Monday April 10, 2017
Under the PPP growth was driven by the illegal economy DEAR EDITOR, Many of the investors under the PPP/C promised jobs but delivered few. Baishanlin promised 10,000 jobs. The Marriott was built by 300 Chinese nationals. Vaitarna Holdings Private Inc. promised to create several hundred jobs for the large acreage of lands they were given. Amaila Falls promised jobs but the plan was to bring 2000 Chinese workers as the US$500 million loan was from the China Development Bank. The jobs the PPP/C were creating; often through crooked deals, were not for Guyanese youth to be employed. So, under the PPP/C, there was growth, driven by an illegal economy. The underground economy and the criminalization of the State created some jobs. But if one were to add all of these jobs over the PPP’s 23 years, the answer would be obvious. Remittances, gold smuggling, cocaine smuggling, fuel smuggling and other illicit activities drove this economy. This is why a 34 year old gold miner can be arrested for fraud and for passing G$17 billion through his account over a two month period. Omar Shariff, the Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of the Presidency allegedly had G$18 billion passing through his account. Some of the construction in Georgetown and elsewhere in Guyana reflected no job creating growth, but illicit funds being legitimised
through money laundering. Now, back to the Private Sector which claims to be the “engine of growth”, but has not proven this through any job creation. In its current form, because of ownership structures; monopolistic, duopolistic and cartel modes of operation; the Private Sector is comprised of many non-competitive firms that are resellers of foreign imports. They manufacture very little. They rarely re-invest their predatory profits in Guyana. There is absolutely no innovation. Expensive and unreliable energy only accounts for part of the failure to innovate by the Private Sector. Additionally, the Private Sector lived of the largesse of the Government of Guyana. If one were to truly investigate the Private Sector one would see that their profits are obtained from the Guyana Government through gold, land and other concessions; government contracts to build roads; schools and other Ministry purchases. Indeed, 70 % of the annual Guyana budget is spent through government procurement. In essence, the Private Sector is very dependent on the same government they are currently at war with through manipulations of foreign currency etc. Moreso, the procurement under Jagdeo was totally ethnic and political. Hence, a very large part of the population, especially African and Amerindian Guyanese, were
left with crumbs or were not even invited to the table of corruption. Today, the country has changed and the new government is being asked to do what the previous government did not do. This is not a bad development. But our young people need to also appreciate several facts. First, the drug, gold smuggling and other illicit activities are being squeezed because the US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) is in Guyana. SOCU is for the first time pursuing money laundering activities under the AML/CFT Bill (note that the Bank of America has stopped being a Correspondent Bank because of money laundering activities). SARA will soon pursue stolen state assets. The Guyana Revenue Authority is clamping down on under billing and other “runnings” such as tax evasion and tax avoidance. Fuel smuggling is being addressed. Much of what is occurring in the Guyanese economy has been inherited from the PPP/C’s 23 years of rule and the criminalization of the State. Young people are indeed “looking for a change”. This “change” begins with the reestablishment of the Rule of Law and the dismantling of the criminal state that was inherited. Today, the same contractors that built bad roads because of corruption and kickbacks are still
winning contracts because those denied contracts have been told they have no experience. The new government should have banned all of these crooked contractors but then the PPP/ C would claim “ethnic cleansing.” Hence, young entrepreneurs and others whom have been denied in the past are also at the same advantage today. Oil will soon be here. The last thing our young people would want is a criminalized state and criminalized economy where racism and ethnic marginalization are again the order of the day and where Black Clothes Police and new Roger Khans will again be in partnership with a government to kill its own citizens so that a few can become rich. No more Parking Meter pickets etc. Our Youth deserve better. Our Nation deserves better. Our Young people are rightly upset. But they need to understand the true facts and not the PPP propaganda that this economy is dying. Criminality, organized economic crime groups are indeed under pressure and the true economy is being revealed. From this base, the new government can build a strong inclusive resilient economy for all Guyanese. Our young people need to join in this campaign. They need to become more engaged in constitutional reform and in making the State a non-criminalized one. Eric M. Phillips
The 14% VAT on Private Education saga; another dimension DEAR EDITOR, On February 23rd we presented a petition, signed by more than 15,000 persons, representing more than 2% of the population of Guyana, to the President and the Ministers of Education and Finance. Part of the petition included more than 1,500 detailed comments from persons from all corners of Guyana and from more than 32 countries decrying the imposition of the 14% VAT on private education. The petition was spearheaded by a group of 6th Formers at Nations. There followed a series of articles by one or two government spokespersons on the rationale for the VAT. The main arguments appeared to be: · Only about 8 of the 58 private schools were fully tax compliant
