Guyana Chronicle E-paper 12-09-2018

9th December, 2018

No.105483

punishing Pull

together for our students’ country’s sake 03 ‘They’re

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… AG calls on Guyanese to join fight for law school

36 arrested in city raids

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–– Outgoing US envoy urges in farewell message … says racism only raises ugly head whenever politics involved

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… police 02 recover stolen motorcycles,TV

Regional 09 development to reduce disparities in living conditions PAGE

–Min. Bulkan

No.105483

Banks DIH Limited on Saturday opened its two-day “Santa's Enchanted Christmas Village" at its Demerara Park facility on the East Bank Public Road, where patrons were treated to entertaining games, storytelling, face painting and other activities (Bank DIH photo)

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE December 9, 2018

36 arrested in city raids … police recover stolen motor cycles, television set

POLICE on Saturday conducted several cordon and search operations in the North Cummingsburg and Kingston areas during which they arrested some 36 persons and recovered a number of stolen items.

The 36 persons have been detained in connection with several offences.

Among those arrested were ten undocumented foreign nationals eight females and two males. Police said a Rose Mary

Lane (Tiger Bay) resident was found in possession of 88 grams of cannabis packaged in small-sized ziplock bags; two motorcycles and a flat screen television suspected to have been stolen or unlawfully obtained have been taken into custody.

Two Senior Superintendents spearheaded the more than three hours operations ,which involved a total of one hundred and eight ranks.

A stolen television set recovered ruing the raid

A motorbike seized during the operations

Another of the stolen bikes

Some of the packaged cannabis

GRDB uncovers ‘desperate plot’ –– receipt proves RPA tried to fleece rice farmers to sell them bad seed paddy

GENERAL Manager of the Guyana Rice Development Board (GRDB), Nizam Hassan has described as “desperate”, an alleged bid by General Secretary of the Rice Producers Association (RPA), Dharamkumar Seeraj to discredit the agency.

What’s more, he said, it’s also an attempt to score cheap political points at the expense of local rice farmers.

Hassan’s comments comes in the wake of his receipt of information disproving statements being peddled by Seeraj about the GRDB selling farmers what he calls “failed-seed paddy”.

According to a release from the GRDB, Head of the Region Two (Pomeroon-Supenaam) Rice Farmers Association, Nauth Ram, is currently making representation on behalf of several farmers who were sold seed paddy, more particularly the GRDB 10 strain of the grain, by the RPA. Ram, who is also the region’s agriculture coordinator, said that contrary to what Seeraj told the National Assembly recently, it was not the GRDB’s seed paddy that failed to germinate, but rather the one sold farmers by the RPA during the last rice crop.

“Farmer Seecharran, of Land of Plenty, visited my office and reported that he purchased 63 bags of ‘10’ paddy from the RPA, and after sowing, he found that none had

germinated,” Ram said.

He said that after the farmer raised the matter with RPA officials, they promised to look into it and even visit his farm but never did.

Ram said: “I reported the matter to the Quality Control Manager, Ms. Allison Peters and she intervened. And I was promised by the RPA that someone will visit the farmer. I was also promised that the seed paddy would be replaced, but as far as I know, the farmer is still waiting.”

EMPTY PROMISES Another farmer, one Indarpaul Babulall, said he is still awaiting his replacement paddy from the RPA, after being promised same since the first crop of 2018.

“I bought 36 bags of paddy from the RPA,” Babulall said, “and I set de paddy fuh shy. And when I ready fuh shy, me see ‘bout 90 per cent ah de paddy nah germinate.”

Babulall said that he, too, raised the matter with the RPA, and that they did send someone out to his fields to see what was happening; and that after they were satisfied that there was indeed a problem with the paddy, they promised to replace it during the next crop.

Unable to wait that long until the RPA could make good on their promise, Babulall said he was forced to scramble for seed to sow his land and ended up planting late with dire consequences.

He said: “All now I ain’t get back no paddy from the RPA, and is hard fuh just leh $160,000 guh down de drain. I really hoping deh either give me back my money, or de seed paddy; it ain’t fair to me.”

Last Thursday, Seeraj, in a bid to support his claim that the local rice industry was in trouble, told the National Assembly that rice farmers on the Essequibo Coast had been sold bad paddy by the GRDB, causing them to lose millions of dollars.

The GRDB has said in its release that a visit to the region on Friday by a team of officials from both the Ministry of Agriculture and the Board has revealed a different story. And this is because the team could not find any farmer who could corroborate Seeraj’s claims.

What they found instead was that farmers were loud in their praise for the work being done in the region by GRDB extension officers, through the provision of quality seed paddy and extension services.

In addition, rice farmers Deoraj Jaikarran of Golden Fleece and Ganesh, known as ‘hassa’, both were loud in their praise

of the quality of paddy supplied to them by the GRDB. One farmer named Ganesh, or “Hassah”, said the only time he has ever had a problem with germination this year was when he bought paddy from the RPA. He, too, is still awaiting compensation by way of seed or cash, and is contemplating legal action if the RPA fails to act.

He said that gone are the days when farmers were willing to be mum and suffer in silence, and that while the GRDB still has a long way to go where ensuring that farmers’ livelihood are safeguarded, they have done a remarkable job at ensuring that the industry continues to thrive.

“We will not sit here and say everything is good and well within the industry, because every day there is changes which we have to adapt to. Climate Change is one such challenge,” ‘Hassa’ said, adding: “However, the GRDB has been, and continues to be, steadfast in its efforts at providing a good life for all of our farmers and their families, and it continues to show annually, in the form of increased production and productivity.”

In closing, the GRDB has issued a call for political maturity, since the rice industry is a major contributor to the country’s overall Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

SUNDAY CHRONICLE December 9, 2018

Pull together for country’s sake

– says outgoing US envoy

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… believes racism only raises ugly head whenever politics is involved

By Lisa Hamilton HE’S not going to pretend that there is not a problem, but he strongly feels that if the politicians are really serious about the country’s future, they would do well to work together.

Asked specifically what he thought about the race relations climate here, outgoing US Ambassador Perry Holloway said, as others have before, that the only time racism raises its ugly head here is whenever politics is involved.

“The interesting thing about Guyana is that there is this race fight going on; and I’m from South Carolina in the United States, a place which still has racism to this day,” he said.

“Quite frankly, outside of politics, I don’t notice the same racial conflict. I’m not saying it doesn’t exist; I know it does... but I’ve readily seen Indo and Afro playing together, working together, doing things together all time.

“But it seems as if politics is the place where it gets more charged,” he told reporters here on Tuesday.

As to how he sees the

issue of race being resolved, Ambassador Holloway said: “It takes both sides; you’re never going to solve it if only one side wants to solve it. So, somehow, the two sides have to figure out a way to come together and work this out.

“There are some challenges, because your system, the actual constitution, is a winner-takes-all system. So, by default, if you’re the winner, you take all the control.

“The other side: What do they have? They have little control; they only have the ability to oppose; they’re the opposition.

“I’m not saying here I’m an advocate for or against constitutional reform, but if you want to have greater power sharing, which might lead to more cooperation, then there would need to be some form of reform out there.”

During his presentation of the 2019 Budget to the House on Monday, Minister of Finance Winston Jordan had said that the Coalition Government is big on constitutional reform; that it’s a promise it fully intends to keep.

He said that it is with this in mind that resources have

been allocated to mounting a survey and an awareness programme, in partnership with the University of Guyana (UG) and other institutions.

“The survey will seek to assess the current understanding of constitutional reform by the general populace and their expectations,” Minister Jordan said, “while the awareness programme will aim to stimulate a grassroots participatory approach to the entire process.”

Another reason Ambassador Holloway believes that the politicians, particularly the leaders of the two main political parties, ought to work close together is because, as Minister Jordan himself said: “2020 will be the mother of all elections,” with both parties likely aiming for the control seat.

But though that is as may be, he still feels that the situation warrants that they work together. “Work more together, ‘cause you never know who will be in power in 2020,” he urged. “It could be one side or the other. The last elections was only won by 5,000 votes, give or take, so work more together.”

As to his take on the topic

Outgoing US Ambassador to Guyana Perry Holloway (Delano Williams photo) of shared governance, Ambassador Holloway said: “I don’t know if it’s the answer, but again, it’s a decision that the people in the government have to make to

Cellphones, other contraband found at NA Prison A quantity of contraband items were Saturday morning found during a search operation at the New Amsterdam Prison, police have said.

According to the police between 06:30 and 09:30hrs a team comprised of police and prison officers con-

ducted a search of the New Amsterdam Prison and the following items were found: 14 cellphones,5 improvised weapons , 22 lighters , a quantity of wire, 12 chargers , 11 earpieces , 2 make shift weapons , 2 SIM cards , one watch, and 12 grams of cannabis.

The cannabis found in the truck at Potaro

The items found during the raid at the prisons

Meanwhile, in another incident police ranks in F Division Saturday morning about 06:30h stopped and searched a motor lorry at Seven Miles Potaro and found concealed there-

in three hundred and thirty-three grams of cannabis and one hundred live rounds of 9mm ammunition.

Two persons have been detained and are assisting with the investigation.

decide what they want to do.

But, certainly, share-government decreases opposition-type behaviour.”

Meanwhile, working towards the initiative, the Finance Minister expressed the hope that the bi-Partisan Standing Committee on Constitutional Reform will soon conclude its review of the Constitutional Reform Consultative Commission Bill.

“Our government welcomes the constructive scrutiny that the honourable members of this committee

will no doubt exercise in their rigorous examination of the Bill, as we collectively recognise the need to adapt our constitution to reflect our evolution as a democracy,” Minister Jordan has said.

Prime Minister Moses Nagamootoo has been spearheading constitutional reform, and will continue to do so, with the full support of the government, while several dormant constitutional bodies have been re-constituted.

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE, December 9, 2018

U.N. climate negotiators sweat over detail and divides KATOWICE, Poland (Reuters) - Half-way through talks to breathe life into the Paris climate deal negotiators haggled over how to share the cost of curbing global warming and struggled to bridge `deep political divides.

The two weeks of talks, which began at the start of the week, are billed as the most important U.N. conference since the Paris 2015 agreement on climate change.

The challenge is to meet a year-end deadline to agree on a rule book to limit global warming, when the unity that underpinned the Paris talks

has fragmented. U.S. President Donald Trump repeated his call to scrap the Paris climate pact.

By the end of Saturday, negotiators aim to have a simplified a draft for high-level ministerial debate starting on Monday.

“We still have a lot to do,” Michal Kurtyka, the Polish president of the U.N. talks, told a news conference.

“It is very technical, very complex, very difficult.”

Delegates said a major issue was how to reassure developing countries that richer nations would deliver on promises to help finance the cost of shifting to a lower

carbon economy.

Environmental campaigners are concerned the Katowice talks will lack ambition, after the United States said this year it was withdrawing from the U.N. process. Saudi Arabia, the world’s biggest oil exporter, in the talks on Saturday added a further challenge by blocking consensus on a major scientific report.

The U.N. report published in October said it was possible to limit the earth’s temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius and prevent damaging levels of global warming provided radical changes in energy consumption and other steps were implemented.

But Saudi Arabia refused to back a proposal from other nations to use wording to “welcome” the report.

Delegates said the task of driving the process forward would fall to ministers next week.

“It’s a question of who wins? The likes of the Euro-

SUNDAY, DECEMBER 09, 2018 – 5:30 - 7:00HRS

pean Union and China with economies deeply invested in climate action and dependent on multilateralism for global trade, or the likes of Saudi dissenters of climate science, with vested interests that put us all in the firing line?”

Camilla Born, senior policy advisor at E3G, a non-governmental organisation, said.

On the streets of Katowice, the capital of Poland’s Silesian coal-mining region, thousands of demonstrators marched to demand a deal to limit temperature rises to no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius.

Environmental campaigners also marched in Paris, where violent demonstrations triggered by a fuel tax have taken place.

Delegates in Katowice said the French social protests were unrelated to the U.N. climate debate, but U.S. President Donald Trump seized on them to call for an end to “the ridiculous and extremely expensive Paris Agreement”.

Thousands protest in Serbia over attack on opposition politician BELGRADE (Reuters) Thousands of people rallied peacefully in downtown Belgrade on Saturday to protest over an attack on an opposition politician and demand policy changes

by President Aleksandar Vucic and his ruling Serbian Progressive party.

Under the slogan “Stop the bloody shirts,” the demonstrators chanted as they marched through the city center to condemn the assault on Borko Stefanovic, leader of the small Serbian Left party.

SPONSORED Stefanovic was attacked by a group of men wearing black clothing on Nov. 23 in the southern city of Krusevac and suffered minor injuries from being beaten with an iron rod.

Vucic said Stefanovic’s assailants were arrested shortly after the incident, but opposition figures maintain that his party was involved — something vehemently denied by Progressive leaders.

“The struggle must be waged with loud chanting against this disgusting,

slimy regime,” Branislav Trifunovic, an actor and a protest leader, told the cheering crowd.

Opposition activists say Vucic is an autocrat and brand his Serbian Progressive Party as corrupt.

Vucic’s approval ratings have slipped somewhat since he won a 2016 presidential vote by a landslide, but he remains the country’s most popular political leader and his ruling coalition has a comfortable majority of 160 deputies in the 250-seat parliament.

Opposition protests have been relatively rare in Serbia since the popular unrest that ousted former strongman Slobodan Milosevic in 2000.

Vucic, a nationalist firebrand during the violent collapse of the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s, later embraced European values and set Serbia’s membership in the European Union as the country’s strategic goal. He also maintains close ties with Russia and China.

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE, December 9, 2018

Buju back on home soil !

KINGSTON, Jamaica Grammy Award-winning reggae artiste Buju Banton has arrived in Jamaica.

The entertainer, who was released from the McRae Correctional Facility in Georgia on Friday morning, arrived at the Norman Manley International Airport (NMIA) in Kingston later that day.

Scores of people had gathered outside the exit of the airport hoping to see the Grammy Award-winning singer, however, reports reaching OBSERVER ONLINE were that the entertainer was routed through another exit and taken to the

police Harman Barracks for processing.

Buju Banton, whose given name is Mark Myrie, was arrested on cocaine charges in 2009 and given a mandatory 10-year sentence in 2011.

He was previously scheduled to be released in 2019, however, his release day was last year changed to December 8, 2018.

Days after his conviction, Buju Banton won a Grammy Award for his album Before Dawn. His other albums include ‘Til Shiloh (1995), Inna Heights (1997) and Unchained Spirit (2000). (Jamaica Observer)

Buju Banton arriving in Jamaica

Bolivian drug lord escapes custody via La Paz medical clinic (REUTERS) - A 67-yearold Bolivian man considered to have been one of the largest drug traffickers in South America in the 1980s has escaped from a private clinic in the country’s capital La Paz, police said on Saturday.

