GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

At left, Deputy Vice-Chancellor with responsibility for Philanthropy, Alumni and Civic Engagement (PACE), Paloma Mohamed-Martin and Deputy Vice-Chancellor of Academic Engagement, Professor Michael Scott along with Assistant Chief Education Officer Owen Pollard and Registrar of UG, Nigel Gravesande, right, unveil the plaque of the new registry (Delano Williams photo) The occasion was witnessed by UG Registrar Nigel Gravesande; Assistant Chief Education Officer (ACEO), Owen Pollard; Deputy Vice-Chancellor with responsibility for Academic Engagement, Professor Michael Scott; and Deputy Vice-Chancellor with responsibility for Philanthropy, Alumni and Civic Engagement (PACE), Paloma Mohamed-Martin.

Pollard, who spoke in the absence of Education Minister Nicolette Henry, said the new building speaks to the progress of the institution.

“It is a step in the right direction and we are certain that in the construction of this building, there will be many benefits on campus, both for the students and staff of the university.”

He also urged those who will occupy the landmark building and use it with care, so as to ensure its longevity in the interest of students to come.

Registrar Nigel Gravesande said the building was built to the tune of $69.2 million and when costs for furnishing and other electrical work are taken into account, the total expenditure to date, funded by the University of Guyana and the Government of Guyana, amounts to an overall total of $86.2 million.

This, the registrar said, would contribute to a better standard of student services at the registry which currently consists of 57 staff members.

President of UG Students’ Society, Norwell Hinds, congratulated the UG administration, noting that the new building will be of great help to the university See page 19

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GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

The new Registry that was commissioned on Tuesday Deputy Vice Chancellor with responsibility for Philanthropy, Alumni and Civic Engagement (PACE), Paloma Mohamed-Martin presents the plaque of appreciation to Assistant Chief Education Officer Owen Pollard in the presence of Registrar Nigel Gravesande

New UG registry ...

From page 18

community.

“The students of the University of Guyana take pride in contributing our ideas to shaping service delivery here at the registry and generally on the campus,” Hinds said, adding, “More than that, we bring our bank of talents, our resources and our intellectual investments to this community and to take the university forward.”

Hinds also noted that the building is symbolic of the university’s new attitude towards commitment in ensuring consistent growth on campus.

Immediate Past Registrar Vincent Alexander, said the previous building was unsuitable for accommodation of staff and the transformation was a welcomed one.

The Admissions Division of the registry was presented with several laptops by PACE’s Deputy Vice-Chancellor Paloma Mohamed-Martin, compliments of the education resource ambassadors of North America.

Likewise, a crystal plaque was presented from the registry to Pollard for the minister of education in recognition of the support received in construction of the new building and aid of the university in general.

The registry took the opportunity to reaffirm its mission to create a conducive environment for the teaching-learning process and to provide support to the students and departments.

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GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

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GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

Marriott sets the Yuletide ball rolling –– with annual Xmas Tree light-up

THE Guyana Marriott Hotel on Monday evening did its bit to foster the Christmas spirit when it upheld a tradition started three years ago, which is the lighting up of a Christmas Tree in its foyer.

The event kicked off with a medley of Christmas Carols from the Bishops' High School Choir.

Also on hand to help sing along and generally join in the festivities were kids from the Ruimveldt Children’s Home, which the hotel reportedly adopted back in 2014.

As the hotel’s Director of Engineering, Mr Monty Lewis explained, ever since the company set foot in Guyana, it has paid a special interest in the Ruimveldt Children’s Home.

According to General Manager, Mr Eduardo Reple, hosting the tree-lighting exercise deepens that special bond between the hotel and the Home, a bond he says will continue well into the foreseeable future.

The Ruimveldt Children’s Home accommodates about 20 children between the ages of two and 17.

The Home also provides 24-hour care to vulnerable children specially selected by the Ministry of Social Protection.

Kids from the Ruimveldt Children’s Home and members of the Bishops' High School Choir bond briefly at the annual Marriott Christmas do on Monday evening (Photo by Samuel Maughn)

Accused committed for Mall owner murder

THE Preliminary Inquiry into the murder of Regent Multiplex Mall owner Ganesh Ramlall, called ‘Boyo’ came to an end before Magistrate Rushelle Liverpool at the Leonora Magistrates Court with the committal of three men.

Bank Demerara are jointly charged with the capital offence.

Particulars of the charge alleged that the trio on July 5, 2015 murdered Ramlall during the course of a robbery at his home at La Jalousie, West Coast Demerara.

Lennox ‘Soldier Man’ Roberts

Fazeel ‘Javed’ Bacchus

Lennox ‘Soldier Man’ Roberts, Tuschen Housing Scheme, East Bank Demerara; Fazeel ‘Javed’ Bacchus, Anna Catherina, West Coast Demerara and Kurt ‘Banana’ Erskine, Golden Grove, East

On the night of the murder, Ramlall was returning to his home from the washroom in his yard when the men attacked him. They then escaped with his licensed firearm, jewellery and wallet.

It was reported that upon seeing the gunmen, he had raised an alarm and called out to his relatives to secure the house as he began to shout, “Bandit!

Bandit!”

After the bandits escaped Ramlall was rushed to the West De-

The dead businessman Ganesh Ramlall, called ‘Boyo’ merara Regional Hospital where he was pronounced dead upon arrival.

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GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

SN under fire for ‘fake’ letter on President’s security detail

THE Ministry of the Presidency (MotP) has rejected and condemned as iniquitous, malicious and misleading the contents of a letter written by an anonymous author, headlined “Heavily armed military officers guarded the President when he came to speak to school students” and published in the Stabroek News on Tuesday.

A link to that letter was

ther, the President attended both events referenced with a reduced security detail, based on the security needs assessment for those types of events. At the graduation ceremony of the St. Roses High School on Wednesday, November 15, 2017 there were no armed officers in the venue. A similar detail was assigned to provide security services for the President at the orientation ceremony for

claims, which are not only unfairly injurious to the Head of State and the Government of Guyana but also the reputation of the members of the Guyana Defence Force (GDF) and the Guyana Police Force (GPF).

Minister of State in the Ministry of the Presidency, Joseph Harmon in an invited comment rubbished the claim in the letter, as he noted that nothing could be further from

no military officers with any big guns as the letter is seeking to suggest, at any of these two events,” he said.

Minister Harmon noted that despite the recent threats to the President’s life, the Head of State has not increased or changed his security detail and has been moving around the country frequently.

He questioned why a newspaper that parades itself in a cloak of credibility would risk

to them, the easiest thing for them to do was to make a call to the Ministry of the Presidency or DPI [Department of Public Information] or Press and Publicity Department of the Ministry of the Presidency and they would have gotten the facts…But the question I would have is why would Stabroek News carry such a letter, and the clear insinuation in it is that the President is seeking to have

President David Granger and students of Queen’s College in August then shared by the Editor-in-Chief of the Stabroek News, Mr. Anand Persaud on his private Facebook Account, with the caption, “very disturbing…to say the least.”

In the first paragraph of the letter the writer states, “What I witnessed was nothing short of mind-boggling in terms of the level of security amassed around the President during his time at the school.

Army officers too numerous to count and heavily weaponised guarded the building. It reminded me of a recent event at Queen’s College where new students were asked to be present in the auditorium to hear the President speak.

Their parents were kept outside in the yard for almost two hours. When the President arrived heavily armed officers were stationed at all the doorways to the auditorium and in and around the school.”

Security for the President is provided by the Presidential Guard Unit, which is a Unit of the Guyana Police Force.

Security is not provided at any time by the Guyana Defence Force (GDF). Therefore, no ‘Army Officer’ would have been at either of the events in the capacity described. Fur-

new entrants into the Queen’s College Secondary School on Thursday, August 31, 2017.

The Ministry rejects the untruths, which were carried in this letter without any attempt by the publication to verify the aspersions and statements made. It is filled with several spurious and wild

the truth. “Presidential Guards are a Police Unit and there are no military officers who are in the President’s security detail when he travels in this way.

The cursory glance by anyone who was there at those two events would have shown that they were only police officers in black clothes. There were

its reputation by publishing the letter with name of author withheld, without seeking to find out whether its contents were based on fact.

“I think that that its totally rubbish and that Stabroek News as a responsible newspaper, when something like that would have come

dictatorial powers… It really leaves one to ask the question, why would something like this appear in the news and it affects the President himself… I want to debunk that nonsense that is written there as utter rubbish and it should be condemned to the garbage heap,” he said.

Further to this, Chief of Staff of the GDF, Brigadier Patrick West, in an invited comment, said that the Army does not hold responsibility for the security of the Head of State, nor has it ever been asked to provide that service. “We have not provided security for the President for that activity or any other activity. When the President visits our location or bases, we have a closed space here and we provide security in the confines of our bases for the President, but that’s what we do and even in those cases you have the presidential security present,” he said.

Brigadier West said that Stabroek News, at no time, made contact with the GDF to ascertain the veracity of the contents in the letter.