Jorge Roca Suarez had been back in Bolivia since April after a U.S. judge ordered his early release, 28 years into a 36-year sentence for drug trafficking.

On his arrival in La Paz, he was ordered to serve another 15-year sentence handed down locally on the same charge, but in early December was admitted to a private medical clinic for treatment for an unspecified condition.

Overnight between Friday and Saturday he escaped, police said, leaving the clinic without being detected.

“The Bolivian Police has activated all its intelligence apparatus,” Fernando Rojas,

the Deputy Director of the Special Force to Fight Crime in La Paz, said. “We are helping in the search tasks to recapture this person.”

Roca Suarez, who is known in Bolivia as “Roof of Straw”, was an associate of Colombia’s Pablo Escobar and is the nephew of Roberto Suarez Gomez, the so-called “King of Cocaine”, who offered to pay Bolivia’s external debt with his ill-gotten gains in the 1980s.

Jamaica’s Kadijah Robinson finishes 4th at Miss World KINGSTON, Jamaica — Kadijah Robinson , Jamaica’s representative to the Miss World Pageant finished fourth in the grand final which took place earlier on Saturday, in Sanya, China.

Robinson, a physiotherapist at the Black River Hospital in St Elizabeth, was also crowned Miss World Caribbean.

She, along with four other continental queens, will join the new queen, Mexico’s Vanessa Ponce on the Miss World Beauty with a Purpose tour next year.

Thailand finished in second place, while third place went to Belarus.

Uganda finished in fifth place.

In July, lawyers obtained the conditional release of Roca Suarez on medical grounds, but in mid-November a judge revoked that benefit and ordered him back to prison.

The police did not give more details about the escape. Roca Suarez’s lawyer could not immediately be reached for comment.

Burst of 54 quakes felt in Leeward Islands PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad (CMC) – The Trinidad-based Seismic Research Centre (SRC) of the St Augustine Campus of the University of the West Indies said on Saturday that a burst of 54 earthquakes occurred north of St Kitts during a 21-hour period. The biggest had a magnitude of 4.1.

In a brief statement, SRC said that the quakes were recorded during the period 4:28 pm (local time) on Friday to 9:50 am (local time) on Saturday.

It said that the 54 earthquakes were in the magnitude range of 1.2 to 4.1.

Several residents on St Kitts reported an earthquake being felt on the island on Friday night.

The earthquakes were reportedly felt in the British Virgin Islands, Dominica, Saint Martin, Sint Maarten, Guadeloupe, Montserrat, Puerto Rico, United States Virgin Islands, Caribbean Netherlands, Saint Barthélemy, Antigua and Barbuda, and Anguilla.

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE, December 9, 2018

APNU+AFC local government policy ONE of the notable characteristics of the APNU+AFC coalition government is its interest in local communities and local government.

The local government elections which took place last month was the second held since the new government assumed office.

The voter turnout was about 40% of the registered voters and this was regarded as low when compared to the national elections over the last 50 years when the average turnout was about 80%.

Despite this comparatively low turnout, the elections resulted in a number of very positive features. In the first place, it lit the flame of local government in the rural communities and these communities began to again be conscious of their local problems and felt renewed hope that these problems would be positively addressed and solved.

It re-established the cycle of local government elections which had been absent for over two decades and it is now most unlikely that these

elections will ever again fall into desuetude. Most importantly, the entire political establishment had an awakened interest in local government and committed themselves to fundamentally solving local problems, since the achievment of political success at the national level became clearly linked with political success at the local level.

In time-honoured Guyanese style, we always try to go back to the genesis of issues and accordingly went back to the beginning of local government in Guyana, which was a proud and interesting one. It began with what is known to historians as the “Village Movement.”

When final emancipation of the plantation slaves came in 1838 with the end of the Apprenticeship System, the now freedmen, most of whom were born in the colony-- though among them there were still a fair number of Africa-born-- decided to leave the plantations and set themselves up in a life of freedom and independence.

The decision to leave the

plantation was not an easy one, since it was fraught with the risk of being hurled into abject poverty.

In the plantation there was a level of economic security which they would have to renounce. And also, the savings they had painstakingly made from the very low wages they received during the Apprenticeship System and the money accumulated from the Sunday Markets which the slaves were permitted to conduct, could all have been lost in trying to buy and develop land. Yet, they courageously took the challenge. Fortunately, just at this time, many plantation owners were convinced that with the emancipation of the slaves, the economy of the colony would be irretrievably ruined and so they abandoned their estates. It was these estates that the freedmen who were moving away from their plantations were able to buy as co-operative ventures.

The first estate which was bought was Northbrook on the East Coast of Demerara which was renamed “Vic-

MoPH response to letter of misinformation in Kaieteur News THEIR motives and untruths having been ruthlessly exposed and in the court of public opinion, having been thoroughly defeated in the budget debate, the PPP, their operatives and surrogates are busy attempting to spread misinformation to the nation on all platforms.

A letter on page 6 of Saturday’s edition of Kaieteur News by one Zamal Hussain is noted. The letter states that “…the minister held two photographs to justify that the CT scan machine is in working order at the New Amsterdam Hospital.”

The letter is correct that Minister Lawrence did in fact display two photographs to the National Assembly during her budget presentation; however, it was to confirm that the CT scanner was installed, not working which it is hoped that it will be shortly.

Specifically, Minister Lawrence said, “…neither did the member (Hon. Dr. Vishwa Mahadeo) inform this House that he was at the New Amsterdam Hospital and enquired what was going on in the space where the laboratory existed and Mr. Speaker, he witnessed, he witnessed the installation of the CT scan machine being done.”

The MoPH calls on the PPP, their operatives and surrogates to conduct themselves in a decent and honest manner when seeking to provide information to the public. Further, the ministry calls on all media to fact-check the PPP and their operatives who from time to time may furnish information to the media, whether via interviews, letters or other

toria” in honour of Queen Victoria during whose reign the Emancipation Act was passed. Victoria Village celebrated its 179th Anniversary last month and was the first such village the freedmen had established.

The freedmen were far more talented than anyone, least of all the planter class, would have suspected. They immediately began laying out the streets, house lots, cultural and educational centres, drainage, and farming lands.

And in a short while they built their homes and began farming. They performed a revolution of creative and cooperative self- help. Other villages began to immediately follow in their footsteps.

President David Granger who is a historian in his own right understood how important a part these villages played in the economic and social development of 19th century Guyana and realised that the ethos, approach and techniques of economic and social development which these freedmen used could be resuscitated in modern Guyana

and with modifications, used in creating a better life for all.

He has therefore emphatically declared that village and rural development in all its facets is now an important part of the policies of the APNU+AFC government.

At the 179th Anniversary celebrations of the establishment of Victoria Village, Hon Basil Williams, Attorney General and Minister of Legal Affairs, was guest speaker. In his address, Mr Williams touched on the reasons for the success of the Village Movement and the creative life it had evolved and manifested. It was on the basis of these achievements and the spirit which infused them that President Granger proposed to build the new local government policy.

Mr Williams, in his address, recaptured the flavour of life in these villages: “African-Guyanese established homes, farms and economic enterprises in these villages. Households maintained kitchen gardens, farms produced fruits, ground provisions

and these products were sold in the markets. Micro-businesses such as bakeries, clothing stores, retail shops, cottage industries and parlours mushroomed.

Artisans, including blacksmiths, tinsmiths, painters, carpenters, cobblers and joiners honed their trades within the villages. . . The imperative of working together to provide common services spawned human and communal solidarity; villages developed a spirit of oneness. Everybody knew everyone else; they supported each other in times of distress and sorrow. They practised selfhelp and worked collectively for the benefit of the community. Elders were respected. People helped one another. These are the values around which community life should be revived”. We fully endorse government’s local government policy and the spirit infusing it.

City Hall bailout is money thrown into black hole Dear Editor, WELL once again the central government like ‘A gallant knight in shining armour, has ridden in very chivalrously and saved the fair maidens at City Hall’ with another huge bailout. And maybe they had no choice, as the garbage was piling up all over the city, the workers have still not been paid for the month of November and council’s other creditors are shouting for relief.

But this recurring pattern has become all too familiar: the council rakes in tens upon tens of millions of dollars monthly from shipping containers, ratepayers, stallholders, vendors, hairdressers, barbers, eating

houses, slaughterers, etc., etc. and then fritters it away on expensive overseas trips, on paying for bodyguards, chauffeurs, personal assistants, anniversary celebrations and 19 different allowances for the “fat cats.”

They choose not to pay their employees’ salaries, pensions or gratuities, do not pay the contractors, nor the Guyana Revenue Authority, nor the National Insurance Scheme, nor the labour or credit unions.

They chose not to pay their water rates nor electricity charges.

They take goods from every conceivable source and refuse to pay. Why don’t they give the pink slips to the more than 200 friends, relatives and church pals that they employed recent-

ly and caused the top-heavy payroll ?

Why do they do this? Because they know that the central government will rush and settle their liabilities. “It’s like calling in the cavalry.”

But one would have thought with the recent findings of the commission of inquiry, a most damning report, that central government would have at the very least waited until the council’s books were audited and until the immoral councillors and officers had left before giving the city a red cent. It amounts to throwing our money into a black hole!

Sincerely Shanta Singh

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE, December 9, 2018

City Hall CoI a comedy of errors Dear Editor, SO, the Kennard Commission of Inquiry-CoI Report(I will show it is a Comedy of Errors- CoE) is now prime news (leaked to the press--how and why is anyone’s guess). The public awaits a formal announcement. Both the Guyana Chronicle and Kaieteur News Sunday, November 2, 2018 editions published highlights.

As I read the Guyana Chronicle and Kaieteur News reports humour turned to unprintable exclamations of disgust and outrage when I read this passage in the Guyana Chronicle: “Justice Kennard also recommended that a detailed forensic audit be done into all transactions between April 1, 2015 and October 31, 2018.” My unprintable exclamation happened because effectively and substantially, by this studied time limit the period of the PPP/C foisted de facto Town Clerk Carol Sooba (from July 24, 2012 to July 14, 2015) was to be exempted (except for the final four months out of her three years) from this “detailed forensic audit”. I--and many others--have always suspected that this CoI is, despite the denials, pure political mischief.

The evidence is now in.

I turn to a brief review of this CoI and its report(in the interest of full disclosure: I represented Town Clerk Royston King at the CoI limited to the two days when in obedience to a summons he appeared under protest). FIRST error: this CoI was, ab initio (i e from the very beginning) a NULLITY (i e without any effect or validity whatsoever in law), being ultra vires the Local Government Commission Act, 2013. I have consistently raised and argued this preliminary point in Mr. King’s Affidavit, my oral submissions before the CoI, and in my written closing submission/ address. My argument is unassailable. Nullity has no degrees; it is incurable. It would be a very bold Judge who would give judicial imprimatur to this CoI. Besides, this CoI is a flagrant usurpation by the Local Government Commission of

the MINISTER’s power under the Eighth Schedule of the Municipal and District Councils Act, Cap 28:01 (M&DCA). The report is equally a nullity.

SECOND, (assuming, without conceding, I am wrong on the nullity point) the error of the CoI’s application of, and reliance on, the irrelevant and inapplicable Public Corporations Act, Cap 19:05 and Companies Act, Cap 89:01.Quoting from Kaieteur News article [“Former Mayor was fed information on Town Clerk’s corrupt dealings- CoI report”] the Learned Chairman’s position is that there is “… a strict duty on the councillors and officers of the council to act in accordance with the provisions of the Public Corporations Act 19:05 and the Companies Act, Cap 89:01 … in respect of the Companies Act, Kennard noted that the town clerk and mayor are bound to follow the provision of section 59 ….” I submit that this is HERESY. This irrelevancy raises serious concerns about the efficiency capacities of the CoI The Georgetown City Council is neither in fact, or in law, a public corporation, or company for the purposes, and within the purview, of the Public Corporations Act and Companies Act respectively. It is ELECTED. It is a “body politic and corporate” (section 3 of M&DCA), but it is SUI GENERIS (inter alia - it has no shareholding, no directorship, no secretary, it is not registrable under the Companies Act, it is not a separate and distinct person from the mayor and councillors; it sues and can be sued only in the name of the town clerk). The mayor, town clerk (and all other Local Government Officers) are creatures of the M&DCA (not the Public Corporations Act or Companies Act) and they derive their powers, functions and duties from it, and it is the M&DCA interpretation, and the limitations of its own wording on those functions, powers and duties, that matters. But a true interpretation of those provisions would

vindicate and absolve the town clerk; so the CoI disregards them.

What the readers need to know (given a discerned disposition to accuse the TC of wrongs is how extensive and far-reaching are the powers given to a town clerk by Parliament. So far-reaching are these powers that the town clerk is made the de facto lawyer of all the other officers; and they are all bound by his/her interpretation of the M&DCA as to their powers/ functions. The town clerk is for all practical purposes and intent a one-man management. This management omnipotence was solidified in 2013 (during the tenure of the PPP/Cs Carol Sooba) by the Municipal And District Councils (Amendment) Act, 2013 which inserted section 8A(g). So, in terms of the M&DCA it is difficult to establish that a town clerk has acted without statutory authority. And if he has acted within his statutory authority, no CoI can find any blame or wrong in him – case law affirms this. Soto circumvent this statutory bulwark, the CoI resorts to the Companies Act and Public Corporation Act! THIRD, on the evidence of the Guyana Chronicle and Kaieteur News reports, the CoI appears (in its dispensation to criminalise certain local government officers) to have also conveniently ignored and disregarded the detailed and comprehensive remedial provisions in the Municipal and District Councils Act regarding the council’s officers acting contrary to law with regard to the Council’s finances and other assets, and their recovery[sections 177 to 201 (inclusive), “disallowance” and “surcharge” by the Auditor, are expressly provided for]. Why then have the Learned Chairman’s recommendations not focused on this statutory regime)? Let that statutory process take its course. Is there condescension, in the report, to particulars of any kind (not just some easy- tomake generalisations of “skullduggery”, “corruption”, “misfeasance” etc.) to show how criminality might have happened? Surely, criminal and civil proceedings would only be merited, where at least the officers

can be shown to have acted “contrary to law” or with “negligence or misconduct” within section 186 of the Municipal and District Councils Act. And most lawyers (the CoI had two young attorneys with undementiated memory faculties, assigned to it) would readily recall the well-known House of Lords case of Roberts v.

Hopwood (1925), where surcharge in the context of a local authority successfully happened (Roberts v.

Hopwood is of seminal applicatin and was applied in Taylor v. Monrow (1960) /All.ER 455]. So I ask this question: has not the CoI erred in law by pre-empting and usurping the statutory jurisdiction of the statutory auditor under sections 177 to 201 of the M&DCA? I submit it has, in its purported findings and recommendation that criminal and civil proceedings should happen. There is not, as there should be, before the CoI any audited evidential basis for this recommendation. Indeed, that whole system of statutory audit to which Parliament has subjected the City Council, is a most emphatic protest and objection to the CoI’s extravagant nonsense, with a tendency to sensationalise, about criminal proceedings, in the absence of audit.

What if the audit proves otherwise?

It is conceivable, that an audit will show that there was no bad faith/ mala fides, even if on one possible view, there was mismanagement, of a non-criminal character.

FOURTH, the two most prominent and specified Terms of Reference (as published in the official Gazette), are (i) the no- confidence motion against the Town Clerk (ii) the lease by the Town Clerk of the Sussex Street Wharf facilities claimed by N.I.C.I. L. Those two ToRs were the crux and gravamen of the CoI, hence the CoIs fixation. Yet no highlights have been published about those two ToRs. Is it that in the face of the insurmountable and unassailable arguments made by Mr. King’s lawyer, they died their natural inevitable deaths. The point is this: those two Terms of Reference generated and excited the highest public interest (in any evet at the level of the LGC. Who can forget

the much publicized “shut up” outburst to the Mayor. So, if Mr. King has been absolved and vindicated in respect of those two ToRs, fairness and elementary justice demands that this be reported to the Local Government Commission with equal fervor, as the condemnation of him. It is a miscarriage of justice, and accordingly an error for Mr. King’s innocence or nofault in respect of those two ToRs to be hushed- up by the CoI FIFTH, the Local Government Commission in its Terms of Reference about the Sussex Street Wharf facility (disputed) property ownership matter, must have appreciated that it involved some determination of disputed ownership, and so appears to have assumed, and arrogated to itself, a constitutional jurisdiction or power to vest and confer on a CoI the constitutional and statutory powers enjoyed only by sitting Judges of the Supreme Court of Judicature to hear and determine issues of disputed legal ownership of land, of this type, in this country.

This jurisdictional disability of both the Local Government Commission and the Commission of Inquiry, is trite and elementary. This CoI (assuming, without conceding it is valid) is not a “Court or Tribunal” within article 144(8) of the Constitution. A more disreputable error it is difficult to conceive; as it calls into question not only the motives of the LGC, but the evenhandedness of an acquiescing CoI. I end with this: out of nothing can come nothing (ex nihilo nihil fit); the case law including the well known local Court of Appeal case of Barnwell,and the Privy Council decision of Ratnagopal (on point about CoI and which I copiously cited to the CoI) is very, very clear about this. Accordingly any recommendation based on a CoI that is a nullity, is, ipso facto, equally null and void. I could have told more, I am out of space.

Mr. King has a legitimate expectation that his administrative leave be rescinded forthwith.

Regards Maxwell. E. Edwards

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE December 9, 2018

FIGURES, FICTION AND FACTS I HAVE noticed faked figures being peddled by the opposition and sections of the media about the outcome of the November 12 local government elections as these relate to a partner of the APNU+AFC coalition government.

Those figures have been used to spin a fiction that the AFC secured only 4% of the total votes cast; that the PPP secured a landslide victory and is poised for an easy win at the next 2020 national elections.

The opposition is in desperation mode and is picking on this small party, as it knows that every single vote for the AFC consigns it eternally to the opposition benches in Parliament.

Accepting but not admitting that the AFC did get 4% of total votes, that would be enough to make a difference.

The PPP fears that as an AFC political leader I could play a key role in making this difference. I expect that they would try all the dirty tricks in their bag to damage my image and to disrespect the office that I hold. They could do worse.

That was why they picked on Whim, the tiny fishing village where I was born on the Corentyne Coast. They boasted that the PPP has captured Whim; that the AFC received only a handful of votes, less that the number of persons who had supported the party candidates.

They insisted that only the Nagamootoo “family cabal” voted for the AFC and that “Nagamootoo lost.”

been for it, since 1964, an Indian-dominated, ethnic fortress.

This is what discerning Guyanese, looking for an answer to ethnic polarisation, should celebrate; not the empty boast of the triumph of political tribalism.

In each of these two constituencies the votes secured by this small “third force” were greater than the 20 backers who supported the candidates. But the opposition and a few others who ought to know better, continued to pour scorn on the defiant and rebellious Whim voters.

By comparison, the AFC did not suffer the horrible defeat that was inflicted on the PPP in a Buxton constituency, where it failed to get a single vote! With 0 votes in Buxton, the PPP completely failed to show that it has multi-racial appeal, and that it could defeat the PNC on its African-dominated turf.

In the Buxton-Friendship constituency, the results were: 1,336 (APNU), 103 (AFC), and 000 (PPP).

The objective critics should compare and contrast Whim and Buxton, and examine which party has the greater potential, or even any semblance of popular appeal to impact Guyana’s ethnic and electoral problematic.

The opposition mis-applied figures to show that the AFC was decimated, that it has polled only 4% of total votes cast.

HISTORIC IN-ROAD At the 2016 Local Government Elections (LGEs), the APNU+AFC polled 31 votes in Whim. However, in 2018, the AFC independently contested two constituencies in Whim and secured a total of 62 votes.

As against the 2016 coalition showing, the AFC alone polled a 100% increase. As a result, the AFC has made an historic in-road into a PPP base, and has breached what has

MULTIPLE CONSTITUENCIES The fact of the matter is, the AFC contested full slates only in four municipalities – Georgetown, Linden, Mahdia and Mabaruma. It also fielded full slates in three NDCs - Bloomfield/Whim, Mocha-Arcadia and Diamond /Grove.

This is what the total votes for these areas show:Total votes cast: 43,295. Of this number APNU polled 24, 881 or 57.46%; PPP 13,106 or 30.27%; AFC - 4,964 or 11.40%.

Unlike general elections where the whole

THE Guyana Police Force hosted the Annual Trainees’ Christmas Luncheon on Friday at the Police Officers’ Mess Annexe where recruits were given a break from their arduous training and treated to an enticing meal and other goodies, served to them by the hierarchy of the force.

Present at the luncheon were: Deputy Commissioner ‘Administration’ and COP (Ag), Mr. Paul Williams, Deputy Commissioner ‘Operations’, Maxine Graham, Assistant Commissioner ‘Training’, Clifton Hicken; Ministry of Public Security’s Permanent Secretary, Ms. Danielle McCalmon; Divisional and Branch Commanders and other Senior and Junior Officers.

The Trainees’ Luncheon, which is a tradition of the Force, is held in December for recruits of the three police colleges (Felix Austin Police College, Georgetown, FAPC Adventure, Berbice and Richard Faikall Police College, Suddie, Essequibo).

The luncheon also serves as a platform for the future police men/women to showcase some of their talents and items such as: group dances, poems, songs and some even described their life in the colleges, much to the amusement of the audience.

The programme concluded with a grand finale where the trainees’ all came together on the floor and performed a dance entitled “the Electric Slide” which had everyone shaking to the tunes.

country is a single Proportional Representation (PR) constituency, the local authority elections have multiple, separate constituencies in town wards and villages.

In the general elections a vote for a party anywhere, is counted as a percentage of the total votes cast. But at local elections, the showing of any party would have to be computed as against the votes cast in the areas in which it contested. I saw a Stabroek News article in which this approach was taken, when it showed that in 27 constituencies where the AFC contested, with and without full slates, it secured a total of 8,719 votes or 8% of total votes.

This would appear realistic when painted on a broader canvas; but the full effect of voting preferences is demonstrated when we examine areas where the contesting parties fielded full slates, as above.

I did not want to engage this issue, hoping that it would pass. But when the PPP took its boast and empty bombast into Parliament during the budget debate, I decided to nail their lies, as my silence did not mean surrender to these false and faked figures!

FAKED LANDSLIDE One of the opposition MPs gave figures to show a 61% “landslide” for the PPP at the local polls. My figures show as follows:PPP -- 122,307; APNU -- 68,060; AFC -- 8,719 and Others -- 2,995, some of whom were independents whom the AFC backed.

Calculated against the 572,531 voters on the 2018 register, the PPP secured only 21% in an election it has described as a “referendum on the government”. It pleaded with its supporters to vote in order to throw the APNU+AFC out of government. As it turned out, it has failed to inspire or mobilise its own supporters. We now know that out of 572,531 persons on register, only 208,534 or 36% turned out.

The critics have used the outcome of the local government elections to put a wedge in the coalition. They must show that the AFC was weakened, or decimated.

But a study of the electoral fortunes of the AFC would show that it remains the most credible, genuinely authentic and consistently strong “third force” in Guyana. In the 2006 national elections, it polled 28,366 or 8.4% of the votes cast. At the 2011 elections it received 35,555 or 10.32% of the 342,236 votes. For the 2018 municipal elections in the capital, Georgetown, where over close to one-half of the country’s voters reside, the AFC polled 3,059 or 10.75% of the 28,436 votes cast. In Whim, the AFC fought the PPP head-on and polled 13% of the votes.

This is no evidence that this party that has been decimated. It certainly is not “dead meat.”

THIRD FORCE I know that there are some otherwise well-meaning persons who are disappointed with the performance of the AFC in government.

They wish that the party should become more strident in getting specific things done.

This may be a good reason to occasionally badger this small force, but it needs all the support it could get to allow it to show that the political system in Guyana has space for a third force.

The AFC is important to keep this space open. Who knows, others may want to come in and, as I had said sometime in 2005, quoting Chairman Mao, even before the AFC was officially launched, “let a thousand flowers bloom.”

For now, the AFC is a fixture in government to push the development agenda and at the same time ensure that “Ali Baba and the 40 thieves” do not return to again plunder our national family treasures.

GPF hosts annual trainees’ Christmas Luncheon

Deputy Commissioner ‘Operations’, Maxine Graham serving recruits during the Christmas luncheon

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE December 9, 2018

Understanding Energy...

Supplier Development Forum THIS week’s latest oil discovery - ExxonMobil’s 10th in Guyana - is yet another reminder that oil is coming soon. As 2020 approaches, things are quickly getting serious for Guyanese firms looking for opportunities to participate in the burgeoning oil and gas industry.

Last week the Center for Local Business Development (CLBD) and ExxonMobil Guyana hosted the Supplier Development Forum for Liza Phase 1. The forum was an opportunity for local companies and Exxon’s primary contractors to discuss their scopes of work, procurement forecasts and opportunities in 2019 and more.

ExxonMobil Guyana representatives, like Country Manager Rod Henson, highlighted key areas where local businesses can increase their competitiveness for contracts by implementing international standards for health and safety, environmental and regulatory compliance, quality, and cost competitiveness.

Henson’s emphasized the company’s “long-term commitment” to Guyana.

This is especially true given the ongoing streak of discoveries offshore, the 10th of

which came this week. Exxon’s long-term presence should be promising for business owners who are looking for stable demand to responsibly invest in long-term capacity-building.

The event was broken into two days, the first focused on helping the 300 companies that have already submitted expressions of interest to better understanding the procurement process. The second day was an opportunity for ExxonMobil and its primary contractors to network with the 1000-plus local companies that have registered with the CLBD. Crucial to the event was the inclusion of Exxon’s “tier 1” suppliers. These companies are Exxon’s primary contractors on the project—mostly large international oil and gas service companies with specialized services. These contractors are the primary target for many local firms since they are the companies which need the subcontractor support that many Guyanese firms are well equipped to provide.

These firms include drillship operators like Noble Corporation and Stena, subsea control systems-specialists like Saipem,

geophysical firms that conduct seismic surveys like TechnipFMC, and other oilfield services companies like SBM and Schlumberger.

Schlumberger is a great example of the kind of opportunities available for Guyanese companies. In June, they advertised and contracted Guyanese firms to help build and renovate facilities for a drilling fluids facility at the Houston Port on the East Bank of Demerara.

Chairman of the Private Sector Commission, Desmond Sears, lauded the work of the CLBD in supporting and training local firms and highlighted the opportunities for joint ventures to combine basic local capacity, capital, and manpower, with specialized international industry expertise.

Sears also noted that many Guyanese companies have already taken advantage of opportunities for contracts in the industry and are investing to develop their capacity to take on more specialized roles.

Representatives of such companies were in attendance at the event, some of which have already achieved the prestigious ISO:9001 certification for quality

management, which is often required in an industry where extremely precise technical work and strict safety standards are the norms.

Government representatives like Joanna Simmons-Homer of the Department of Energy also emphasized the high standards of the industry and its notoriously steep learning curve, but noted that “nonetheless, success stories are emerging.”

Despite this progress, it’s important to recognize that the industry won’t necessarily touch every business and won’t employ every Guyanese. The reality is that oil extraction offshore is not a particularly labour-intensive industry. Many of the opportunities discussed last week require high technical capabilities which only a handful of companies worldwide can provide.

However, the potential revenue flowing into Guyana and long project timeline indicate that there will be ample opportunity and time for local businesses in various sectors [to] increase their capacity and have a role in this arena, and that translates to greater opportunities and development for Guyanese citizens.

Regional development to reduce —Min. disparities in living conditions Bulkan THE guiding principle and philosophy of the government to regional development is to reduce the disparities between the living conditions and access to social services, amenities between the hinterland and coastland populations, according to Minister of Communities, Ronald Bulkan.

The minister made the remarks during his recent budget 2019 debates in the National Assembly.

Bulkan said the overarching obligation of the ministry in this context is to continuously provide necessary technical support toward the realisation of the strategic objectives of the core programmes of education, public health, public infrastructure and agriculture.

Minister Bulkan said the regional development agenda is also guided by the principle of

expanded participation in decision making to enable the regions to be effective in keeping with the policy of decentralisation.

“With this objective in view, the ministry will focus on strengthening the capacities of regional structures to be better able to provide sustainable development—related services; the institutionalisation of the Regional Agriculture and Commercial Exhibitions and other mechanisms such as the Regional Development Consultative Committee and NRDCC,” Bulkan said.

Underscoring that the leader of the opposition is of the view that the 2019 budget came up short on plans for the emerging sector, Minister Bulkan said clearly Jagdeo did not give serious consideration to what was presented.

“Budget 2019 has clearly articulated the vison of the govern-

Minister of Communities Ronald Bulkan ment; a vision which resides with the people; the removal of a centralised decision-making model to one of community participation

and cooperation that will enhance local economic development and self-determination,” he said.

Further, Minister Bulkan said that the opposition is of the opinion that the 2019 budget is “tone deaf” is a deliberate attempt at undermining the empowerment of citizens and undermining the empowerment of constituencies.

He questioned how more divorced from reality can the opposition get when every citizen of this land is aware that the major constraint to councils delivering quality services, is the limited resources at their disposal.