While noting that he is not at liberty to decipher the agenda behind the letter, he said that the GDF’s role is to provide security for the nation, ensure that the integrity of the borders is maintained, aggression is defined and the normal functions of the institution are carried out to ensure a peaceful country. Attached to this release are a number of images captured at the two events mentioned.

These images confirm that the accusations made in the letter are untrue. Footage is also available for both events at the Press and Publicity Unit at the Ministry of the Presidency. (Ministry of the Presidency)

President David Granger seated in front at the St Roses High School graduation. There is no sign of military presence in the audience as was claimed by the letter writer

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GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

Budget caters for key Moruca bridge, radio station

IN 2018 the Moruca Bridge which connects the villages of San Jose with Kumaka in the Region One area, will be completely refurbished.

In addition, Radio Moruca is expected to go on air in 2018, as allocations have been made in the 2018 national budget for these projects.

This and other projects were highlighted by government Member of Parliament, Richard Allen, who told the National Assembly during the budget debates on Tuesday evening that the government has been delivering on its promises to further develop the North West District.

“It’s under this APNU/ AFC coalition government, we are not talking care, we are demonstrating to all Guyana that we will do and take you into that journey,” Allen said. He said that the main roads

The Moruca Bridge will be refurbished in 2018 (Alva Solomon photo) in the region are being rehabilitated, including the main roads at Mabaruma, the region’s capital, which he noted will provide relief to residents living in communities there.

He said in the past the community of Baramita was neglected and according to him improvements in infrastructure, including the construction of

schools and rehabilitation of roads there have added to the development of the area. “The community of Baramita is well on its way to experience the good life,” Allen said. He said too that some persons have been able to acquire birth certificates at the community for the first time.

“So we will fix it, we

are here and we will continue to fix it,” he said of the government’s mandate in the region. Allen told the National Assembly that in 2018, Radio Moruca will add to the services of Radio Mabaruma which was commissioned in the region in 2016. Moruca will also receive a new generating set while a new electricity network will be

established at the community of Arakaka, located in the Matarkai sub region.

In addition, he said the region will receive a passenger cargo ferry; a move which he noted will make life easier for persons who utilise the services of the existing service. Allen said that several schools in Region One will receive new music and sports equip-

ment while he noted that the North West Secondary School at Mabaruma will experience improved laboratory facilities.

As he gave his full support to the 2018 budget, Allen noted that the reopening of the manganese mines in the Matthew’s Ridge area will provide job opportunities for persons living there.

Linden fire leaves 10 homeless

By Naomi Marshall

TEN residents of Linden are now homeless after their house was destroyed by a raging fire last Monday night.

Mark Miggins of the Linden Foundation Secondary School The top flat of the house located at 119 Self Help Housing Scheme Amelia’s Ward, Linden, was burnt completely while the bottom flat was partially burnt.

The two-storey building caught fire around 19:30

hours after a family member who was playing with matches accidentally lit a mattress nearby.

Owner of the house, Dylon Lampkin, 51, who was not at home at the time, said he was informed about the fire by neighbours and quickly rushed home.

“When I got there, the backroom was already engulfed in flames,” said Lampkin.

Lampkin attempted to save items from the home but the raging fire prevented him from doing so. “I tried to save a few things from downstairs but the fire was kinda moving very quickly,” he noted.

Among those homeless is 17-year-old Mark Miggins, a student of the Linden Foundation Secondary School who is preparing to write the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate examinations next year.

Miggins’ laptop and all of his School Based Assessments (SBAs) were destroyed in the blaze.

According to Lampkin,

The upper flat of the house that caught fire on Monday the six children and four adults are now staying at relatives.

“Right now all I’m thinking bout is getting

this place clear up… because the place is a complete mess right now,” said Lampkin.

He said fire tenders

took a while to respond but commended the firefighters for saving the upper flat of the building.

“They took a very long

time to get here but they did a good job when they arrived but the timing was very bad, way too long,” he expressed.

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OP-ED

GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

On the School System, Predators and Society’s Good People

By Ruel Johnson MONDAY 4th of December, marks two weeks since I sent a letter of complaint to the Chief Education Officer, Marcel Hutson, reporting what I had discovered to be predatory behaviour by a teacher at a senior high school, targeted at young female students.

Since that time, this society has gone into an uproar over the disclosures, particularly in the wake of my deliberately making the complaint available to the media and outing said teacher for what I maintain is a two-decade long history of predation.

It is my understanding that the Guyana Police Force is looking into the issue and so I will refrain from commenting further on any specific allegations against the teacher.

What I want to focus on instead is the fact that he was allowed to operate as long he did, this society’s reaction to the revelations, and what are the steps I believe should be taken going forward.

THE SYSTEMIC FACILITATION OF PREDATION A few months ago, I watched the move Spotlight for the first time. Winner of multiple awards, including a Best Picture Oscar, the movie covers the events leading up to the Boston Globe’s investigation into and reportage on the Catholic Church in Boston covering up sex abuse committed by priests in the archdiocese.

In the upcoming months, there is going to be an extensive media coverage on the issue of predatory behaviour by teachers in schools in Guyana and I would recommend watching the movie to try understand what took place, and currently still is taking place.

In investigating the teacher – and here I should state that I have been a journalist for 14 years, most of those as a senior journalist – one of the things that stood out for me was the parallels his early career had with some of the priests associated with abuse in Boston.

Between the years 1997 and 2005, the teacher in question taught at about seven public and private institutions, an average of about one per year – with the exception of one, persons have come forward to level allegations of his behaviour at each. As with the Church in Boston, there seemed to have been some sort of cycle of discovering the behaviour and transferring it elsewhere.

Last Friday, even as Guyana is confronting its own issues with teacher predation, the Toronto-based Canadian newspaper, The Star broke a story about teacher sexual abuse and how transferal systemically facilitated continued deviant behaviour. The story, “‘One wrong just creates another wrong’: How the quiet transfer of teachers over disciplinary issues has led to patterns of abuse in schools”, notes the following: “The Star identified 27 cases heard by the Ontario College of Teachers, the provincial oversight and licensing body, between January 2012 and November 2017. In each case, the teacher had been investigated by their school board, disciplined, and transferred at least once by the time their case made it to a college hearing. In all of the cases, the college’s disciplinary panel — made up of publicly appointed and teacher-elected college members — substantiated allegations of sexual, physical, psychological, verbal abuse or serious misconduct by those teachers. In nine of the 27 cases identified, the teachers had re-offended at their new school.”

For about eight years, the system in Guyana seemed to have passed the problem of this particular teacher on from school to school, institution to institution.

And then came Bishops’. In Spotlight, much of the focus was placed on the role played by the head of the Boston Archdiocese, Cardinal Law, the man who was instrumental in the covering up of sexual abuse and the protection of predatory priests. Around 2006, the teacher who has bounced around from institution to institution, hounded by claims of sexual abuse, would find his most lasting home. Report after report by former and current students, teachers, parents and other persons point to the systemic thwarting of sexual predation complaints against the teacher covering the larger part of his career at Bishops’, spanning headmistresses.

Bishops’ had to have had (indeed likely still has) its own parallel to the Cardinal Law, a person under whose powerful protection a predatory teacher would have sheltered for over a decade.

In brief, during the latter part of the man’s career, the systemic facilitation of predation shifted significantly from transferal to institutional protection.

When the dust settles, and pending what should be an independent external investigation into the administrative system at the school, I expect that this is going to be one of the key revelations concerning why what took place took place for so long.

WHAT THE LAW SAYS AND DOESN’T When it comes to the issue of teacher predation, the law is fairly clear.

Under Section 19 of the Sexual Offences Act, someone in a position of trust is criminally liable if they have a sexual relationship with someone under their care who is under the age of 18. There is a distinction between penetrative sex (by other definition oral, vaginal, anal) and other sexual activity. With regard to education institutions, the prohibition of sexual contact is not relegated to teachers alone, but anyone who is part of the school administrative system, from the security to the cleaners.

The law also says that anyone who is found seeking to prevent a victim’s account being reported to the proper channels is also liable – what this means is that if a student, or parent, were to have sought to report the teacher’s behaviour to the school administration and that report were discarded or ducked, the person or persons responsible for ducking it can be charged. Another section of the law also speaks to the facilitation of sexual exploitation, also criminal under the SOA. Part III, Section 41 of the Sexual Offences Act speaks to the issue of mandatory investigations into a reported offence under the Act, but the major shortcoming here is that nowhere does it refer to the police being obligated to independently investigate potentially connected cases.

When you consider the sociocultural apathy on issues like sexual grooming and the sociocultural tendency towards victim-blaming young women; the institutionalised suppression of complaints that existed or exists within Bishops’, and unclear reporting mechanisms in schools in general; and the poor protections of confidentiality afforded victims in general, what we have is a system that is practically tailored to make the law ineffective in the

case of mass or serial predation.