“These pronouncements represent the philosophy of the opposition for local government, of control, for he who pays the piper calls the tune. Candidates prior to the election and the convening of a council to deliberate on the community interest and

priorities; were emphatic, we will NOT be doing such and such; Why? Mr. Speaker, because they are in receipt of instructions from Robb Street NOT to exercise their constitutional right to autonomy and to develop their own programmes,” Bulkan noted.

Adding that the theme of Budget 2019 is “Transforming the Economy, Empowering People, Building Sustainable Communities for the Good Life”, it encapsulates the Vision of this government, Bulkan said this is a vision which government have never shied away from, that an empowered nation with an empowered people is critical to advancing national development, building cohesion, transforming the economy and affording the needed opportunities for sustainable communities and a good life.

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE December 9, 2018

Revitalisation of Integrity Commission shows gov’t efforts against corruption – PM Nagamootoo

UNDER the previous administration, “Guyana could not even make its integrity commission functional,” Prime Minister Moses Nagamootoo said during his Budget presentation, noting that the country is in a better position today citing specifically, a 2011 Ram and McRae Report which spoke to a mountain of corruption under the PPP. In his Friday evening presentation in the National Assembly, the prime minister rebuked the opposition’s accusations of corruption

within this current administration.

He noted that it was the Coalition that has made greater efforts to clamp down on corruption.

“We revived the Integrity Commission… today we have a functioning Integrity Commission that is asking and going after the declaration of assets and incomes of public officials,” the prime minister said.

The prime minister said under the post Jagan PPP regime children “used to spell the word corruption with three ‘P’s, corruPPPtion.”

Leader of the Opposition, Bharrat Jagdeo

Speaking specifically of the former President and now Opposition Leader, Bharrat Jagdeo, Prime Minister Nagamootoo said according to the 2011 report, his presidency was riddled with corruption.

“Ram and McRae said this …they concluded that the (2011) Executive Presidency was synonymous with dictatorship,” Nagamootoo said.

The prime minister says even though the damage done to the country under the PPP/C has left is scars, the coalition government remains committed to fighting corruption as it “hinders economic growth and development and undermines public confidence in the administration.”

He said no one should benefit from unjust enrichment. “In 2011, the leader of the opposition was in his last days as president and Ram and McRae asked rhetorically what would be Jagdeo’s legacy and this is what they wrote: “The Presidency has witnessed corruption rising to heights that are as dramatic as the depth of governance.”

He continued: “The public sector has effectively been subservient to the political directorate, the independence of the judiciary was under constant threat, the gap between rich and poor is widening in a chasm, and fear of victimisation has silenced civil society, the business community and independent professionals.”

Further, the prime minister said the Ram and McRae 2011 report also stated the Executive Presidency was synonymous with dictatorship and today the same PPP leaders are in condemnation of the government after being accused of a mountain of corruption.

Meanwhile, in response to the opposition’s rejection of the 2019 national budget, Prime Minister Nagamootoo said the opposition continuously described the budget as visionless and lacking in investments.

He said the opposition’s rejection is confusing as they seek to condemn the very thing, they wish to advocate which is jobs for citizens.

“The opposition during these debates say there are no jobs” …but the opposition opposes $16 Billion set aside for public servants …they condemn the very thing they are advocating for,” Prime Minister Nagamootoo said.

He said that the budget will not only benefit public servants, but will also aide in the alleviation of food shortages, as much emphasis has been placed on agricultural development.

“Monies from the $300.7-billion budget ensures that the programmes in health, education, housing, water and security sectors are adequately funded, jobs must be maintained …. In this budget, agriculture will get a big boost, securing the livelihood of our farmers0,” the prime minister said.

Jagdeo said that the peo-

Prime Minister, Moses Nagamootoo ple of Guyana have been of the themes that characterbadly served by the govern- ise a good budget, such as ment through negotiations trans-formative measures for that display incompetence, the economy or empowering which he believes damages citizens are actually present.

Guyana’s prospects for eco“None of this will be nomic growth. achieved through this He noted that though budget as it is currently they continuously referred to configured. In fact, we the looming prospect of first believe that these goals are oil, none of the government not only unattainable, but speakers addressed the oil many of the measures outcontract with ExxonMobil lined in the budget will run in their budget speeches. He counter to those objectives. said that in their reluctance So for anyone to have an to mention the lopsided con- understanding of the state tract, the government contin- of the economy and the ues to recite the successes of future economic health of ExxonMobil worldwide. the country, we have to do Jagdeo related to the Na- an in depth analysis,” the tional Assembly that none opposition leader said.

506 industrial accidents, 19 fatalities in 2018 –– government commits to reducing occurrences through an alliance

OVER the past year, there have been 506 industrial accidents, 19 or 3.5 per cent of which were fatalities.

As part of its effort to address and reduce the

number of accidents, government has started to train and educate all employers and employees about good occupational health and safety practices, said Minister within the Ministry

of Social Protection, Keith Scott during his presentation to the National Assembly last week.

“We have set ourselves a target of investigating all fatal accidents in a timely manner…we will also continue to conduct workshops and seminars with employers and employees…. In 2018, 40 training activities were conducted,” said the minister.

According to Minister Scott, most of the workplace fatalities occurred in the mining sector but, the ministry has since formed an alliance with the Guyana Geology and Mines

Commission (GGMC), the National Insurance Scheme (NIS) and the Guyana Forestry Commission, to reduce the occurrences in the sector.

The stakeholders intend on conducting more inspections in the hinterland areas to ensure that safety is a priority.

“We will expand inspections across the country…we will also conduct safety audits because while not all of the accidents were fatal, time or a limb was lost,” said Scott, adding that the ministry and stakeholders will conduct projects with the guidance

of the National Occupational Safety and Health Policy.

Guyana is the only country in CARICOM with a health and safety policy which could be mirrored across the community.

“We will continue to develop ways and means to deal with accidents,” said Scott, noting that they have invested in training to empower young people and to create more trainers.

Some $383 million was invested into the Board of Industrial Training (BIT) which has been training hundreds of young people for years.

Minister within the Ministry of Social Protection, Keith Scott

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE December 9, 2018

PPP’s ‘doomsday’ Budget 2019 – Ramjattan projection pathetic –– opposition using scaremongering tactics to appeal to political base MINISTER of Public Security Khemraj Ramjattan during the 2019 budget debate reprimanded the parliamentary opposition People’s Progressive Party/Civic for their “doomsday” projection and stated emphatically that “there can be no doubt that Guyana is doing better than it was under the previous administration.”

“They spread their litany of woes… the illusions they come up with, their pessimism … I want to say that Guyana has its challenges, but there can be no doubt that it is doing much better in everything when compared to years ago,” Minister Ramjattan said during his presentation in the budget debate.

In addition, the public security minister said that despite the claims of the opposition, the evidence shows that homicides and other crimes are on the decline.

“We have the statistics on the homicides that happen in this country for the year 2012 we had 139 murders, in 2013 we had 155; 2014 we had 149; 2015 – 149; 2016 – 142; 2017 – 115 and 2018 up to now 93. Yes, it is declining!”

Ramjattan asserted.

Ramjattan said, “…just don’t give the impression to your base that crime rates are skyrocketing. Robberies of all categories – 1,401 in 2012 in 2013 – 1,531; 2015 – 1,449; 2016 – 1,293.

Robberies of all types we had …. 2017 – 1,237 and in this year thus far 965! ….

That is what false news and fake news does. It weaponises the truth to the extent that it will burn it. That is what the opposition wants… they want to give the impression that crime is very high in Guyana.”

In addition, Minister Ramjattan highlighted that ‘Homicide Monitor,’ the most comprehensive publicly available dataset on murder in the world indicates that for Guyana, out of 100,000 persons there are 15 murders, compared to Jamaica with 56; Trinidad – 36; St Lucia – 34; St Vincent and Grenadines – 35; Belize – 37 and Barbados – 11.

“I want to say that although 15 murders per 100,000 is bad, it is far superior to the impression you guys want to give to the world,” the minister said.

Further, Minister Ramjattan highlighted several successes in local crime-fighting and pledged to continue to invest in training and other resources for members of the Guyana Police Force

and other public security agencies.

“Every day in the stop and search we are catching somebody with a gun… we are training at-risk youths, we are training our policemen… MBAs in the police force. Now… they didn’t have that under Mr. Rohee … the quality of the police stations is being improved. In 2019 we have another six police stations to commence rehabilitation or be newly constructed. We are also going to upgrade our forensic laboratory to the cost of $1Million USD. An Italian company, Q and T has won the bid and we are also going to get gun-residue testing there.

We are doing what is required. We have MoUs and other agreements with other partners the DEA, Interpol…,” Minister Ramjattan outlined.

The minister said more than $35Million has been allocated in the 2019 budget to continue improvements in the security sector. He also commended Minister Jordan for a well put together budget. “Thank you, Minister Jordan, for the best budget you have presented, and the 15 percent increase given to the MoPS $35.6Billion is a quite sum,” he said.

“In 2019 when you get a report all stations across the country will know of it. The CSSP programme has been helping in many ways with training at-risk youths for the reduction of crimes and recidivism … a brandnew prison will be constructed in Berbice… we will have a number of programmes to ensure we do not unnecessarily incarcerate our people.

We are also talking about restorative justice inside the prison where there can be earlier releases for nonviolent offences. We are also asking the parole board to move faster, so that the issues of parole for women and children in prison can be addressed faster,” Minister Ramjattan indicated.

He said, “It was the PPP’s propaganda and disinformation both crudely and subtly presented. And of course, with a straight face directed to their base who they know will be watching on TV, so that this government can look very ugly and very discriminatory. That is what they have done.”

He zeroed in on claims by the opposition which suggest that the government’s closure of sugar estates was a race-based decision. “… they give the impression, to

deal with this emotion of bias and discrimination, to give the impression that we here never loved sugar workers and that we fooled them. That’s food for the base; but let me just remind members here that indeed when we started in the administration every month for 36 months GuySuCo wanted $1Billion to bail out sugar. $1Billion and we gave it to them!”

He said the opposition had failed to restructure the sugar industry despite knowing that it was unsustainable to keep subsidising its operation.

This, he said, was because of political patrimony: “You over there could not make that decision and you knew that it was coming down since 2010 with the economic partnership agreement with the European Union that sugar will not be profitable. From 2010 all through to 2015 it was almost US$40Million lost every year. You wanted to employ your people because you are very strong in the sugar estate areas. It was jobs for the boys…. so please don’t play to your base that we are the ones who are discriminating.”

The minister said despite the challenges, the coalition government has brought significant improvements to almost every aspect in the lives of citizens.

“I want to say immediately that Guy-

Minister of Public Security Khemraj Ramjattan during his presentation ana has its challenges, but there can be no doubt that she is doing better overall when compared to years ago. Every day, doing better everywhere! I must highlight just a few, public servants’ wages have gone up; we have had two local government elections when you did not hold one in 22 years.

We have gotten a public procurement commission,” he added.

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE December 9, 2018

Brazilian hotelier, miner charged, remanded

–– for trafficking, exploiting Venezuelan women

A BRAZILIAN hotelier and a miner were on Friday remanded to prison for the alleged trafficking of two Venezuelan women for employment.

They are Christina Rodriquez Gomes, 32, owner of Ola Hotel on Charlotte Street, and Arnold Melville, 50, of Eteringbang, on the Cuyuni River.

The two charges against Gomes read that between November 4 and 28, 2018 at the Ola Hotel on Charlotte Street, she engaged in the trafficking in

persons by harbouring two Venezuelan women by means of abuse of position for the purpose of labour exploitation. She was not required to plead to the two indictable charges.

It is also alleged that between the same dates and location, Gomes, while being the employer of the two women, for

Christina Rodriquez Gomes the purpose of trafficking knowingly confiscated their immigration travel documents, to which charges she pleaded not guilty.

Her attorney, Siand Dhurjon during his appli-

cation for bail, told the court that incident started about three weeks ago when his client needed cooks at the hotel for her Latino customers.

He said that the two alleged victims applied for the posts, but were later hired as maids and were paid $12,000 weekly.

Dhurjon contended that there are even pay slips to prove these claims, in addition to CCTV footage showing that the two women were not held against their will, and that they came and went freely at the hotel.

“This problem came about over a dispute between Gomes and the two women,” the attorney told the court.

Police Prosecutor Gordon Mansfield, however, was opposed to Gomes being released on bail on the grounds that she is not a Guyanese national, in spite of her attorney explaining that she has been living here for over 11 years, is married to a Guyaneses, and has a 10-year-old son.

Melville, meanwhile, was charged separately for the said offence, in that between November 4 and 28, at Eteringbang, he assisted Gomes in engag-

Arnold Melville ing in the trafficking in persons by recruiting and transporting the two women by means of deception for the purpose of labour exploitation.

He, too, was not required to plea to the two indictable charges, and was represented by attorney-at-law Clyde Forde.

Mansfield objected to the father of two being released on bail on the grounds that he transported the women to be trafficked.

The chief magistrate remanded him to prison until March 19, 2019 when he will appear at The Kamarang Magistrate’s Court, and Gomes until January 3, 2019.

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE December 9, 2018

Men encouraged to join campaign to eliminate gender violence

THE Ministry of Social Protection joined with the global community in observance of the international campaign to end violence against women and girls under the local theme “HearMeToo: Collective Voices Against Gender-Based Violence”.

The campaign, was known as “16 Days of Activism”, which had commenced on November 25 (International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women) and concludes on December 10, 2018 (International Human Rights Day).

This year, the ministry will be hosting several initiatives calling for action towards ending gender-based violence.

One of the activities which is an ‘Against Violent Forum’, was hosted on Thursday evening at the GT Motorsports Inc. Club (Thomas Lands and Albert Street).

The objective of the event was to encourage national commitment towards ending gender-based violence in anticipation of forming purposeful and strategic alliances with the male community.

The “#HearMeToo: Men against Violence Forum” will challenge stakeholders to examine intervention strategies for men and boys at various levels, thereby contributing to the prevention and elimination of all forms of gender-based violence.

Additionally, the forum created an opportunity for discussion about challenges and solutions for reducing gender-based violence.

Mr. Dennis Glasgow, who spoke about sexual and reproductive health and gender-based violence, highlighted the challenges that gender-based violence poses to the public health division and other sectors crucial to the national development of the country.

He added that while gender roles are changing, women need to appreciate the sensitivity of men and men must not use provocation as an excuse for violence. He also pointed out that while women and children are the primary

victims of gender-based violence, men are also affected.

According to Social Services Director Whentworth Tanner, activities will be conducted in all 10 Administrative Regions.

Tanner noted that, “We are working closely with the Regional Democratic Councils, but where we don’t have those collaborations; we are working through the Regional Women’s Affairs Committee.”

Tanner noted that the through the programme, men complained about not being heard in society as it relates to violence.