ON THE CONCEPT OF DUE PROCESS I’ve seen, particularly as pushed by the key lawyer for the accused, that the publicity surrounding the accusations has somehow affected the teacher’s right to due process. This represents a fundamental misunderstanding of how due process in terms of legal procedure works.

If a public allegation is made against someone for a specific crime or act that they did not commit, due process under the law is handled under the Defamation Act, wherein the person making the defamatory statement is liable to criminal penalty of up to two years in prison. Under the Sexual Offences Act, a person making a false complaint can be charged and on conviction sentenced to three years in prison. In essence, the law provides for due process for the accused in the case of both public exposure on a false accusation as well as false accusations to the police.

The area of actual due process that most people seem ignorant of or unconcerned about is that which speaks to the victims of predation having clear and unobstructed systems of reporting. Within the school system, the school administration is both the first line of defence against predatory activity and the primary reporting mechanism in the event that it happens – in brief, it is a critical component of the system of due process. Every single occasion in which a child or parent or teacher approached Bishops’ admin to complain about the teacher’s predatory behaviour and found their complaints ignored or thwarted or berated, due process was grossly interrupted, both in that instant, as well as in terms of future implications. Any current investigator seeking to discover whether indeed he had a history of complaints against him that would make any subsequent complaint credible and therefore cause for dismissal and/or prosecution, would likely find no institutional evidence of such because the system which is intrinsically prejudicial to the teacher, did not likely record such complaints.

What makes the situation so viral in the media is that while most people find grooming young girls to be absolutely heinous, others seem more concerned with the public embarrassment of the individual accused than the private torture of his victims as covered up by the institution.

If there were one category of people here who had the greater right to a presumption of innocence, it is the young victims for whom the system meant to protect them refused to afford due process to them.

LEGAL ETHICS AND VICTIM SHAMING When the accused and his three lawyers – Jerome Khan, Priyanka Sookraj, and Siand Durjhon – among whom was a young woman who could easily have been the target of his advances, held a press conference in response to my general complaint of alleged serial predation against the teacher in question, the purpose was two-fold.

The first was to discredit my motives in bringing the complaint to the Chief Education Officer and to frame them within a non-existent competition of egos between myself and the teacher, including the absurd claim that I would risk a defamation suit and possible dismissal from my senior post in government on the basis of social media arguments in which I was proven ‘intellectually deficient’.

The second, and more sinister purpose

Ruel Johnson of the press conference was to pre-emptively identify and shame one survivor of the teacher’s predation by publicly associating her with me, and then framing my motives against a background of personal jealousy as a flimsy excuse for justification of that public shaming. It was untrue, it was unethical, it was slimy, but it is also quite possibly illegal.

Under Section 62 of the Sexual Offences Act which speaks to Anonymity for the Complainant “publication in any document, or the broadcasting, or transmission in any way, of any information that could identify the complainant or witness to an offence under this Act is prohibited.”

I personally believe that all three attorneys should be subject to censure of some sort, whether under the provisions of the Act or under any governing rules of ethical conduct that govern the members of the Bar. THE MEDIA RESPONSE The media response to this case has been mixed overall with Stabroek News and Newsroom standing out for the breadth of their coverage on this issue.

What continues to be missing overall however is the sort of necessary depth of coverage that this admittedly complex issue warrants. As someone who has been involved in investigative journalism, in editorial management and who is currently responsible for editorial policy in a media entity, I know the constraints of investigative journalism in general. Deep feature investigations like the one featured in Spotlight require resources – human and financial – that media agencies simply do not have at their disposal.

That said, what seems to be missing generally is an instinct or intuition or impetus towards where to look and what for. No one, for example, has sought to investigate a very basic component of the narrative, which is whether or not there was any previous complaint made against any teacher at Bishops’ over a specific period, and if there were, what were those matters and how were they See page 31

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On the School ...

From page 24

dealt with.

The teacher’s record of employment at previous institutions should be critical to establishing whether or not there was a pattern to his behaviour before.

ON GOOD PEOPLE AND AN INVERTED SOCIETY When I first made the decision to actively do something about the teacher predation issue at Bishops’, one person I informed sarcastically and vehemently asked if I felt I had a Jesus complex, meaning a messiah complex, some misguided sense of a burden of responsibility to fix real or perceived wrongs.

While I can easily dismiss criticisms of my motives in this, or defend general attacks upon my character, and can more than ably justify my role, I actually agree enthusiastically with any credible person who says that I am not the most fit and proper person for leadership or even significant prominence on this issue. I am in fact an incredibly flawed man with a less than stellar history with women. I am unkempt and crude and foul-mouthed and I don’t go to church on Sundays. I actually therefore have found it somewhere between appalling and absurd that these young women have come forward to me, and I see it as an indictment of the society that I live in.

Over the past two weeks, I have seen good citizens impugn their own character in trying to defend either the teacher at the center of the accusations or the image of the school in which he was allowed to operate.

One source of angst for me in all this has been precisely how much information to release to the public, and what sort of information best serves the public interest and when.

When I labelled the issue a psychosocial phenomenon, it was because I recognised this quality in Guyana in relation to both the normalisation of predatory behaviour as well as the rejection of even the possibility that it could be even at a fraction of the scale that I’ve discovered it to be, even as people are ironically saying that this is something that is not only widespread but has long been endemic to this society. In essence, we accept that it happens, and has been happening, but we reject the possibility that it would happen at Bishops’ of all places.

Here is what I can guarantee. This situation is much wider than any single teacher, even in Bishops’. It involves not only perpetrators but a system of facilitation that goes from direct suppression of complaints to a deliberate institutional blindness that transcends any single school. It isn’t facilitated by an unkempt, bad boy, renegade government advisors but by good, respectable, churchgoing people with husbands and wives and families, people who were either directly party to what was going on, or for whom image and status were considered more important than the protection of girls who, in their minds, had the primary responsibility to not be lascivious and tempt a respectable man, a good teacher who dressed well and produced good grades for a

good, respectable school.

Good people – parents, lovers, husbands, family, friends – also contributed to upholding the system whether out of shame or fear or of a sense of impotence. Some survivors are wives whose husbands would turn on them for falling prey; some are daughters whose parents know but who don’t want to come forward for fear of a ‘scandal’, or simply don’t want to fathom a conversation with their child about the possibility of what might have happened; friends who blame the survivors for not being strong enough or moral enough.

I stand by what I’ve said because I believe these young women who have come to me, and I believe their friends who witnessed his behaviour, and I believe the teachers who confirmed that it was known in the school. That belief is the basis for my commitment to ensure that there is an institutional change in the aftermath of all this. I know that introspection for the average good person is a painful, often valueless exercise. In every society throughout history, people have accepted a certain communally agreed quantum of dysfunction as the basis for functionality, particularly as guided by sociocultural institutions.

In Boston, the Catholic church was an institution the myth of the sanctity of which was critical to society it functioned in. In Guyana, Bishops’ had a history that was premised on colonial era class and respectability. It is precisely that façade of goodness that allowed such banal evil to fester and metastasize while good people continued to narrow their vision to avoid what would have been right before them.

What has been in the public domain on this issue is the tip of the iceberg. If there is going to be any sort of meaningful inquiry or investigation into the full dimensions of this issue, it is going to take this inverted society into a place of unprecedented darkness and division. Familial, communal and professional bonds will be tested and broken, political pressure will be brought to bear either way, and the system of justice tested on an issue of fundamental decency. It is a process that I believe we have to endure however because the alternative is unspeakable and indecent.

The question for the good people in this inverted place is, what do you intend to do going forward?

WHAT I INTEND TO DO From the moment I recognised that there was an institutional component to the sexual predation situation at Bishops’, I began to plan ahead with regard to how we could create the sort of system that would significantly mitigate its reoccurrence in the future.

Victim accommodation – Firstly, there needs to be a mechanism in place to ensure that the victims that have come forward can share their stories with competent social work professionals and receive the treatment they deserve. In that regard, I am in discussion with a

small organization that has ongoing work with the Child Care and Protection Agency to establish a protocol for doing so. I have also spoken to the group with regard to use their Facebook page as portal to which new victims coming forward can report.

Week before last I requested that CCPA Director Ann Greene assign a liaison officer to monitor the information processing and I’ve already had, through Ms. Greene’s facilitation, a preliminary meeting with that officer to explain the scope of the problem and to show him examples of the complaints I have received. I’ve also spo-

ken to GT&T about assigning a special national hotline for victims of teacher predation and have been informed that this is possible.

Judicial and institutional dimensions – I can say, without prejudicing confidentiality, that at the investigative level there is requisite attention being paid.

However, considering the tragically low incidence of reports of sexual assault in general, the low incidence of convictions in sexual assault cases, the complexity of proving abuse of trust sex crimes, and the unprecedented scope of what has taken place at Bishops’, I believe that this case warrants special attention, both in terms of the school system as well as the judicial system. I reiterate that this is an issue that warrants Cabinet attention as well as action and the degree to which this is addressed, or not, will be

impact the administration social services scorecard.

Continued advocacy – I have reached out to a small group of people who have been passionate about this issue and will assist them in forming a standing mechanism, ideally an NGO or NGO forum that complements the admittedly limited state resources in this area. The central objectives of this mechanism would be to monitor the ongoing investigation into the Bishops’ affair; investigate reports of teacher predation in general, link the victims to partner social work institutions as well as state mechanisms, and monitor cases that enter the legal system; and provide information to the general public on the processes involved in reporting predatory behaviour.

Take a break – While I am committed to this process to

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a certain degree, I am not the least bit qualified to replace what should be institutional and social mechanisms to deal with this issue.

My annual vacation started the beginning of this month. I intend to take most of it, enough to get back to my writing and to spend time with the people that matter most to me, my partner, my son, and my family and friends.

WHAT I DON’T INTEND TO DO …cave in to the very same special interests who turned a blind eye to, or were active participants in, the mechanism that was designed to stalk, groom, sexually exploit and then stifle the voices of the girls of the Bishops’ High School for more than 10 years. Not once. Ever.

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Judge considers defendant’s mental state –– before passing 12-year sentence

By Michel Outridge A REMORSEFUL Adrian McKenzie was on Tuesday sentenced to 12 years imprisonment for the 2010 murder of his 62-year-old mother, when he appeared in the Georgetown High Court before Justice James

Bovell-Drakes.

In an earlier appearance before the same judge, he had pled guilty to the lesser count of manslaughter through his attorney, Mr Maxwell McKay. Justice Bovell-Drakes told the court that it was a very difficult task for

him, considering McKenzie’s mental state, but after speaking with the prisoner’s sister, Samantha, in his presence in Chambers, he had a better understanding of certain things.

He said he’d also sought the advice of McKenzie’s doctor, and after listening to both the Pro-

bation Officer and the Prison Social Worker, he was able to arrive at a reasonable timeframe as it relates to the sentence in which the prisoner can be seen by Dr. Bhiro Harry.

He, however, said that the thing that touched him the most was the postmortem report which in-

A penitent Adrian McKenzie at the Georgetown High Court on Tuesday (Photo by Samuel Maughn) dicated that McKenzie had inflicted certain injuries on his mother which caused her death.

But because of the mental issues he has, he needs to continue seeing Dr. Harry at least twice a month to assess how he’s responding to treatment.

Addressing the prisoner directly, Justice BovellDrakes urged McKenzie to be on his best behaviour, and to utilise whatever skills he has to become a better person in an effort to be reintegrated into society.

“I wish you the best; only you can be the best and stay away from problems,” he told McKenzie.

He also encouraged him to stay on the straight and narrow path, and to make use of his normal life.

McKenzie, on the other hand, told the court: “I am sorry for what I did, and I would like to go to another prison.”

Before the sentencing, Dr. Harry told the court that after gathering information on the defendant and perusing his old medical records, he had several psychological sessions with him before preparing his report.

And, based on his evaluation, he came to the conclusion that while the prisoner exhibits a wide range of symptoms associated with psychotic disorders and needs medical

treatment, he understands when spoken to and can relate to simple questions.

He said he also noted that the prisoner becomes very emotional at the mere mention of his mother, and is under the impression that she is still alive, although he hasn’t seen her in years.

According to Probation Officer, Ms Pamela Atwell, in spite of his troubled upbringing,the prisoner has a sound education but had to leave school due to financial constraints.

But, she said, his mother made sure she enrolled him in a vocational school, which later helped him land a job as a certified electrician.

She said, too, that ever since the family lived in Kaneville, McKenzie had always displayed the behaviour of a person of unsound mind, in that he would often refuse to shower or even eat.

His sister, Samantha, on realising that something was wrong, once took him to the Georgetown Hospital where he was admitted to the Observation Ward.

But, somehow, his angst always seemed to be directed at his mom, as Atwell told the court, back in 2007, he had hit her in the head so hard she had had to be hospitalised for a whole month. Then later, while living in the Rupununi, he was feared by both villagers and relatives alike, and considered to be a ‘mad man’. He was also in the habit of smoking marijuana.

During his incarceration while awaiting trial, he reportedly worked in the prison’s Tuck Shop but usually kept to himself.

And to this day, he insists that he cannot remember ever hurting his mother, Ms. Ethel Andries, much less killing her.

According to reports, it took a posse of able-bodied men from his village to arrest McKenzie and hand him over to the police after he’d beaten his mother to death with a hammer.

The bloody hammer was reportedly recovered at the crime scene.

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Anderson, Root give England a sniff in Adelaide

James Anderson takes his first five-wicket haul in Australia.

By Nick Mulvenney ADELAIDE, Australia (Reuters) - England were 178 runs from a stunning comeback victory in the second Ashes Test after James Anderson grabbed five wickets and Joe Root steered the tourists to 176 for four at close of play on an extraordinary fourth day yesterday.

Root, who eked out a half-century under the Adelaide Oval lights, will probably need to stay out in the sun for much of the fifth day if he is to lead England to a first Test win in Australia in nearly seven years.

Root will resume unbeaten on 67 with Chris Woakes (five not out) keeping his skipper company after Dawid Malan was bowled for 29 by a Pat Cummins snorter shortly before the close.

“We’re delighted to be in a position to have any chance of winning the game,” said Anderson, whose 5-43 gave him his first five-wicket haul in Australia.

“There’s a huge amount of work to do but we’re in with a chance, which we didn’t think we would be after the first couple of days. It would be huge for us.”

Australia skipper Steve Smith will be hoping his bowlers can keep up the pressure on the

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final day and help him avoid the ignominy of becoming only the second captain to lose a Test after not enforcing the follow-on.

“I think we’re still reasonably confident, obviously the last two days haven’t gone to plan but I think we’re still in front of the game,” said Australia bowling coach David Saker.

“But it’s getting closer and closer and Joe’s batting has played a large part in that.” Anderson and Woakes (4-36) had fired England’s resurgence when they did the lion’s share of the work of dismissing the Australians for 138 at tea with a brilliant display of seam bowling.

GROUND RECORD Set a ground record 354 to level the series after last week’s 10-wicket Brisbane defeat, England made a steady start before losing openers Alastair Cook (16) and Mark Stoneman (36) in the last half-an-hour of the second session.

It was to the third session that Australia’s quicks would have been looking to make serious inroads into the England batting. However, when James Vince was quickly caught in the slips off Mitchell Starc for 15, it looked to be going to plan.

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however, with Root first overturning an lbw decision off the bowling of Nathan Lyon and seeing a Smith review fail when the Australian suspected an inside edge.

Smith left his team with no referrals for what could be a tense final day a couple of balls later when he pursued an lbw decision against Malan only for the tracking to show the ball would have gone over the wickets.

Root, cheered on by the vocal Barmy Army of England fans, made the most of the reprieve and reached his fifty with a lovely back cut for four, one of nine boundaries he peppered throughout his 114-ball knock.

Anderson had earlier picked up where he left off in Monday’s night session, dismissing nightwatchman Lyon, a jittery Peter Handscomb and Starc.

Woakes chipped in to see off Tim Paine and Shaun Marsh cheaply, making sure the latter was unable to get anywhere near the unbeaten 126 he hit to underpin Australia’s 442 for eight declared in the first innings.

England had looked certain to go 2-0 down in the series after the inaugural Ashes day-nighter when they folded for 227 in reply, until Anderson finally found his mojo with the pink kookaburra.

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SCOREBOARD

AUSTRALIA 1st innings 442 for 8 decl. (S. Marsh 126 n.o., T. Paine 57, U. Khawaja 53) ENGLAND 1st innings 227 (N. Lyon 4-60) AUSTRALIA 2nd innings (o/n 53-4) C. Bancroft c Bairstow b Anderson 4 D. Warner c Root b Woakes 14 U. Khawaja lbw b Anderson 20 S. Smith lbw b Woakes 6 P. Handscomb c Malan b Anderson 12 N. Lyon c Broad b Anderson 14 S. Marsh b Woakes 19 T. Paine c C. Overton b Woakes 11 M. Starc c Ali b Anderson 20 P. Cummins not out 11 J. Hazlewood c Malan b C. Overton 3 Extras: (lb-2, w-2) 4 Total: (all out, 58 overs) 138 Fall of wickets: 1-5, 2-39, 3-41, 4-505-71, 6-75, 7-90, 8-122, 9-128.

Bowling: J. Anderson 22-7-43-5 (w-1), S. Broad 13-6-26-0 (w-1), C. Overton 2-0-11-1, C. Woakes 16-3-36-4, M. Ali 5-0-20-0.

ENGLAND 2nd innings (Target: 354 runs) A. Cook lbw b Lyon 16 M. Stoneman c Khawaja b Starc 36 J. Vince c Handscomb b Starc 15 J. Root not out 67 D. Malan b Cummins 29 C. Woakes not out 5 Extras: (b-3, lb-5) 8 Total: (for 4 wickets, 62 overs) 176 Fall of wickets: 1-53, 2-54, 3-91, 4-169.