This, he noted, caused the ministry to set up a forum where men can freely discuss their social issues.

“Most men don’t see themselves as perpetrators but because a few men that participate in activities that are condemned by society, all men are painted with the same brush. We don’t want that so the goal of this activism programme is to be able to help the targeted audiences, which are men, to change their mindsets as it relates to

The speakers. Dr. Dennis Gill, Dr. Esan Reid, Dennis Glasgow, Mr. Colin Marks, Mr. Will Campbell, Mr. Gladwin Samuels violence against women.”

Tanner also related that the Ministry is also working to introduce more male-related programmes where they can be trained in particular divisions which will, in return, be beneficial “not only to women but society also”.

Some of the topics discussed during the 16day programme were sexual and reproductive health and gender-based violence, poor health choices, male perpetrators of violence, masculinity and manhood and consequences and corrections.

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE, December 9, 2018

‘They’re punishing our students’ …AG calls on Guyanese to join fight for law school …accuses Nandlall of blackmail; says CLE shifting positions

By Vishani Ragobeer ATTORNEY General and Minister of Legal Affairs Basil Williams SC has said that all Guyanese including the parliamentary opposition should work

together to push for the establishment of the JOF Haynes Law School here in Guyana. Additionally, he accused his predecessor of blackmailing the government by writing secret letters to the Council of Legal

Education saying Guyana was never given approval to open a school.

The minister made the statement as he spoke at the 2019 Budget Debates on Friday. “The hardships suffered by our young people

Minister of Legal Affairs and Attorney General Basil Williams SC

in Trinidad—we can’t even begin to describe…They are punishing our students,” Williams said emotionally. As such, he posited: “This nation must call for this law school to be built”. According to him, it is urgent now more than ever to establish this school because of the continued discriminatory practices against Guyanese students and because of crucial need for local skills, when Guyana transforms into an economic “hub” by 2020. The minister spoke in detail about the continued hardships faced by Guyanese students studying at the Hugh Wooding Law School (HWLS), in Trinidad and Tobago.

“They (HWLS) are allotting to us, Guyana—a founding member of CARICOM [and] a signatory to the Council of Legal Education (CLE)... they are reducing us to 25 students while they are churning out students there,” he said.

He contended that 250 students graduate each year from the law schools in Trinidad and Jamaica, yet only 25 Guyanese are allowed entry. The minister further highlighted that by 2020, Guyana will undoubtedly become an economic hub that will need lawyers to boost local capacity. And while acknowledging that the quota

of emerging Guyanese lawyers will be significantly less, he explained: “That means we are going to employ all those lawyers that they are churning out at the expense of Guyanese lawyers.”

This, he noted, is a gross injustice to Guyanese minds and the nation must continue to press for the establishment of the local Law school so that more students would be able to pursue studies in law.

Just recently, he noted that his ministry successfully hosted stakeholders in the law field- including representatives of the CLE, the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) and personnel from the three Caribbean Law schools (Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica and Bahamas).

Despite this, he said: “The Joseph Haynes Law School (JHLS) was subjected to another shifting of the CLE’s position to deny Guyana its right to establish a law school.”

In September of this year, CLE Chairman Reginald Armour announced that the Government of Guyana and its joint-venture partners, the Law School of the Americas (LCA) and the University College of the Caribbean (UCC), have been asked to revisit

the feasibility study for the establishment of the school. Citing the study submitted as non-compliant to the standards of the CLE, Armour has also indicated that study does not satisfy the quality assurance that the CLE requires and the body needs to see a proposed curriculum. Nevertheless, the AG affirmed on Friday that the government will make every effort to ensure that this law school comes to fruition. The Government of Guyana and the Council of Legal Education (CLE) had previously agreed to revisit the feasibility study and business plan for the establishment of the law School.

“We will continue pressing the CLE, the Bar Association, the Judiciary, the Department of Law at the University of Guyana and the opposition for their support of the establishment of this law school,” he stressed.

The AG’s statements came at the heels of the contentions raised by Opposition Parliamentarian and Former Minister of Legal Affairs, Anil Nandlall that the current AG’s office is “devoid” of any substantial programmes and was operating in a “piecemeal manner”.

Antagonising members of the government, Nandlall said: “It is one thing to say that you lose law books, it is another thing to say that you lose cases, it is another thing to say that you lose chairmanship of your party... but when you lose a whole school that is cause for concern.”

Responding to this, the AG Williams accused Nandlall of writing the chairman of the CLE to block the setting up the school. “He wrote, he emailed the chairman of the CLE to tell him don’t worry with this school.

We didn’t get permission to support it. That is what he did and that is why he had to leave in disgrace,” Williams said of Nandlall, who had stepped out of the National Assembly Chambers at the time.

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE December 9, 2018

CDC boosts disaster risk management capacity in Region Nine

STAKEHOLDERS in Upper Takutu- Upper Essequibo (Region Nine) are now better equipped to prepare for and respond to emergencies as the Civil Defence Commission (CDC) handed over the draft Regional Risk Assessment Report and draft Regional Multi-Hazard Preparedness and Response Plan for Region Nine to the Regional Democratic Council (RDC).

The CDC also hosted an Orientation Session and Tabletop Exercise, which were aimed at familiarising regional stakeholders with the use of the two documents. The report and plan were developed over a three-year period, which saw several rounds of con-

through stakeholder engagements.

This is in an effort to build resilience at the regional level, so as to reduce disaster risk. He also said that completion of the plan will give the region the independence to manage its own disaster planning and resilience.

“The regional system is a proactive system, one where you will meet quarterly to plan for disasters and your response to emergencies. The plan contains a risk profile, which can be used as a planning document and help in decision-making.

We want you to take ownership of this system; key to this system we are implementing today is that all resources belong to the

ising of the disaster risk management system in place, Colonel Craig said too that the CDC will be going ahead with its plan to build a warehouse in Lethem to stockpile and store emergency items in the event of flooding or droughts, or any other emergency in the region.

Funds have been budgeted in the 2019 Budget and construction will begin in the first quarter of the new year, once approved by the National Assembly.

In reviewing the draft report, the participants were able to examine preliminary information regarding risks and hazard exposure within the region. The draft report demonstrated that the key drivers of risk within the

Director-General of the Civil Defence Commission (ag), Lieutenant-Colonel Kester Craig hands over the draft Regional Multi-Hazard Preparedness and Response Plan for Region Nine to Vice-Chairman Mr. Karl Singh action, which would be carried out by responsible agencies.

Vice-Chairman of Region Nine Mr. Karl Singh said the significance of the plan to the region cannot be understated. He noted that information contained in the plan can and will be used by the region in its planning and budgeting.

“Part of this plan is go-

and I want to assure you that we are going to put it to good use,” the vice-chairman expressed.

Chairman of the National Toshaos’ Council (NTC) Mr. Nicholas Fredericks who also participated in the activity, in an invited comment echoed the sentiments shared by the region’s vice-chairman. However, he noted that as a toshao and

Director General of the Civil Defence Commission (ag), Lieutenant-Colonel Kester Craig (seated third left) and Vice-Chairman Mr. Karl Singh (seated fourth right) with the participants and stakeholders who took part in Saturday’s activities sultations with regional stakeholders, as well as focused group meetings with communities, all conducted by the CDC. Speaking at a simple ceremony held at the Amerindian Hostel, Lethem, Director-General of the CDC (ag), Lieutenant-Colonel Kester Craig, said the commission remains committed to building Guyana’s disaster risk management capabilities

region, so in the event of any disaster or emergency, all resources will be maximised and centralised. The committee must come together and work. We have to take disaster risk management very seriously; it should not be a talk shop, it should be about what is going to affect our health, our environment, our security, our generation, our future,” he said.

Along with the formal-

region were found to be floods, drought, crop pest and diseases, among others.

The activity saw the successful completion of a Tabletop Exercise, which tested the operability of the Regional Multi-Hazard Preparedness and Response Plan. During the exercise, participants examined various hazard-impact scenarios and simulated emergency-response

ing to assist us to strengthen our resilience and once we do this, then the region as a whole can save resources.

We have a comprehensive document here. This will help us to plan more and put things in place to reduce the risks we face. For example, before we could have predicted the rainy season, today it is very difficult to say when it’s going to rain. To the government, who would have provided the funding for this plan, I am grateful

head of the NTC, it is his intention to take the plan to the various communities so that they too can become involved in the process of identifying risks and hazards and plan for them.

“The Disaster Risk Management Plan is a very important document to have. Due to the global climate change, droughts and floods are affecting us, so this plan is now going to put us in a position for us to plan to overcome di-

sasters. Looking at it from the regional level, I think we can now take it back to the villages so that we can modify it from a village level to see how we overcome the challenges that will be coming our way.

So the plan itself is like a foundation for the region, which can really assist the communities individually or from a sub-district level on how we go about our activities and life,” he said.

To date, the Barima-Waini (Region One); Pomeroon-Supenaam (Region Two); Essequibo Islands-West Demerara (Region Three); Mahaica-Berbice (Region Five); East Berbice-Corentyne (Region Six); CuyuniMazaruni (Region Seven); Potaro-Siparuni (Region Eight); Upper Takutu- Upper Essequibo (Region Nine); and Upper Demerara-Upper Berbice (Region 10) have completed their plans. The commission is hoping to complete the plans for Demerara-Mahaica (Region Four) in the new year, given the many complexities of this region.

The region’s Disaster Risk Management Committee comprises members from the Guyana Police Force (GPF), Guyana Defence Force (GDF), Guyana Fire Service (GFS), Guyana Lands and Surveys Commission (GL&SC), the RDCs, Ministry of Public Health, Lethem Regional Hospital and the Ministry of Public Infrastructure, among others.

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE, December 9, 2018

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE December 9, 2018

30 teen moms equipped with skills in Home Economics THIRTY (30) teenage mothers graduated from the Carnegie School of Home Economics (CSHE) on Friday as part of the Teenage Mothers’ Reintegration Programme executed by the Ministry of Education (MoE) in collaboration with the Ministry of Public Health (MoPH).

The young women completed Elementary Cookery and Cake Decorating programmes; and according to Programme Coordinator Ms. Janel Sweatnam, the young ladies are now equipped with

collaborative effort between the two ministries began a number of years ago and it has been successful with today having the first batch of graduates from the five-week programme.]

Deputy Chief Medical Officer of the MoPH Dr. Karen Boyle highlighted that this collaboration is part of the Public Health Ministry’s community support programme for young mothers.

Boyle noted too that families of the graduates must be thanked for providing the support to the

sight but no vision.”

The late American was able to achieve a lot in an era when a woman’s presence was considered to be necessary only in the kitchen; and her story is remarkable since she was both blind and deaf, but was still able to defy the odds.

Cognisant of this, the public health official encouraged the women that regardless of their backgrounds and situations, they need to have a vision as to what they want to achieve in life and work

Deputy Chief Medical Officer Dr. Karen Boyle presenting one of the graduates with her certificate that here and now, to have Home Economics, Myrna ministries is an outstanda vision for yourself”, Dr. Lee, who told them that it ing one and she congratBoyle advised. was a great pleasure to share ulated the teachers and the students for beginAlso speaking to the in the experience. graduates was Principal For her, the collabo- ning well and ending of the Carnegie School of ration between the two well.

Teen mothers preparing their dish for the final practical exercise of the course skills to provide for themselves and their children and to advance their skills in the respective fields by taking advantage of opportunities that will become available.

As stated in a release from the Education Ministry, “[Sweatnam] said that the

teenage mothers, so that they could have been able to attend classes every week.

Dr. Boyle reminded the graduates about late American Author and Political Activist, Helen Keller, who said: “The only thing worse than being blind is having

towards that by not limiting themselves.

“It is an important message for us women today.

It doesn’t matter what your circumstances started off as.

It doesn’t matter what the curveball in life might throw at you, the important thing is

CSHE Principal Ms. Myrna Lee presenting one of the graduates with her certificate

Regional Tourism Committee established in Bartica

THE Regional Chairman of Cuyuni/Mazaruni (Region Seven), Gordon Bradford, has announced the establishment of a Regional Tourism Committee comprising 12 residents of the Municipality of Bartica.

The committee for whom Bradford was elected the Chairperson, was established just a month ago, and was sparked by the encouragement of the Director General of Tourism, Donald Sinclair.

Bradford told the Guyana Chronicle that he, along with other residents of the town attended various tourism forums hosted by the Guyana Tourism Authority, and they would have impressed upon the people that Bartica should

be highlighted as a prime tourism hotspot.

It is with that backdrop that they have decided to formulate a committee within the town, with a mandate to facilitate and encourage tourism.

Since its establishment, he shared that the committee undertook a beautification project to clean up and improve the Baracara Resort.

“Our first project, which was done also to mark tourism month, we undertook the beautification of Baracara Resort, since we observed that it had a lot of litter. We have planned to return with a pressure pump to wash the rocks because we noticed it accumulates a lot of mass. In

Regional Chairman of Cuyuni/Mazaruni (Region Seven) Gordon Bradford

addition to that, we will be servicing the sheds there and we will visit periodically, to ensure that it is always in an attractive state. We also cleaned up the beach front and Boulevard,” he shared.

What was done at the Baracara Resort and the Bartica Boulevard will also be done to other areas that have the potential to be a tourist attraction area, he added.

Bradford expressed their commitment and enthusiasm to have locals enjoy and appreciate the beauty of this country. He believes that the best persons to sell what Guyana has to offer are the citizens.

“We see a great need for locals to have the opportunity

to visit places around this country. We are the ones who have to sell the beauty to others, so we therefore have to experience the beauty for ourselves so that we can better sell it. And one of the things we are hoping to achieve is to make tourism affordable for locals,” Bradford said.

The committee’s next project is a school tour to various tourism sites. The chairman shared that the love for nature and the beauty of our country have to be established from a young age. As such, a few students from various schools in and around Bartica will be selected and taken on a tourism tour that will be funded by the committee.

Aruwai Resort has also

committed to receiving the students to give them a tour of the resort and have them enjoy the facilities there.

Bradford said they have a long way to go in expanding their projects to promote tourism internationally, making mention of a yacht parade in Bartica, but noted they had to start somewhere, and they have started.

“I’m waiting to see the budget allocation for our region, since we have submitted for the enrichment of our beaches among other beautification projects, and I hope that we are granted a favourable and adequate amount to enhance and make our town and region a tourist hub,” he said.

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE, December 9, 2018

Educating human capital key to Caribbean’s development –– CXC top performers told THE Caribbean’s development hinges on the development of its human capital, according to St. Vincent and the Grenadines Minister of Education, National Reconciliation and Information, St. Clare Prince.

The minister was speaking at the Regional award ceremony hosted on Thursday in his country for the top performers of the May/June 2018 sitting of the Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC) regional examinations.