Bowling: M. Starc 14-2-652, J. Hazlewood 14-5-37-0, P. Cummins 14-5-29-1, N. Lyon 20-5-37-1.

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Rahim, Babb score big at final 2017 GAPLF competition

VIJAI Rahim and Grace Babb emerged the overall winners at the Guyana Amateur Powerlifting Federation (GAPLF)’s final event for 2017 - the Senior Nationals.

Rahim (74 kg), also the overall winner from the Raw Nationals held in October, garnered 504.128 wilks points with his best squat at 22.5 kg, bench press at 155 kg and deadlift of 300 kg.

He competed unequipped.

On the flipside, there was a showdown between the Babb sisters - the only two competing females, but in the end Grace edged past her sister Blossom with a total of 296.675 wilks points from her 102.5 kg squat, 32.5 kg bench press and 142.5 kg deadlift. Blossom came close with 275.225 wilks points through her 87.5 kg squat, 47.5 kg bench press and 137.5 kg deadlift.

In the other male categories, Golden Boy Romario Gonsalves (66 kg) competed and scored the top spot for the 66 kg Men’s Open Unequipped and Men’s Junior Unequipped categories with a total of 560.5 kg and 460.395 wilks points.

His best squat was 195.0 kg, bench press 130.5 kg and dead lift 235.0 kg.

Dwayne Welch (59 kg) competed unequipped and raked in 313.287 wilks points, earning him the top spot. His best lifts were: 117.5 kg squat; 92.5 kg bench press and 145.0kg dead lift.

Winning in the 83 kg Men’s Open Unequipped and Men’s Sub-Junior Unequipped was Brandon Badal with a total of 522.5 kg, and 353.374 wilks points.

Also in the 83 kg category was Vickram Panday who scored first in the Open Equipped category with a total of 580.0 kg and 387.286 wilks points, from his

227.5 kg squat; 132.5 kg bench press and 220.0 kg deadlift).

Franklyn Brisport (66 kg) competed in the male Open Equipped and male Masters 1 Divisions, and gathered 320.803 wilks points and 382.5 kg.

Feroz Hussain and Nigel Phillips both took gold in the 93 kg category.

Hussain competed in the Open Unequipped and Men’s Junior Unequipped classes and scored 340.146 wilks points and a total of 540.0 kg. Phillips, in the Open Equipped amassed 705.0 kg and 445.490 wilks points.

And Fazim Abdool also captured the first spot in the 105 kg Men’s Open Equipped through his 775.0 kg and 465.697 wilks points.

Seasoned powerlifters: Joseph Stoll (105 kg) Masters 2; Winston Stoby (74 kg) Masters 2 and Frank Tucker (105 kg) Masters 3 also secured the top positions in their categories.

Stoll amassed 269.413 wilks points from his 165 kg squat, 90 kg bench press and 182.5 kg deadlift.

Tucker managed a 230 kg squat, 100 kg bench press and 202.5 kg deadlift, totalling 330.469 wilks points. Stoby managed 464.013 wilks points for his 230.0 kg squat; 137.5 kg bench press and 275 kg deadlift.

Stoby also scored second in the male Open Equipped 74 kg class.

The highly anticipated Colin ‘Mr Clean’ Chesney and Arif Immamadeen were unable to excel overall or in their weight-class categories.

A total of 22 local strongmen and women vied for supremacy and a chance to represent Guyana at the 2018 international competitions at the event held at the Ramada Princess Hotel last Sunday.

Holder out ... had a similar offence during the opening Test against Pakistan in Jamaica last April, meaning the current one was his second within a 12-month period, resulting in a one-match suspension.

Holder has been a key player for the Windies, with his steady medium pace first change and more than handy lower order batting which has already brought him two Test hundreds.

However, he experienced lean returns in Wellington, scoring zero and seven and picking up one for 102 off 34 overs in New Zealand’s innings of 520 for nine declared.

With West Indies left to chase a series-equalling win at Seddon Park at the weekend, Holder on Monday urged his side not to panic as they looked to take something away from the series.

“I think we’ve done reasonably well in the year. We’ve done some good things in this Test match as well, so there’s no need to panic,” he said before the suspension was announced.

“It’s only one Test match gone – we lost that obviously – so this is a chance to put things right in the second Test match. Hamilton will be probably similar conditions to

Continued from back page

what we had (in Wellington) in the second innings.

“I’ve played there before, it’s a good batting surface so hopefully our batsmen can put up a really good first-innings total and try to control the game from there.”

Holder’s absence could open the door for the other all-rounder in the squad, Raymon Reifer, to make his debut.

The left-handed batsman and left-arm seamer was part of the Test tour of England and Zimbabwe, but failed to break into the squad.

It is now expected that opener and vice-captain Kraigg Brathwaite will step up to lead the side in Holder’s absence.

The second Test bowls off on Saturday.

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India closing in on 2-0 series win against Sri Lanka THE net is closing in on Sri Lanka’s hopes of saving the series with India after they finished day four 31-3 in pursuit of a mammoth target of 410.

India quickly mopped up the final Sri Lankan first-innings wicket before piling on the runs once again, Virat Kohli racking up another half-century before declaring on 246-5.

That gave India around half the evening session to begin extracting the tourists and Ravindra Jadeja’s two wickets led good progress towards a 2-0 series win, leaving Sri Lanka battling to avoid another heavy defeat in the third and final Test.

Sri Lanka skipper Dinesh Chandimal brought up his fourth 150+ score in the first over of the day, adding another three boundaries before Ishant Sharma lured him into a thick edge to Shikhar Dhawan at third man.

His dismissal – for a career-best 164 – signalled the end of Sri Lanka’s rebuttal to India’s 536-7 declared and, after a shaky start, the hosts quickly

built on that advantage.

Murali Vijay’s hopes of back-to-back hundreds disappeared in the third over as he edged Suranga Lakmal to Niroshan Dickwella for nine, and Ajinkya Rahane was not far behind him.

The number three has endured a miserable series, which he finishes with a paltry 17 runs in five innings, 10 of which came in this knock.

If that gave Sri Lanka a glimmer of hope, Dhawan and Cheteshwar Pujara soon extinguished it with a 77-run partnership for the third wicket.

Both men played with great fluidity and Dhawan, in particular, peppered the boundaries at the Feroz Shah Kotla Ground – including a huge six over long-off that took him past 2000 Test runs.

A fifth fifty came for the birthday boy, but Pujara was not so lucky as he perished one short of the milestone, Angelo Mathews taking a superb catch at slip.

Dhawan fell just before tea for 67 but Kohli and Rohit

Sharma picked up where he left off to push India’s lead past 400.

Kohli’s 50 off 58 balls takes his tally to 610 runs in the series at 152.50 - not bad after starting the first match with a duck.

Another Indian half-century prompted Kohli’s declaration, Rohit (50 not out) given the chance to lift his

Skipper Virat Kohli eases to 50 off 58 balls. (BCCI)

England chasing 67-year-old record ENGLAND are looking to become just the second team in Test history to pull off a successful run chase having conceded a lead of 200 or more on the first innings.

Australia’s batting collapse in Adelaide has left the tourists needing an unlikely 354 for a series-levelling win, a daunting victory target but one that is far smaller than they would have expected when they conceded a 215-run deficit after their first innings.

Steve Smith’s contentious decision to not enforce the follow-on on Monday evening, and Australia’s subsequent collapse that saw them bowled out for just 138 yesterday, has left the door slightly ajar for an England victory.

And if their misfiring batting line-up can reverse their form and pull off the record chase, Smith will join South African Dudley Nurse 67 years ago as the only Test captain to lose a match having declined to enforce the follow-on.

Three previous Australian sides have lost a Test after they’d taken a lead of 200 or more runs on the first innings;

Jack Blackham (against England in 1894), Kim Hughes (against England in 1981) and Steve Waugh (against India in 2001) are the only three captains in history to have enforced the follow-on and ended up on the losing side.

no one has done so at Adelaide Oval. And only three teams have scored more than 350 in the fourth innings in a Test match at the historic venue. India scored 445 in 1978, England posted 370 in 1921 and then 363 four years

Steve Smith hopes to avoid an unwanted piece of history.

But Nurse’s South African side, who failed to defend a target of 336 against Australia in Durban in 1950 is the only team to have given up a 200-run lead and lost when bowling in the fourth innings.

While England are in a much stronger position than they were midway this match, history is still well and truly against them.

Only nine sides in Test history have successfully chased down a victory target of more than 354 and

bat before the bowlers set about Sri Lanka’s batsmen with some fierce deliveries.

Sadeera Samarawickrama (5) felt the brunt of Mohammed Shami, a second-successive bouncer clipping glove and shoulder on its way to Rahane in the cordon.

later, with all three run chases ending in defeat.

England’s recent batting history in Australia suggests victory is out of their reach; they’ve scored more than 350 just once out of their past 13 innings on Australian soil and their average total in that time is just 221.

But their highest two totals in that time, 353 and 312, came in the fourth innings on their tour here four years ago, with the latter coming at Adelaide Oval.

Spin quickly took over and Jadeja removed Dimuth Karunaratne (13) and nightwatchman Lakmal (0) before the close,

leaving all the responsibility on first-innings centurions Mathews and Chandimal if they are to avoid a 2-0 series loss. (Omnisport)

SCOREBOARD

INDIA 1st innings 536 for 7 decl.

(V. Kohli 243, M. Vijay 155, R. Sharma 65; L. Sandakan 4-167) SRI LANKA 1st innings (o/n 356-9) Dimuth Karunaratne c Saha b Shami 0 Dilruwan Perera lbw b Jadeja 42 Dhananjaya de Silva lbw b I. Sharma 1 Angelo Mathews c Saha b R. Ashwin 111 Dinesh Chandimal c S. Dhawan b I. Sharma 164 Sadeera Samarawickrama c Saha b I. Sharma 33 Roshen Silva c S. Dhawan b R. Ashwin 0 Niroshan Dickwella b R. Ashwin 0 Suranga Lakmal c Saha b Shami 5 Lahiru Gamage lbw b Jadeja 1 Lakshan Sandakan not out 0 Extras: (b-4, lb-5, nb-2, pen-5) 16 Total: (all out, 135.3 overs) 373 Fall of wickets: 1-0, 2-14, 3-75, 4-256, 5-317, 6-318, 7-322, 8-331, 9-343.

Bowling: M. Shami 26-6-85-2 (nb-1), I. Sharma 29.3-7-98-3, R. Jadeja 45-13-86-2 (nb-1), R. Ashwin 35-8-90-3.

INDIA 2nd innings M. Vijay c Dickwella b Lakmal 9

S. Dhawan stp, Dickwella b Sandakan 67 A. Rahane c Sandakan b D. Perera 10 C. Pujara c Mathews b D. de Silva 49 V. Kohli c Lakmal b Gamage 50 Ro. Sharma not out 50 R. Jadeja not out 4 Extras: (b-1, lb-2, nb-3, w-1) 7 Total: (for 5 wkts decl’d, 52.2 overs) 246 Fall of wickets: 1-10, 2-29 A, 3-106, 4-144, 5-234.

Bowling: Suranga Lakmal 143-60-1 (w-1), Lahiru Gamage 12.2-1-48-1 (nb-3), Dilruwan Perera 11-0-54-1, Dhananjaya de Silva 5-0-31-1, Lakshan Sandaka 10-0-50-1.

SRI LANKA 2nd innings (Target: 410 runs) Dimuth Karunaratne c Saha b Jadeja 13 Sadeera Samarawickrama c Rahane b Shami 5 Dhananjaya de Silva not out 13 Suranga Lakmal b Jadeja 0 Angelo Mathews not out 0 Extras: 0 Total: (for 3 wickets, 16 overs) 31 Fall of wickets: 1-14, 2-31, 3-31.

Bowling: I. Sharma 3-0-6-0, M. Shami 3-1-8-1, R. Ashwin 5-2-120, R. Jadeja 5-2-5-2.

Russia banned from Pyeongchang Winter Olympics

By Karolos Grohmann LAUSANNE, Switzerland (Reuters) - Russia has been banned from the 2018 Pyeongchang Winter Olympics after evidence emerged of an “unprecedented systematic manipulation” of the anti-doping system, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) said on Tuesday.

Some of the country’s athletes will be allowed to compete under the tag of “Olympic Athlete of Russia”, if they satisfy strict conditions that show they have a doping-free background.

The IOC also decided to suspend Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) president Alexander Zhukov as an IOC member given that his membership is linked to his position as chief of the ROC, which has been suspended from next year’s Games in South Korea.

Russian Deputy Prime Minister Vitaly Mutko was also banned from any future participation at the Olympic Games.

The IOC told a news conference that the Schmid report confirmed “the systematic manipulation of the anti-doping rules and system in Russia.”

Samuel Schmid, author of the report, told journalists: ”The results are not based only on (Russia’s former an-

ti-doping chief-turned-whistleblower) Grigoory Rodchenkov’s testimony. There is scientific evidence, witness statements documents and correspondence.

“The facts are that in Russia there was systemic manipulation of doping and the anti-doping system... that also took place at Sochi 2014 (Winter Olympics).”

IOC President Thomas Bach said: “As a former athlete I am feeling very sorry for all the clean athletes who are suffering from this manipulation.

“We had a Russian delegation today and gave them again the opportunity to express themselves. In this meeting this afternoon the president of ROC has apologized.”

Many Russian sporting figures were outraged by the decision, with Alexander Zubkov, president of the Russian bobsleigh federation, telling Reuters by telephone: “I am simply shocked by what is happening and what happened and by Thomas Bach’s decision regarding our country and our athletes.”

OUTRIGHT BAN The IOC’s decision comes 18 months after it had refused an outright ban of Russian athletes at the 2016 Rio de

Janeiro Olympics and told international sports federations to decide individually on the participation of Russians in Brazil.

While all the track and field athletes bar one and the entire weightlifting team were banned from Rio, about 70 percent of Russia’s original 387-strong squad took part at those Games.

Bach said on Tuesday, however, that the situation was different now. “(Ahead of Rio) there was no opportunity to hear the Russian side and at the time of Rio it was mainly about the failure in the Moscow lab. Now it’s about the manipulation of an Olympic lab. The conditions then and now are totally different.”

The Schmid report said the IOC had not found any documented, independent and impartial evidence confirming the support or the knowledge of this (anti-doping manipulation) system by the highest State authority.

Alexei Kravtsov, president of the Russian Skating Union, told R-Sport agency: “The IOC decision is offensive and insulting. It is completely unjustified. I consider that this decision will deal a great blow to the whole Olympic movement.”

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GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

Windies selectors call up Miller and Emrit for New Zealand duties ST JOHN’S, Antigua (CMC) – The West Indies selectors have called up the veteran pair of Nikita Miller and Rayad Emrit for the limited overs tour of New Zealand later this month, in a surprise move that has handed both players new leases on their international careers.

The 35-year-old Miller was yesterday named in a 15-man squad for three-match One-Day International series while Emrit, 36, was included in a 14-man unit for the threematch Twenty20 series.

Left-arm spinner Miller has taken an astonishing 23 wickets for Jamaica Scorpions in his only two games of the ongoing Regional first class season, after missing the first three fixtures while recuperating from surgery.

He topped the bowling charts last season with 58 scalps but picked up just nine at just over 3-1/2 runs an over in the Regional Super50 earlier this year.

Jamaican Miller played the last of his 46 ODIs during the 2015 World Cup in Australia and New Zealand but chief selector Courtney Browne said his experience would prove valuable especially as West Indies geared up for the all-important 2019 World Cup qualifiers in Zimbabwe next year.

“Miller has played ODI cricket previously. Along with his vast experience in our domestic competitions, we felt that he is the right fit to form a part of our ODI bowling unit at this time,” Browne said.

“With the World Cup qualifiers fast approaching, we felt that this is not the right time to introduce an inexperienced slow bowler.”

Emrit, meanwhile, has not tasted international cricket since he played a pair of ODIs 10 years ago in India, but has reinvented himself as a dependable lower order batsman and steady seamer in the T20 version of the game.

tent performer in our domestic competitions and so the opportunity has now presented itself for him to join our T20I squad.”

Emrit is one of three changes to the T20 squad with leg-spinner Samuel Badree available after missing the oneoff game against England last September and Andre Fletcher coming in for Evin Lewis who is unavailable due to personal reasons.

Rayad Emrit

He was outstanding for Guyana Amazon Warriors in the Caribbean Premier League this year, snatching 15 wickets at seven runs per over to follow up on his haul of 16 scalps the previous year.

Browne said the Trinidadian had been rewarded for his consistency and would be an asset to the T20 squad.

“The selection of Emrit is to fill one of the all-rounder roles. He has always been on the fringes of selection and now gets his opportunity,” Browne explained.

“He is a whole-hearted player, and has been a consis-

Nikita Miller

Miller’s inclusion is also one of three changes to the one-day side with Test speedster Shannon Gabriel and uncapped pacer Ronsford Beaton also called up.

Of the side that toured England last September, pacers Jerome Taylor and Miguel Cummins, along with leg-spinner Devendra Bishoo, have been dropped.

Browne said the one-day series would be a critical one

for the Windies, as the only international series before the World Cup qualifiers.

“This series against New Zealand and our CWI Regional Super50 Cup next year are the only chances we will have for preparation prior to the World Cup qualifiers, which are scheduled to be played next March in Zimbabwe,” he noted.

“So these matches will be used to help us identify the players that will play during the qualifiers, and this is why we have also taken the opportunity to introduce Ronsford Beaton.

“Though he is more known for his pace and variations in T20I cricket, we believe he can add value within our ODI bowling unit.”

West Indies face New Zealand in three ODIs and three T20Is from December 20 to January 3.