Among these regional top performers were five students from Guyana who excelled at this year’s Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) and the Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Certificate (CAPE) examinations.

“This achievement is simply another step in your climb to success,” he told the awardees. “Be mindful though, that with each step towards that dream, greater effort is required.”

In fact, he posited that these awardees now have a great responsibility on their hands since the rest of the Caribbean is looking up to them, and the younger generation will be drawing inspiration from them.

“We all are looking to you as future Caribbean leaders, to find innovative and mitigating ways of addressing the myriad of challenges that we as a people face,” Prince said.

And in finding these solutions, the education minister highlighted that education is fundamental to growth and development, and it is a critical means achieving economic and social mobility.

“The survival of our Ca-

ribbean civilisation lies deeply in our human civilisation,” he noted and added, “It is by educating our human capital that we—as a community— will be able to thrive.”

gional awards. Daniel Basdeo-Thorne of Queen’s College was adjudged the Best Science Student for the Region; Salma Majeed of ISA Islamic School copped the award for the Most Outstanding Candidate in Humanities and Rebekah Persaud of

All of the regional awardees, including the Guyanese top performers, pose with their awards

Muneshwar, who is the best CAPE mathematics performer in the Caribbean.

Students from various schools in Trinidad and Tobago took the CAPE awards for the humanities, language studies, business and environThe Guyanese crew! Guyanese students pose with their regional awards following the CXC Regional Awards ceremony, held in the St. Vincent and the Grenadines on Thursday

And the CXC in its mandate of developing the young human capital in the Region, has been striving to do just this by continuously introducing new subjects and systems, according to Prince.

The introduction of Financial Services in 2017 as a CAPE subject is indicative of the efforts being made to develop the local human capital, Prince shared. In this regard, he posited too: “The Region must seek out ways on how it can promote economic growth and build a stronger and more resilient financial sector so that it can adequately attend to its people.”

At the award ceremony, a total of 17 top regional students from across the Region were awarded.

At the CSEC level, Guyana bagged three of the re-

the St. Rose’s High School, won the award for the Most Outstanding Candidate for Business Education.

Keondre Herbert, from St Joseph’s Academy in Antigua and Barbuda was adjudged the overall best performer and his school received the CSEC school-ofthe-year award. The awards for best short story and 2-D and 3-D visual arts were awarded to students from Jamaica.

Guyana dominated the CAPE awards however with Aadilah Alli, being adjudged this year’s regional top student and the most outstanding candidate in natural sciences. As such, her school— Queen’s College won the CAPE school-of-the-year award. Alli was complimented by her colleague, Rajiv

Region 10 councillors support motion for stipend increase in 2019

WITH the recent announcements of increase in salaries for public servants, increase in the minimum wage, increase for teachers, increase for chairmen and vice-chairman, increase for pensioners, etc., the Region 10 RDC councillors are too calling for an increase in 2019 of their stipends to $35, 000. It is currently $10, 000, which the councillors described as disrespectful and at Thursday’s statutory meeting, which was the last for 2019, the councillors called on Regional Chairman Renis Morian to use his account to validate the increase in 2019.

The motion was put on the floor by Councillor Charles Sampson and was supported by all present. Sampson based his

argument on the fact the Linden Municipal Councillors receive a stipend of $30, 000 and since they are third-tier government, the regional councillors, who are second tier, deserve more, since their work load spans not only a town but an entire region. He said, “If the municipal councillors can get $30, 000, I think in a very stingy way, we can start by asking for $35, 000.”

He calculated that the increase for the 16 councillors will incur an additional cost of $400, 000 per month and $4.8 M per year which he believes can be taken from the chairman’s budget. “I feel we need to step up, councillors deserve more than $10, 000, that is less than 1/6 of the nation’s minimum wage,” he further argued.

Regional Chairman Renis Morian said that he supports the recommendation but it is not in his remit to authorise the payment of same.

He said that he had already pre-empted discussions with the permanent secretary of Ministry of Communities as he fully supports the recommendations of the councillors, knowing they are deserving of same. Morian said that he will be making a very strong case on their behalf and will be penning letters to the requisite ministers including Minister of Finance Winston Jordan, since disparity between the two tiers of councillors does not speak well.

Regional Vice Chairman Elroy Adolph also supported the motion.

mental studies fields.

Prime Minister of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Ralph Gonsalves, in delivering remarks at the ceremony also noted: “Education has been transformed over the years and it will be trans-

formed even further.”

By 2050, he advanced that students will learn about subjects that can only be dreamt of at the moment.

And he also iterated that the ability of the students to grasp education now will be instrumental in the Region’s development.

Gonsalves joked too that he wishes that the bright minds would all remain in his country, but he affirmed that these young people would go on to add to the Region’s development.

Remarks were also given by academic giant of the Caribbean and Chairman of the Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC), Professor Sir Hilary Beckles.

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE, December 9, 2018

Agriculture to be added as a new programme head in Region 10

A farm in West Watooka Linden

REGION 10 (Upper Demerara-Upper Berbice) has been allocated $3.9 B, from the 2019 national budget, which is the largest allocation the region has received and an over $500 M increase from $3.3B in 2018. The region has seen it fit to add agriculture, to its four existing programme heads, which are: Health, Education, Administration and Public Works.

The RDC has been pushing for increased agricultural production in the region, so as to strengthen its food security base and to limit its dependency on other regions for agricultural produce. Regional Chairman Renis Morian highlighted that this is necessary for the provision of funding for agricultural projects throughout Region 10, since the region is gearing towards diversification in the various sectors. It has been noted over the years that over 70% of Linden’s food consumption is imported into the town by farmers and vendors from other areas such as Regions Two, Three and Five. With the plethora of trucks that enters Linden on a daily basis with fruits, vegetables and ground provisions, Linden farmers were placed on the back burner since Lindeners even supported those outside vendors and farmers.

The RDC is cognisant of Region 10’s high dependency on agricultural produce from other regions and there is fear of recurrence of the food scarity which occurred in 2005 from the coastal flood. It was described as a regional disaster as food was a scarce commodity. It is because of these reasons that the RDC will include agriculture as a programme head, giving it the priority and attention it deserves. Programmes to raise awareness on the importance of agriculture will be initiated and technical and material support in the form of training, seeds, tools, etc will be given to all those who take up the mandate to farm.

The RDC has been motivated by the many farmers and even residents who came forward and have shown interest in agriculture and have even started their own subsistence farming in their backyards.

On a wider scale however, the RDC is looking to support wide-scale farming in the farming community of Dallawalla; this has been stagnated for some time due to regular inundation as a result of poor drainage and irrigation systems. Dallawalla was once the source of a significant TURN TO PAGE

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE, December 9, 2018

Bartica gets access to tertiary education

THE cries of Barticians for access to tertiary-level education in their region have been heard by the American University of Peace Studies (AUPS).

Several teachers, head teachers, welfare officers and other persons, are now able to read for a diploma or degree in Psychology through the AUPS. This newspaper spoke with the facilitator of the programme, Clinical Psychologist and Senior lecturer at AUPS, Nadine McIntosh-Ramsarran, who said that their extension to Bartica was in response to letters that were sent by residents of the town, requesting accessibility to the programme without having to relocate.

McIntosh-Ramsarran said she saw it fit that they render assistance, since the persons who would have indicated their interest, were persons who work in the capacity of dealing with young minds.

With psychology she said, they will be taught to delve into the mind and behaviour of human beings, and given their line of work, she believes that the knowledge will be most beneficial to them to enhance their delivery.

“The knowledge they will gain from the programme

will help them to better assist persons who are suffering emotionally. Since the class comprises mostly of teachers and welfare officers, I believe that the exposure to psychology will better equip them to understand their students or whoever they are dealing with, and be able to render the appropriate assistance,” McIntosh-Ramsarran said.

She explained that the programme also flexes with the students’ affordability.

“We try to ease the burden of having to find a bulk of money to pay off tuition, so we offered the programme with a $35,000 deposit, and monthly installments to their affordability. They are also given a text book with the deposit and additional reading material,” she shared.

One student of the class said that they have been waiting years for the opportunity to access a higher level of education than the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate, without having to move from Bartica leaving their loved ones behind.

The student said that even though only one programme is being offered at the moment, it is at least a start to developing the human resource in Bartica.

Apart from the psychology programme, AUPS is also

Shop with your eyes – M&CC warns AS the Christmas season sets in the Georgetown Mayor and City Council (M&CC) Chief Meat and Food Officer (ag) Onica Alleyne, is warning shoppers and the general public to be cautious.

Allleyne says that City Hall will do whatever it can with their limited staff to ensure the meat available at the markets will be inspected and safe for consumption, but acknowledged that some cases do fall through the cracks.

In such cases it is up to the consumers to be careful of what they purchase. “I would encourage them to shop with their eyes. We expect that the customers would shop with their eyes because you want to ensure that you’re buying wholesome products. In terms of meat, when you’re looking at meat it must have that rich red colour, it must not have any off-odour, no discolouration of any sort,” Alleyne explained.

“Normally if the meat has been inspected by our facility

it’s evident somewhere on it with the use of the stamp with the food grade ink that we use. Everybody wouldn’t get to see it but if they take out meat and they’re cutting it up in your presence you should be able to see that stamp on some part of the carcass.”

The abattoir is expected to begin extending its working hours from December 15 to cater for the increase in animals coming to the facility to be slaughtered.

“Everything that comes to the abattoir is inspected, nothing bad leaves there,” Alleyne assured.

Aside from meats, shoppers should also be cautious of the packaged products and fruits that they purchase. “It generally doesn’t just extend to meats; you have a lot of sweets, even to the fresh fruits. You look for certain things: packaging material, the expiry dates are in place, labels intact, and everything is ok, to safe guard,” Alleyne said.

looking to offer other programmes for persons in the town who may be interested in a different area of study.

McIntosh-Ramsarran shared that AUPS also offers the programme in Essequibo and they have so far earmarked Linden and Berbice

to offer same as well.

AUPS is a Higher Learning Life Skills Based Educational Institution that was established to promote life skills teachings to serve as a means to empower people in challenging situations to acquire knowledge, and to

develop attitudes and skills, which support the adoption of healthy behaviours.

Its programs serve as a useful tool to assist humanity in making decisions and to take positive actions in changing behaviours and environments to promote health

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and safety, and to create a more peaceful world.

AUPS also provides non-traditional students adults with more options and opportunities for success.

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE, December 9, 2018

Remittances to the C’bean projected to reach new record in 2018 WASHINGTON, United States (CMC) — The World Bank says remittances to low and middle-income countries, including those in the Caribbean, grew rapidly and are projected to reach a new record in 2018.

The latest edition of the Washington-based financial institution’s Migration and Development Brief, notes that remittance flows into Latin America and the Caribbean grew by about 9.3 per cent in 2018 to reach US$87 billion.

“The strong growth in 2018 was driven mainly by the strong US economy and labour market, where the majority of the region’s migrants reside. Improving fundamentals were also seen in Spain, the second largest host of migrants from the region,” the World Bank added.

In its report, the Washington-based financial institution said intra-regional migration also contributed to the rise in remittances.

But it said remittance growth for the region is expected to slow down to 3.8 per cent in 2019.

The report estimates that officially recorded remittances to developing countries will increase by 10.8 per cent to reach US$528 billion in 2018.

It said this new record level follows robust growth of 7.8 per cent in 2017. Global remittances, which include flows to high-income countries, are projected to grow by 10.3 per cent to US$689 billion, the report says.

The World Bank said remittance flows rose in all

regions, most notably in Europe and Central Asia (20 per cent) and South Asia (13.5 per cent), followed by Sub-Saharan Africa (9.8 per cent), Latin America and the Caribbean (9.3 per cent), the Middle East and North Africa (9.1 per cent), and East Asia and the Pacific (6.6 per cent).

The report states that growth was driven by a stronger economy and employment situation in the United States and a rebound in outward flows from Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries and the Russian Federation.

“Even with technological advances, remittances fees remain too high, double the SDG target of three per cent,” said Mahmoud Mohieldin, Senior Vice President for the 2030 Development Agenda, United Nations Relations and Partnerships at the World Bank.

“Opening up markets to competition and promoting the use of low-cost technologies will ease the burden on poorer customers,” he added.

The report said no solutions are “yet in sight for practices that drive up costs, such as de-risking action of banks, which lead to closure of bank accounts of remittance service providers.”

It said “another persistent factor” that keeps fees high is the exclusive partnership between national post office systems and any single money transfer operator, “as it allows the operator to charge higher fees to poorer customers dependent on post offices.”

Agriculture to be ...

FROM PAGE

amount of food that was produced in Region 10. The RDC will be collaborating with the National Drainage and Irrigation Authority (NDIA) to revitalise farming in the community.

In addition to Dallawalla, the RDC is pursuing various avenues and looking into other communities in an effort to restore agricultural development in Region 10. Communities such as Christianburg, West Watooka, and Wisroc are being targeted from the ground level. The National Agricultural Research and Extension Institute (NAREI) has indicated that it is lending 100% support to agriculture in Region 10.

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One of the strategies on which the RDC will be embarking is to establish a farmers’ market adjacent to the Wismar Municipal Market on Burnham Drive, on weekends, as a start to gain the residents’ confidence. A trial exhibition was done in October and was well received. “If we can get a steady flow of food every weekend, that will help to build the residents’ confidence, that they could look internally for that food supply.” Morian is calling for all stakeholders and local leaders to come on board to holistically push agricultural production in Region 10.

SUNDAY CHRONICLE, December 9, 2018

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE, December 9, 2018

Caribbean Boxing Championship…

Guyana’s Allicock produces stunner as local boxers continue dominance

By Michael DaSilva GUYANA’S Junior Commonwealth Games’ silver medalist, Keevin Allicock, exhibited tremendous speed and stamina on the second night of the Caribbean Boxing Championship which concludes tonight at the Cliff Anderson Sports Hall.

The `Ghetto youth’ who

hails from the Albouystown, Georgetown community, displayed class and tenacity in his bantamweight clash against Trinidad and Tobago’s Anthony Joseph, scoring a points victory after three bruising rounds of boxing.

While the Allicock versus Joseph bout was an entertaining one, there were other bouts on the night’s programme that were equally entertaining and at the end of the night, the host country secured four victories from five engagements.

The locals won one of two Elite Category bouts and three of three Novices contests.

Barbados won three of their four contests, Trinidad and Tobago won three of five, the US Virgin Islands and St Lucia both won one each from as many bouts.

On the other hand, Grenada lost all five of their second-night bouts. Dominica lost both their fights on Friday night.

In the Allicock versus Joseph Bantamweight contest, both boxers went to the middle of the ring, looking to end the fight as early as possible and it was Allicock who took the fight to the Trinidadian.