SQUADS: ODI – Jason Holder (captain), Jason Mohammed (vice-captain), Sunil Ambris, Ronsford Beaton, Shannon Gabriel, Chris Gayle, Kyle Hope, Shai Hope, Alzarri Joseph, Evin Lewis, Nikita Miller, Ashley Nurse, Rovman Powell, Marlon Samuels, Kesrick Williams T20I – Carlos Brathwaite (captain), Samuel Badree, Ronsford Beaton, Rayad Emrit, Andre Fletcher, Chris Gayle, Jason Mohammed, Sunil Narine, Kieron Pollard, Rovman Powell, Marlon Samuels, Jerome Taylor, Chadwick Walton, Kesrick Williams.

Man. United reach Champions League last 16 af ter 2-1 home win over CSKA (REUTERS) - Manchester United reached the Champions League last-16 as Group A winners after coming from behind to beat CSKA Moscow 2-1 at home and finish ahead of Basel who also went through with a 2-0 win at Benfica on Tuesday.

The result left United top of the section on 15 points, three more than second-placed Basel and six ahead of third-placed CSKA who will carry on in the second-tier Europa League after the winter break.

Having missed a string of good chances in the opening period, United fell behind to a freakish Vitinho goal, heavily deflected off Alan Dzagoev, on the stroke of halftime before Romelu Lukaku and Marcus Rashford struck within a minute to turn the match on its head.

Rashford hit the post in the fourth minute and saw a shot from a tight angle saved by CSKA’s busy keeper Igor Akinfeev, who also kept out a Luke Shaw volley

as United’s left back enjoyed a fine evening after making his first start since April.

CSKA struck out of the blue as Mario Fernandes broke

Marcus Rashford

down the right and set up Vitinho, whose miscued shot struck Dzagoev in the back and bounced into the net.

United piled the pressure after the break and Akinfeev parried another fierce Rashford

shot before the home side’s siege finally paid dividends.

Lukaku used his physical strength to steer in the equaliser in the 64th minute, as he got on the end of a probing Paul Pogba pass despite being tugged by CSKA centre back Viktor Vasin.

Rashford got his reward for tireless work less than a minute later, drilling in a sublime Juan Mata chip with a fierce left-footed shot from 13 metres which gave Akinfeev no chance.

Needing to match CSKA’s result to go through, Basel quickly established their grip on a knockout stage berth as Mohamed Elyounoussi headed the Swiss side into an early lead in Lisbon after Michael Lang’s inch-perfect cross.

Another close-range header by striker Dimitri Oberlin doubled Basel’s lead midway through the second half as Benfica finished bottom of the group with zero points from six games.

GCUC biennial general meeting set for February 11 T H E B i e n n i a l G e n e ral Meeting (BGM) of the Guyana Cricket Umpires Council (GCUC), will be held on Sunday, February 11, 2018 from 10:00hrs at the Union Hall, Woolford Avenue, as stipulated in Article 15 of the constitution.

Secretaries of the respective associations are reminded that notice of motions or resolutions shall be sent in writing to the secretary Nigel Duguid not later than twenty-eight days before the fixed date of the BGM. Additionally, members of the council may make nominations for the following offices: president,

vice-president, secretary, treasurer, assistant secretary/ treasurer, public relations officer (PRO) and four other management committee members.

The absence of a nominated person at the time of election shall not disqualify him /her from the election, provided he/she has forwarded to the secretary in writing his/her consent to accept office if elected.

The secretary shall be notified as to the names of the representatives of each cricket umpiring body recognised by the council, prior to the commencement of the general meeting.

No letting up, says Griffith … Jaguars unchanged for sixth round clash

By Rajiv Bisnauth GUYANA Jaguars manager/assistant coach Rayon Griffith, says there is no room for complacency heading into tomorrow’s sixth round of Cricket West Indies (CWI) Profession-

Rayon Griffith

al Cricket League (PCL) Four-day game against the Windward Islands Volcanoes at the Guyana National Stadium, Providence.

The Jaguars crushed Barbados Pride by eight wickets last Sunday.

The result gave the Jaguars their fourth victory of the season and they have now extended their lead at the top of the table, moving to 86.4 points, having gained 21.6 from the match.

Speaking with Chronicle Sport yesterday, Griffith indicated that the hosts will play tough cricket, with the aim to garner maximum points.

“Definitely there is no room for complacency. We will come hard at them (Windward Islands Volcanoes); we will play tough cricket as usual, with the aim to get maximum points,” Griffith, the former national fast bowler pointed out.

He added, “We will be looking again to exploit the home conditions to our advantage, something we have done really well in the past.

Having said that, I want the guys to remain focused, since the inclement weather could be a major factor”.

Meanwhile, the Jaguars have named an unchanged 13-man squad for the key sixth round clash.

Guyana Jaguars squad reads: Leon Johnson (captain), Tagenarine Chanderpaul, Chandrapaul Hemraj, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Vishaul Singh, Anthony Bramble, Keemo Paul, Akshaya Persaud, Sherfane Rutherford, Romario Shepherd, Veerasammy Permaul, Gudakesh Motie and Keon Joseph.

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GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

The little athletes who were outstanding at ‘Nationals’

By Tamica Garnett LAST week’s National Schools Championships (Nationals) was a time for many young athletes to be in the spotlight. However with so many athletes and so little time, there was hardly ever enough of a chance to give all the athletes the kind of coverage they deserve.

No other group felt the squeeze of this situation than the athletes of the younger age groups at the event. Though they do just as much as their older counterparts, year after year we find that those of the younger, Under-12 and below categories do not get the recognition they deserve.

Adessa Albert, Somaiya Orna, Jeremiah Leitch,

District 13’s Jeremiah Lynch wins the Boys’ Under-12 100m CRICKET QUIZ CORNER (Wednesday December 06, 2017) COMPLIMENTS OF THE TROPHY STALL-Bourda Market & The City Mall (Tel: 225-9230) & CUMMINGS ELECTRICAL COMPANY LTD-83 Garnett Street, Campbellville, Georgetown (Tel: 225-6158) Answers to yesterday’s quiz: (1) Lawrence Rowe (214 on debut) & Roy Fredericks (163) (2) Glen Turner ‘carried his bat’ in NZ’s first innings. He made

223*-the highest Test score made by a player ‘carrying his bat’.

Today’s Quiz: (1) How did Lawrence Rowe distinguished himself in the WI/NZ

Sabina Park Test of 1972?

(2) Which two WI players (excluding the wicketkeeper) did

not have a ‘bowl’ in this Test?

ANSWERS IN TOMORROW’S ISSUE

Aleka Persaud, Okeziah Mingo, Matrim Martin, and Jair Samuels were a few athletes who excelled throughout the week at the track & field competition at Nationals.

They pushed above and beyond their limits, they faced adversity yet persevered; they competed fiercely and tore down records and at times even more than the older categories. They entertained, as the crowd roared at the sight of the little ones giving it there all on the track.

Though still in its planning stage, the splitting of the National Schools Championships into the primary and secondary school competitions will be a welcome chance to give these younger athletes a chance to have their own moment to shine and be in the spotlight.

The Girls’ Under-10 champion Albert was the most consistent contender in her category, with three gold medals and a silver, not to mention setting two records along the way.

Anyone who saw Albert perform agreed that this was one young lady with a bright future ahead of her.

Many remember Albert from 2015 when she first participated at Nationals and blew many away with her performance in the Girls’ Under-8 category, also becoming the age group champion back then.

Albert’s 4.03m was a record jump in the long jump, while she set the 100m record at 13.70s, which she ran in the heats.

However, she was not able to take over District 4’s Marissa Thomas in the 400m. Thomas was another standout. Prior to racing to the 1:10.23s win in the 400m on Friday, she also won in the 800m with a time of 2:48.81s.

East Coast’s Marissa Thomas heads in for the win in the Girls’ Under-10 400m, as District 10’s Adessa Albert (right) fights her way to second place. (Delano Williams photo)

A n o t h e r s p r i n t e r, Orna etched her name in the record books, in the Girls’ Under-8 150m, setting the record at 23.08 seconds. She won the 80m in 12.44 seconds.

Then there was District 12’s Jeremiah Leitch, whose speed for his size left many in awe of his sprint performance. The shortest among the Boys’ Under-12 lineup, Leitch was considered an underdog, but he stunned the crowd as he towered over his competitors to take the gold in the Boys’ Under-12 100m.

He was unable to rep-

licate the feat in either the 200m or 400m, where he finished fourth and third respectively. Nonetheless he was already a crowd favourite and left a lasting impression on those who witnessed his 100m triumph.

Known for her well established achievements in the pool, Aleka Persaud proved that she could handle herself just as well on the track, claiming the Girls’ Under-12 1000m in a record-breaking 3:36.17s, on the first day of competition at the Championships.

She took ten seconds

off District 9’s Marisa Refino’s 3:27.4s record.

Persaud achieved one of only two records broken on the opening day, the other record fell in the Boys’ Under-12 1200m thanks to District 9’s Matrim Martin, who lowered the time to 3:52.36s erasing a tenyear-old record by Shaqueil Marshall.

Martin also left the Championships with the long jump win, clearing 4.52m for the gold.

District 5’s Jair Samuels took a 200m/400m sprint double in the Boys’ Under-10.

West Coast Berbice (District 5) Jair Samuels during his winning run in the Boys’ Under-10 400m. (Delano Williams photo)

43

GUYANA CHRONICLE Wednesday, December 6, 2017

Winston George or Daniel Williams?

AAG, GOA to deliberate on composition of Commonwealth Games Track and Field team

By Rawle Toney

WITH the Commonwealth Games set for April 4-15 in the Gold Coast, Australia, the Athletics Association of Guyana (AAG) and the Guyana Olympic Association (GOA) could ‘bump heads’ over the composition of the track and field team.

The AAG recently submitted a 20-man shortlisted squad which features some of brightest youth prospects, with the likes of Daniel Williams, Chantoba Bright, Compton Caesar and the Hooper sisters (Natrena and Patricia) making the cut.

However, the AAG was only given five places on the team, with president Aubrey Hudson telling Chronicle Sport in an exclusive interview that “this is going to be difficult, because the AAG will have to make a big decision: if we will look to invest in the future of track and field, or, look to the older athletes and try to medal now.”

The only automatic selection is US-based triple-jump athlete Troy Doris, according to Hudson.

Meanwhile, president of the GOA, KA Juman Yassin, told Chronicle Sport that the final selection of the Commonwealth Games team rests on the shoulders of the Olympic Association.

“We will allow them (the AAG) to make their selection and then if we agree, then we move from there. We will have to agree with their selection, but it’s too early to make up the team,” said the GOA’s long-serving president.

pic Games (2012 and 2016) as well as three world Championships (2013, 2015 and 2017) but never made it out of the qualifying rounds at those events.

George also competed at the 2014 Commonwealth Games where he

Winston George (left) and Daniel Williams

Some pundits believe that both the AAG and the GOA should explore the idea of giving the country’s top youths a chance to shine at the Commonwealth Games, especially the case for Williams and Caesar who could be competing for a spot on the team with George.

The 30-year-old George has competed at two Olym-

reached the semi-finals of the 200m and 400 metres.

He runs a personal best of 45.16 seconds in the 400m, 10.24 seconds in the 100m and 20.41 seconds in the 200m; accomplishing the times this year (July) at the Leonora Track and Field Centre.

Williams, the 17-year-old from Linden, at this year’s

IAAF World U-18 Championships ran a personal best of 46.7 seconds in the 400m to win silver, and at the 2016 CARIFTA Games, he ran 21.56 seconds in the 200m.

However, Williams is 13 years younger than George and has shaved almost two

Triple-Jumper Troy Doris

seconds off his 400m times in less than a year. Internationally, especially in South America, he has racked up a number of podium finishes in the 200m, 400m and high jump.

Caesar is 19 years old and ran his personal best in the 200m (21.91 seconds) in 2015 and this year, he clocked 10.37 seconds in the

100m at Leonora.

“The Council will have to make a tough call,” Hutson said, when asked about if they will give Williams and Caesar a shot ‘down under’, or if they will turn to Winston George who has not won a medal outside of the ALBA Games (2011) and the South American Senior Championships (2017).

“We’re going to have to decide if we will go for medals or go for building the future of the sport. We might have to come up with some balancing act, because it’s important that we give our young athletes the exposure, because they’re been going out and giving us many medals,” said Hudson.

“We’ve really gone past where we used to be years ago. But people will ask us; how do you justify Daniel Williams over Winston George? But for me, I’m thinking futuristically and that will have to be the key.

“We will be taking into factor that we have to look at our youngsters, a lot of the senior athletes have been over their peak. George is still running 45 seconds, but the 400m has gone past that.

You might be able to get a 43 seconds out of Daniel next year because he seems to be stepping up faster with higher competition according to his progression

over the last year,” the AAG president explained.

“If we are selecting a team for today, our best athlete is Winston George, but if we’re thinking about tomorrow, then we will have come up with something else, because we’ve sent George to many games and he’s not getting a chance to podium, but with Williams, we might not get a medal out of him now, but certainly will in the future,” Hudson pointed out.

Yassin, when asked about giving a youth athletics team a try said, “Let’s see, I mean the young athletes have plenty more time, but it’s still too early to make that call, so I’ll wait on the AAG and see what they present, but the final decision rests with the GOA.” Next year’s Commonwealth Games will present the GOA and the AAG the perfect opportunity to redeem themselves after years of failing some of Guyana’s best with the lack of exposure when they were young.

The eyes of Guyana will be paying keen attention of the team’s selection, since it could tell a story about the two entities’ readiness to properly embrace and mould the country’s future stars of track and field.

Taylor signs new two-year deal with Sydney Thunder MELBOURNE, Australia, (CMC) – West Indies Women captain, Stafanie Taylor, has signed a new two-year deal with Sydney Thunder and says her objective is to notch her maiden Twenty20 hundred, in the new Women’s Big Bash League campaign which bowls off this weekend.

The stellar righthander, who also bowls penetrative off-spin, has been a key member of the Thunder squad for the last two seasons and was cen-

tral to their title-winning success in the inaugural 2015/16 season.

“I’m really excited to be back at the Thunder. It is a really great group to be a part of and I’m looking forward to seeing everyone again,” Taylor said.

“I’m hoping this year I can score my first Twenty20 century; that’s my goal for this season.”

Taylor is one of the leading players in the women’s game, with over 4028 runs and 127 wickets in 108 one-dayers, and

West Indies Women captain, Stafanie Taylor

2474 runs and 68 scalps from 80 T20 Internationals.

The Jamaican has managed 661 runs and 12 wickets in her first two seasons with Thunder and general manager Lee Germon said she remained a definite asset to the franchise.

“Stafanie is hugely respected on the international cricket scene for her ability and leadership,” he noted.

“As captain of the West Indies side, she will com-

plement our strong leadership group. She will bring experience and power as a batter, and guile as a bowler in our line-up.”

Taylor joins a the likes of Indian stroke-maker Harmanpreet Kaur and New Zealand star Rachel Priest in a Thunder line-up led by Australia vice-captain Alex Blackwell.

Thunder raise the curtain on the new season with a clash against Melbourne Renegades at Sydney North Oval on Saturday.

AAG, GOA to deliberate ee on composition of Spa4g3e Commonwealth Games Track and Field team

GHB lauds selection of Guyanese trio on PAN AM Indoor Elite Team

2017 Pan American Indoor Elite Team - Medroy Scotland, goalkeeper (Guyana) (PAHF Photos)

By Stephan Sookram THREE Guyanese players have been named as members of the Pan American Hockey Federation (PAHF) Indoor Elite Team, following the conclusion of the tournament here last month.

Captain Robert France and goalkeeper Medroy Scotland were the two named in the male squad while midfielder Marzana Fiedtkou was the female selected.

According to president of the Guyana Hockey Board, Philip Fernandes, this is a positive indicator as to the

Holder out of second Test after suspended by ICC

2017 Pan American Indoor Elite Team – Robert France obvious growth of the sport locally.

“The Guyana Hockey Board (GHB) is very pleased to have three of its players selected to the Pan American All Star Team. It is a very prestigious award and is only the second time in our history that we have had a Guyanese

2017 Pan American Indoor Elite team - Marzana Fiedtkou

selected. “ We h a v e M a r z a n a Fiedtkou of the women who have played some hockey at University (in the United States) but she has learnt most of her hockey here in Guyana.”

“Both France and Scotland have played hockey here

and we are very pleased that we can produce players of this calibre and we are happy that they have been recognised by the Pan Am Federation for their achievement.

According to a release on the PAHF Website, this is the first time that separate Indoor teams have been named with

the aim of giving “deserved exposure to the top indoor players and the game itself’.

Hockey specialists who were present at the 2017 Indoor Pan American Cup in Georgetown, Guyana, were consulted for the selection of this year’s Elite Teams, the release added.

Rahim, Babb score big at final 2017 GAPLF competition See page 39

West Indies captain Jason Holder

HAMILTON, New Zealand (CMC) – Still reeling from their heavy innings defeat to the Black Caps in the opening Test, West Indies were dealt another blow yesterday when captain Jason Holder was ruled out of the second Test after being suspended by the International Cricket Council (ICC) for an over-rate offence.

The ICC announced that West Indies had been hit by a slow overrate penalty after being adjudged to be three overs short of their target during the opening Test which the

Windies lost by an innings and 67 runs inside four days on Monday at the Basin Reserve in Wellington.

While the players were fined 30 per cent of their match fee, Holder, as captain, was hit with a 60 per cent fine.

Under ICC regulations, players are fined 10 per cent of their match fees for every over their side fails to bowl within the specified time, with the captain fined double.

The 26-year-old Holder also

Turn to page 39

Male overall winner Vijai Rahim collects his prize.

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Female overall winner Grace Babb receives her reward.

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 6, 2017