The Guyanese connected with a solid left hook to the head of his opponent and followed up with an overhand right to the same point that caused the referee to issue an eight-count to the

Trinidadian.

On resumption, Allicock connected with a left uppercut and overhand right.

Round two saw Allicock in the same attacking mode, connecting to Joseph’s body and head with one-two combinations which the ‘Trini’ had no answer for.

The high point of the round was when Allicock pinned the ‘Trini’ to the ropes while pummeling him with a series of body combinations.

From the start of the third round, both boxers started to mix it up with the Guyanese getting the better of the exchanges.

Apart from Allicock, Trinidad’s light welterweight boxer, Michael Alexander, secured a unanimous points-decision win against Guyana’ and 2017 Caribbean gold medallist, Colin `Superman’ Lewis, in a fight that could have gone either way.

In the Welterweight Elite contest, it was evident from the start that the Guyanese (Lewis) wanted an early night as he stormed his opponent who chose to counter fight and was successful in doing so. Alexander caught the 2017 gold medallist with some telling uppercuts.

Lewis then switched up the game and started to use bull-dozing tactics, which was not enough to make inroads into the Trinidadian’s defence.

Lewis’ bull-dozing tactic did not pay off as the Trinidadian just countered his opponent’s advances with crisp uppercuts and overhand right crosses and in the end, Alexander was declared the winner on points.

There were four fights that ended within the distance.

The first was a light welterweight contest between Guyana’s Kevin McKenzie and Dominica’s N. Joseph which the referee stopped in the second round in the Guyanese favour.

The second was a novice welterweight bout between Barbados’ Lemer Tull and Dominica’s R. Williams which was stopped in round three in the Barbadian’s favour.

Trinidad and Tobago’s Olympian Nigel Paul then forced the referee to stop his super heavyweight contest against Grenada’s Shevon Lewis at two minutes 37 seconds of the first round and then Guyana’s Antion Nilles secured a second-round TKO against Trinidad and Tobago’s Kevin John in their novice’s light heavyweight contest.

Irish Racing Tips

10:15 hrs Dawn Shadow

09:55 hrs William H Bonney

Punchestown

10:50 hrs Antimatter

10:25 hrs Charbel

08:20 hrs Ballyneety

11:20 hrs Eight And Bob

08:55 hrs Tornado Flyer

English Racing Tips

09:25 hrs Countess Cathleen

Kelso

10:00 hrs Min

08:30 hrs Donna’s Diamond

South Africa Racing Tips

10:30 hrs Getabird

09:05 hrs West Of The Edge

Greyville

11:05 hrs Se Mo Laoch

09:35 hrs Xpo Universal

08:45 hrs Dark Moon Rising

11:40 hrs Santana Plessis

10:10 hrs Jet Master

Cork

11:15 hrs Scales Of Justice

08:40 hrs Getaway John

Huntingdon

09:10 hrs Robin De Carlow

08:50 hrs Bags Groove

10:35 hrs Golden Pheasant

09:45 hrs Great Field

09:20 hrs Brewin’Upastorm

11:10 hrs Rocking Ruby

11:00 hrs Silver Forever 11:30 hrs Boughtbeforelunch

09:25 hrs Being Fabulous 10:00 hrs Miss Milanna

29

SUNDAY CHRONICLE, December 9, 2018

DCC and International SOS launch partnership IN 1968 when West Indies travelled to Australia under the stewardship of Gary Sobers, a young Myles Neri was following the series on his radio. The flamboyance of the visitors made him instantly attracted to the West Indies style of cricket and he developed a lifelong passion for our regional cricket team.

Neri, who was born in Australia to Indian/English parents, saw a number of West Indians play, including DCC cricketers, Lance Gibbs and Clive Lloyd.

One of his special memories was seeing Gibbs break Fred Trueman’s record in the 1975-76 tour of Australia.

In his wildest dreams, Neri never believed that he could have helped to play a part to produce a new crop of players from Gibbs’s long-time club; so when the opportunity came, he took it. A meeting between him and president of the DCC, Roger Harper, another renowned West Indies cricketer, spurred Neri and the International SOS into action.

The world’s largest medical and travel security ser-

vices firm, which is set to deliver medical emergency services for ExonMobil, has agreed to support the Queenstown club, commonly known as the “Home of Legends”.

Prior to the DCC’s annual award ceremony on Wednesday evening, Harper and the International SOS officially announced their partnership. Unfortunately, Neri, who serves as the Global Medical Director of the company, could not make it, so Senior Manager of Projects, Mark Jackson spoke on his behalf and read a prepared speech.

The International Organisation will outfit both the first division and second division teams and supply equipment, while assisting in other ways, including through a bursary for cricketers who excel academically.

At the award ceremony, they made their first set of bursary presentations.

NECESSARY SUPPORT According to the DCC president, the club can only maintain its status with sup-

Former renowned WI cricketer Roger Harper (left) and International SOS representative, Mark Jackson, officially launched the partnership on Wednesday evening.

port.

“For a club like ours to continue on the path of success, to continue on the path of producing legends, we need to build relationships with corporate society, we need the support and that is why these relationships are a big step in the right direction.”

Harper added that one of the spinoffs of this partnership would be a healthier club.

“There will be health

outreaches held here (at DCC) from time-to-time, not just for the players, but also for their parents and family members. International SOS is also pushing and supporting education.”

Both Harper and the members of International SOS are hoping that the partnership can grow.

CWI Regional four-day Championship…

Chanderpaul, Barnwell half centuries put Jaguars in control THE Guyana Jaguars will head into the fourth and final day of their match against the Windward Islands Volcanoes in firm control after setting the latter 348 runs mainly through unbeaten half-centuries from Tajenarine Chanderpaul and Christopher Barnwell.

Guyana Jaguars resumed their second innings yesterday with the score on 115 for 3 with Chanderpaul on 29 and night-watchman, Clinton Pestano, yet to score. They then combined in the morning session for a partnership of 111 before Pestano fell for a well-played 69 (127 deliveries, 2x4s, 5x6s) with the Jaguars nicely placed on 225-4.

This brought Barnwell to the crease and he wasted no time in building another sizable partnership with Chanderpaul; the duo’s innings were contrasting as Chanderpaul was patient (reminiscent of his legendary father Shivnarine) while Barnwell was brisk.

When the Jaguars declared on 310 for 4 shortly after the dinner break, Chan-

derpaul was unbeaten on 84 (334 deliveries, 3x4s) and Barnwell 61* (2x4s, 2x6s) with a mammoth 347 run lead.

Batting a second time, the Volcanoes got off to a poor start as Keon Joseph had opener Tyrone Theophile out caught by Pestano for just 6. Volcanoes skipper Kirk Edwards was the next to go, becoming Pestano’s fifth scalp of the match; he was LBW for 4.

When play resumes today with opener Taryck Gabriel on 33 and Kavem Hodge on 9, the Volcanoes will need an additional 294 runs with eight wickets in hand while the Jaguars will be looking to wrap up the game quickly.

In the other match between Leeward Islands Hurricanes and Barbados Pride, the Hurricanes are on 165 for 9 in their second innings with a lead of 169. The batsmen at the crease are Jeremiah Lewis on 38 and Sheldon Cottrell on 6.

That match is evenly poised and today’s action will be full of intrigue.

Powell won’t dwell on Test series loss (CMC) – STAND-IN skipper Rovman Powell believes West Indies can turn the page on their wretched Test series outing by flaunting their true Caribbean identity in the three-match OneDay International series starting here today.

West Indies were crushed 2-0 in the preceding Test series with neither match in Chittagong nor Dhaka going beyond three days.

Powell, a surprise choice to replace injured regular captain Jason Holder, said it was important the Caribbean played their own brand of cricket in order to counter Bangladesh.

“It all comes down to the brand of cricket West Indies want to play, us finding our identity and us doing what we want to do as players,” Powell said ahead of the contest.

“This is a good blend of guys, mixing youth with experience. We have Marlon Samuels and Darren Bravo, Shai Hope and young (Shimron) Hetmyer and all those players combined gives us a nice blend.”

The one-day side will have a new look, with new players flying in for the shorter format. Windies Twenty20 skipper, Carlos Brathwaite, has been recalled to the side along with Bravo, while vet-

eran Samuels adds further experience.

Stroke-makers Hope and Hetmyer will add the youthful flavour to the squad along with all-rounder Fabian Allen and speedster Oshane Thomas.

Powell said the squad had worked hard in preparation since the end of the Test series and were well-oiled for the tough series.

“I think the team is very prepared. A lot of hard work has gone on over the last few days and I think that is good.

Here in Dhaka, the conditions can be difficult for us but the guys are upbeat and I’m optimistic we’ll get positive

results,” said Powell.

“The training was very good. We did some hard yards and we’re definitely looking forward to tomorrow. Day/night games always bring exciting cricket and it’s just up to us go out there and play our brand of West Indies cricket, back our skills and get the best possible result.”

West Indies will be looking to exact revenge for their 2-1 defeat to Bangladesh, when the Asian side toured the Caribbean earlier this year.

They will also be hoping to break the drought which has seen them go without a series win since 2014, when

they beat Bangladesh at home.

Overall, the Windies ODI form has been wretched. In 31 ODIs in bilateral series dating back to March last year, they have won just five matches while losing 21.

Sunday’s match bowls off at 1 pm (3 am Eastern Caribbean time)

hidy Hasan, Nazmul Is-

SQUAD: BANGLADESH – Mashrafe Mortaza (captain), Tamim Iqbal, Soumya Sarkar, Liton Das, Shakib Al Hasan, Mushfiqur Rahim, Mahmudullah, Rubel Hossain, Mustafizur Rahman, Me-

Shimron Hetmyer, Dar-

lam, Mohammad Mithun, Mohammad Saifuddin, Abu Hider Rony, Ariful Haque, Imrul Kayes.

WEST INDIES – Rovman Powell (captain), Roston Chase, Devendra Bishoo, Chandrapaul Hemraj, ren Bravo, Marlon Samuels, Shai Hope, Carlos Brathwaite, Keemo Paul, Kieran Powell, Fabian Allen, Kemar Roach, Sunil Ambris, Oshane Thomas.

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE, December 9, 2018

NexGen/Banks DIH/MACORP to host Media Awards NEXGEN Global Marketing. in association with Banks DIH, MACORP, New Trend Auto and Party Castle will host the first Media Appreciation Awards ceremony on December 20.

These major companies have come together to show their appreciation for the remarkable efforts that the media has made over the past year in the various areas of promoting sports, business, and entertainment.

“Without the extra efforts made by the members of the media, we could not have accomplished the goals we set in 2018 and informed the public in such grand fash-

ion,” said NexGen’s Aleem Hussain.

“The companies who have joined together are some of the elite businesses in the country that recognise the media plays an important role in ensuring that vital and necessary information is passed on to the public in a timely manner.”

Carlton Joao of Banks DIH saluted the decision to recognise the media corps and said “the decision to participate was made without hesitation. Banks DIH is one of the largest sponsors of sports in the country with contributions to almost every type of sporting activities in

Guyana”.

Guillermo Escarraga, the newly appointed head of the machinery giant MACORP, which recently launched its agricultural division with Case IH Tractors stated that “his company felt it was a great initiative to celebrate the efforts made by the media houses and that his company was proud to be a part of this event.”

Entrepreneur and business owner Rudy Ramalingum of New Trend Auto applauded the event and felt that without the contributions of the media, the general public would never know all that is happening in the coun-

NexGen Global’s Aleem Hussain

Atiya Thompson, District 11’s rising cycling star

By Michelangelo Jacobus

RENOWNED motivational speaker, Jim Rohn, once said: “Success is steady progress toward one’s personal goals”. This applies to 13-year-old student-athlete, Atiya Thompson, who is steadily making progress towards her own goals in cycling.

Atiya, who is a second-form student at Brickdam Secondary School, copped two Gold medals at the recently concluded National Schools Cycling,

Swimming and Track and Field Championships; her medals came in the U-14 800M and 1500M cycling races, respectively.

Representing North Georgetown (District 11); the outspoken Thompson told Chronicle Sport that it was back in 2017 when she first became interested in cycling.

Upon representing her district, she didn’t do so well that year in her special events: the 800M and 1500M races.

However, Atiya noted that due to her disappointing

CRICKET QUIZ CORNER (Sunday December 09, 2018) 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) Brian Lara-117 (Dhaka, 1999) (2) Anamul Haque-120 (Khulna, 2012) Today’s Quiz: (1) Which WI took the first five-wicket haul against Bangladesh in ODI cricket?

(2) Which Bangladeshi claimed the first fourwicket haul against the WI in ODIs? Answers in tomorrow’s issue

try. “These are the eyes and ears of the people and they too need to be rewarded for their time and hard work.”

The event will be hosted and catered by Diane, owner of Party Castle, one of the nation’s leading party services. Diane recently hosted a Thanksgiving Dinner for 200 children from several orphanages and youth programmes and vowed to continue to give back to the community; she is such an integral part of in so many ways.

The Media Appreciation Awards was the brainchild of Hussain of NexGen Global Marketing, one of the largest

real estate, auto rental and Advertising & Marketing companies.

Hussain is also president of the Lusignan Golf Course and complimented the efforts that the media to promote the development and awareness of golf, boxing and business in the country.

“These Awards will celebrate those who have contributed in various fields and departments and all media houses will be invited. We are asking that every major media outlet appoint three persons for recognition and they will be recognised in a manner they truly deserve.”

South American executive sees potential in Open Water Swimming

Rising cycling star, Atiya Thompson.

results, she vowed that she would do better in 2018, which is just what she did, with much satisfaction and gold medal rewards.

Quizzed about her preparations and routines, Atiya revealed that she trains within her community, Turkeyen, Sophia, most of the times, after school and in the mornings. Her commitment and discipline paid dividends, which she said, gave her even more motivation to do better and reach for more.

“This year I set myself the goal of winning at least one gold medal and I ended up with two (medals); last year I didn’t do very well.

After placing fifth and eighth in my races, I was motivated a lot, thus, I put my all into training and I ended up making myself proud, my parents proud and I also won valuable points for my district.”

“My future goals are to become even more involved in cycling, this is something that I am passionate about, that I love, and I want to participate in more cycling events. Apart from cycling, I also have my sights set on bettering my performances in academics.”

Atiya credits her support system, which is made up of her parents, especially her father, Seon Thompson (a Guyana National Newspapers Limited employee) for her success. She explained that her father played a pivotal role in her success with his dedication to her training along with his invaluable advice.

Come 2019, Atiya expects to expand her events and better her medal tally; so cycling fans and enthusiasts, look out for this rising star.

Vice-President of CONSANAT Jorge Delgado (right) and President of the Guyana Amateur Swimming Association, Ivan Persaud.

GUYANA has the potential to produce world-class swimmers, but rigorous training by the right individuals are necessary, opines Vice President of the South American Swimming Federation or Confederación Sudamericana de Natación (CONSANAT), Jorge Delgado.

The FINA instructor, who recently helped to facilitate an open water swim meet, told the Guyana Chronicle that he is optimistic about the potential that we have.

The 64-year-old said that the goal of CONSANAT is to have swimmers from Guyana participate in the South American Championships in Open Water Swimming.

He said that when the Guyana Amateur Swimming

Association (GASA) held an open water swim meet last month at Lake Mainstay, the swimmers swam small lengths in comparison to open water swimmers, but the hope is to keep increasing the lengths at different meets.

He said that the onus is on the local swimming authority to seek out talent swimmers, that might mean trips to interior locations and riverine areas where open water swimming might be something natural.

“Once in a while you have to travel to identify talent.”

The Ecuadorian, who competed at the 1972 and 1976 Summer Olympics, said that he would return next year to assess the progress of the local swimmers.

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE, December 9, 2018

Smalta Girls U-11 football tournament

West Ruimveldt and North Georgetown to meet for title

WEST Ruimveldt will face North Georgetown in a battle for the title of Smalta Girls U-11 football champions next weekend.

The two won their respective semi-final games yesterday at the Ministry of Education ground on Carifesta Avenue in contrasting fashion.

In the first of the semi-finals, West Ruimveldt played St Pius in a ding-dong match that kept fans and parents on the edge of their seats.

And when Seona France

scored the opener for ‘West’ in the 5th minute, there was little doubt that the opposition would take that lying down.

Several squandered chances on the part of St Pius only added more tension to an already tight affair, and when Christal Archer scored the equaliser in the 21st minute, the crowd erupted.

The game then went down to penalties and ‘West’ were the better shooters when the dust settled, winning 3-2.

In the second semi-fi-

nal, it was almost the same thing, though eventual winners North Georgetown held their own and kept out every chance from South Ruimveldt.

Nikka Manning scored the lone goal in the 4th minute.

There was a hint of desperation as the game came to a close from the girls from ‘North’ and rightly so, considering a spot in the final was on the line, but they could not find the equaliser to send the game to penalties.

In other results, St Margarets went down to Smith’s Memorial 2-0, thanks to Fiona Gibbs’ double (16th and 38th ), while Enterprise beat Tucville 4-3 on penalties after a goal-less stalemate and Sherry Ann Foster helped St Stephen’s beat Genesis.

Apart from next Sunday’s final which is set for 15:45 hrs, the third-place play-off between St Pius and South will take place at 14:50hrs.

The 7th place play-off between Tucville and the 5th place play-off between

GCA Noble House Two-Day Second-Division Final…

Vicious Bailey gives GCC control on day one

Enterprise and St Stephen’s will be played simultaneously from 14:00hrs.

Full results below Match #26: St Margaret 0, Smith Memorial 2 Goal-scorer Fiona Gibbs (16th ,36th) Match #27: Enterprise 0, Tucville 0 (4-3) penalty Match #28: Genesis 0, St Stephen’s 1 Goal-scorer for St Stephen’s

FIESTY medium-fast bowling from Bernard Bailey, which produced six wickets, propelled GCC to honours on the first day of the Georgetown Cricket Association’s Noble House Seafoods Two-Day Second-Division Cricket final at the GCC ground, Bourda.

At the close of play, yesterday, the home team had reached 80-3, 27 runs short of Police’s first innings score of 107 all out.

On paper, the lawmen were not expected to crumble the way they did; they had a quality batting lineup, including former national U-19 player Kemol Savory and the classy Andrew Lyght Jr. among a few other well known names, but Bailey produced something special.

He was disciplined and fierce and his deliveries were impactful.

The right-arm seamer collaborated well with West Indies U-19 fast bowler, Ronaldo Ali-Mohamed when GCC won the toss and opted to bowl first. Ali-Mohamed

did the early damage as he got the wickets of Reginald Rodrigues (0) and Savory (0) to peg the visitors at 2-4.

Bailey then took control, despite more free-flowing shots from the lawmen on the slow outfield. He got the wickets of Paul Tyndell (23) and Lyght (10) and then later that of set batsman, Jason Heyliger, who faced 101 balls for his top score of 32 (3x4s). After picking up the three scalps, Bailey cleaned up the tail.

In his 10th over, he got two wickets in two balls, trapping Trevor Benn (17) and Eon Rodrigues (0) LBW. He then bowled Hemchand Persaud after lunch as Police folded in 47.5 overs.

Bailey finished with 6-36 from 14.5 overs, while Ali-Mohamed and Timothy McAlmont supported with two wickets each.

POLICE FIGHT BACK Despite their below-par batting performance, the lawmen did not give up in the field; they were alert and assertive and made batting

Bernard Bailey finished with 6-36 from 14.5 overs.

difficult for the home team openers.

Although he was not rewarded, Rodrigues was impressive. He bowled a solid line and length and got the edge twice, but both fell short of the slips. It was, however, Skipper Kester Harcourt who broke through when he knocked the off-stump of GCC’s captain, Khemraj Jaikaran.

Andsuegga Rodrigues then joined Deonarine Seegobin and the pair batted themselves in. Rodrigues scored 16 before he was caught

and bowled by off-spinner Heyliger.

Seegobin was patient and watchful at the crease; he built his innings well and looked solid to return to the pavilion unbeaten, but was undone while attempting a quick single while partnering Ali-Mohamed.

The all-rounder struck three fours in his 82-ball score of 42.

When play continues today, Ali-Mohamed will resume on his overnight score of 16, and McAlmont will continue on two.

Match #29: West Ruimveldt 1, St Pius 1 (3-2) penalty Goal-scorer for West Ruimveldt --Seona France (5th) For St Pius-- Christal Archer (21st) Match #30: South Ruimveldt 0, North Georgetown 1 Goal-scorer-- Nikkia Manning (4 min)

Sixth UDFA GT Beer Football launched

Double-header on tonight

By Joe Chapman

Trevor Benn was trapped LBW for 17.

Sherry Ann Foster (34th)

PRESIDENT of the Upper Demerara Football Association (UDFA), Terrence Mitchell, has pled for discipline on the field of play and respect for the sponsors.

The president was, at the time, speaking to the ten football clubs contesting the 6th annual GT Beer Football championship which was launched yesterday in the mining town.

He said that the teams must show respect for the beverage giants, Banks DIH, which has shown a commitment to developing the sport in Linden by their continued sponsorship.

The launch, which took place in the Macaw Boardroom of the Linden Enterprise Network (LEN) saw the UDFA boss laud the six years of sponsorship from the beverage company.

Banks DIH Linden Branch Supervisor, Shawn Grant, said the company is looking forward to the continued support coming from the community.

There will be cash incentives for the four top teams and individual prizes for outstanding players.

The tournament gets going from today with the marchpast billed for 16:30hrs, and UDFA has warned that clubs who turn up late for this, as well as their games, will be

fined.

The first game is set for 19:00hrs between newly crowned GTT senior champions, Eagles United and Capital FC. Eagles will be led by former national midfield player, Clive DeNobrega, as well as Deon Charter, Colwyn Drakes, Kellon Primo, Allan Halley and Yannick.

Capital FC will make their debut with a group of youngsters, mainly with school player Andre Mayers joining Tyric McAllister, Duquan Hercules, Seon Barrett, and Tevin Crawford.

That game will be followed at 21.00hrs when former champions, Silver Shattas, face the number two club, Net Rockers.

Net Rockers will be looking to maintain their rich form recently when they, like Eagles United, played unbeaten in the just concluded League.

Among their best performers recently are Denzil Pryce and Clarence Huggins leading them, along with Orande Wills, Joel Isaacs and Mark Wilson. In goal will be Compton Bennet.

Their opponents, Silver Shattas, will field a line-up that will have in it players like goalkeeper Kelon Major, young Randy Pickering, Jomain Samuels and Robin Adams.

Smalta Girls U-11 football tournament

West Ruimveldt and North Georgetown to meet for title PAGE

31

North Georgetown were winners on a tense day of action in the semi-final round of the Smalta Girls U-11 Football tournament (Delano Williams photo)

Caribbean Boxing Championship…

Guyana’s Allicock produces stunner as local boxers continue dominance

Powell won’t dwell on Test series loss

PAGE

PAGE

27 Night-two of the Caribbean Boxing Championship belonged to hosts Guyana whose boxers won five fights on the night.

29 Left-hander Shimron Hetmyer.

CWI Regional four-day Championship…

PAGE

29

Chanderpaul, Barnwell half centuries put Jaguars in control Printed and Published by Guyana National Newspapers Limi ted, Lama Avenue, Bel Air Park, Georgetown. Telephone 2 2 6- 3243-9 (General); Editorial: 2 2 7- 5204, 2 2 7- 5216. Fax:2 2 7- 5208

SUNDAY, DECEMBER 9, 2018

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SUNDAY CHRONICLE, December 9, 2018

Pujara, Kholi stand tall on day three (REUTERS) - CHETESHWAR Pujara and Virat Kohli thwarted Australia in a diligent partnership to push India to a position of strength and a 166-run lead at the close of day three of the first test on Saturday.

Brought together before tea with India vulnerable at 76 for two, the pair stood firm through the best part of a session before spinner Nathan Lyon snared Kohli for 34 to end their 71-run stand at Adelaide Oval.

Pujara, who rescued India’s first innings with a sparkling 123, survived to stumps on 40 not out, with number five Ajinkya Rahane on one run under a cloudy sky.

Lyon was denied Pujara’s wicket twice by the Decision Review System, so his Kohli breakthrough was a relief after a long afternoon’s toil.

Deceiving the Indian talisman with flight and dip, he caught Kohli’s inside edge and the nick popped up to Aaron Finch at short leg.

Dismissed for three in India’s first innings 250, Kohli was fuming to have his second knock cut short but soaked up 104 balls to frustrate the home crowd, sections of which had jeered him as he strode out to the crease.

He also managed to join an elite club of Indians who have notched 1,000 test runs in Australia, with only Sachin Tendulkar (1,809), VVS Laxman (1,236), Rahul Dravid (1,166) and Virender Sehwag (1,031) ahead of him.

Having conceded a 15run lead after being dismissed for 235 before lunch, the home side will be desperate for early wickets on day four to have hope of containing the tourists.

Jasprit Bumrah, who took 3-47 to finish with India’s best bowling figures, looked forward to the spin of Ravichandran Ashwin coming into play on a fifth day wicket.

Nathan Lyon sees an lbw against Cheteshwar Pujara get overturned, Australia v India, 1st Test, Adelaide, 3rd day, December 8, 2018

“In the fourth innings he will obviously play a crucial role,” said the paceman of Ashwin, who took three first innings wickets and was a constant handful.

“We saw Nathan Lyon using the rough to his advantage so I think (Ashwin)

knows what he has to do.”

With only 250 to defend, India’s bowlers could take great pride in restricting Australia to 235.

With lusty tail-end cameos by Mitchell Starc (15) and Nathan Lyon (24 not out), Australia looked set to

Salah hat trick sends Liverpool to the top ( B B C) - M O H A M E D Salah scored a hat-trick against Bournemouth to send Liverpool to the top of the table - then handed his man-of-the-match award to team-mate James Milner.

Former England midfielder Milner became the 13th player to make 500 Premier League appearances when he captained Liverpool against the Cherries.

When handed his award after the game, Salah opted to give it to Milner and told Sky Sports: “I will not take it.

“Congratulations on his amazing career. He deserved it today. I hope we’ll win something together.”

Salah scored his second hat-trick for the club since arriving from Roma 18 months ago as Jurgen Klopp’s side went one point clear of Manchester City, who later suffered their first top-flight defeat of the season as they lost 2-0 at Chelsea.

Salah was in an offside position when Roberto Firmino hit a 30-yard shot that home keeper Asmir Begovic carelessly pushed out in the direction of the

Mohamed Salah scored a hat trick to send Liverpool to the top of the table

Egypt forward. He finished clinically and his eighth topflight goal of the season was allowed to stand to break the deadlock in a game the visitors dominated from the start.

There was nothing fortuitous about the Liverpool forward’s second though, a composed finish after driving at the Bournemouth defence, before Steve Cook back-

heeled the ball into his own net while attempting a clearance to make it 3-0.

Salah then completed his hat-trick after rounding Begovic, cutting back to beat the Bournemouth keeper for a second time and poking the ball past Nathan Ake on the line.

“Whatever you do in a football game, you need

somebody to finish it off and what Mo did with his two goals in the second half was exceptional,” said Klopp after his side’s fifth straight league win.

Liverpool have taken 45 points from the past 51 on offer and are unbeaten in 17 league games in a run that stretches back to last season.

race past India’s total after resuming on 191 for seven in the rain-delayed morning.

But Mohammed Shami swung the momentum back to India and was on a hattrick after claiming the final two wickets of batsman Travis Head (72) and number 11

Josh Hazlewood (0).

‘Ball dogs’ fetch in Champions Tennis competition India’s openers put on a 63-run opening stand to press the advantage before Australia fought back to remove them both.

Hazlewood had Lokesh Rahul caught behind for 44 after fellow seamer Starc snared Murali Vijay in the slips for 18, both batsmen again falling to loose shots after soft dismissals in the first innings.

Kohli and Pujara then steered India to safety and a platform to set up a rare test victory Down Under and an early lead in the four-test series.

“It’s just a really big hour in the morning to change that momentum and to get us going,” said Head.

“If we can get the wickets in the morning and then put them under pressure with the new ball, anything’s gettable.”

Chelsea end City undefeated streak (BBC) - MANCHESTER City were “fantastic” despite suffering a first Premier League defeat of the season at Chelsea, said manager Pep Guardiola.

Chelsea bounced back from the disappointment of losing at Wolves in midweek to end City’s 21-game unbeaten league run stretching back to April, and a sequence of 14 unbeaten games away from home.

The defending champions paid for a lack of ruthlessness as they dominated the first half, only to be struck by a smashand-grab right on halftime as N’Golo Kante fired high past Ederson from Eden Hazard’s pass.

Chelsea gained confidence and momentum and improved after the break, securing the win with 12 minutes left when David Luiz’s glancing header following a corner bounced in

off the far post.

They closed out the win to give Sarri his first triumph over Guardiola, whose team are replaced at the top of the table by Liverpool.

Despite slipping a point behind the Reds, the Spaniard rejected the notion his team had an “off day”.

“If you think that, you didn’t see the game,” he told BBC Sport. “In the first half, we were exceptional.

“In general, we were fantastic. I don’t have any regrets. We came and showed we wanted to win. We created chances.

They had one in 44 minutes and we conceded a goal. Sometimes that happens.

“It is emotional for me to see these players do what they do every three days. We were outstanding except for five to eight minutes.”