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· Some schools were “charter schools” (but no explanation of what this meant was ever given) · Some schools paid no tax because they are “religious schools” · If you can afford private education, by definition you are wealthy and you can afford the 14% increase · Private schools are making large profits & should therefore pay the 14% themselves · Parents have a choice – they can return to the free public education Many of these points were rehashed at the forum where Ministers Hughes and Roopnarine and the Prime Minister met with about 300 persons at the National Cultural Centre to examine the imposition of VAT on private education. Some of the points raised
to refute these ministerial adumbrations included: · If there are Private Schools that are indeed not paying their taxes, expose them and make them pay the taxes that we all face. There needs to be a level playing field. There is no logic in saying that because some schools are delinquent in terms of paying tax then the ones that already pay in excess of 35% tax should now attract a further 14% tax. · Publish the list of “charter schools” and “religious schools” and explain the loopholes they have been given not to pay tax and let the public comment on the wisdom of these decisions · Nations held a number of meetings with parents to gauge their feelings on this issue. At the end of one meeting of 35 parents,
someone put up their hand and said “I am part of the Government … when we discussed this issue it was said that the people who attend your school are all rich and can easily afford the increase ….. now that my child attends this school I see that is not true and that children in fact come from a wide variety of backgrounds.” · There are more than 1,200 students at the three centres in Guyana that offer the Association of Business Executives (ABE) programme. The great majority of these students are school leavers from humble backgrounds. There is no comparable programme to the ABE programme in Guyana which is internationally accredited, accessible and affordable. Now with the imposition of the VAT already 12% of the ABE students at Nations have dropped out and will do Continued on page 6
The collective force of “We the People” DEAR EDITOR, The Parking Meter saga was a political red herring of sorts. It has received wide support because it gave people an area to vent. Persons bridged the political divide to picket the City Hall because they were able to find common ground on a local issue. I say that the parking meter saga is a red herring of sorts because if we were to step back, we in Guyana could find a dozen things to picket about that are way more significant than the parking meters. For example there is the shortage of drugs and the crime wave. Just this weekend some men tied up the security guard at the Durban Backlands Millicent Greaves Old People’s home and broke into the container that the overseas missionaries are using to house their equipment and other important and valuable stuff. We also have the festering issue of Constitutional Reform. Guyana has a constitution that has kept us racially and politically polarized for over 50 years. It has also been used to exert force tantamount to dictatorial repression. As seen with the prorogation of the parliament or the refusal to call Local Government elections for two decades. If the truth was told, our lack of progress as a nation and our autocratic leadership styles are tied directly to our dictatorial constitution. I believe that our constitution is the only one in the Caribbean that does not follow the Westminster style of governance. We are probably the only Caribbean country that uses the proportional representation, rather than the first past the post, electoral system; meaning that you cannot vote for, or elect, your parliamentary representative. The so called Burnham constitution does not allow you to have any local representative at Central level of governance. In every Caribbean and First World country you are allowed to vote for your Parliamentary representative, but not in Guyana. Additionally, no
member of a party can vote on any issue independent of the collective party membership. And if they do vote independently, the constitution (through an amendment), allows for their immediate removal from the parliament. Also, the constitution does not allow for parties to collate after an election. This means that even a party with a simple majority can form the government. For instance – Guyana’s parliament has 65 seats - if in a 3-way race two of the parties win 20 seats each, the party that won the other 25 seats will form the government and the two parties with the combined 15seat majority, cannot collate to form the government. We all know that our constitution was drafted by folks who wanted to make sure that they remain in power, with ultimate power, for life. Of course you know also that the President of Guyana stands immune from the law for any deeds he commits while in office. Again, this is only true in Guyana and in countries with dictatorial regimes. For years there have been calls for the reformation of the constitution but neither of the political big wigs would push for any substantive change in the constitution, why? Because it is a gold mine of political and oppressive powers. It is said that power corrupts and Guyana’s constitution gives the executive absolute power, hence the absolute corruption that we see pervasive in Guyana. So if we really wanted a matter of national significance that we should rally and picket for, it is the reformation of the 1980 constitution. It has almost single handedly stifled the growth and upward mobility of Guyana and yet, for personal gains, our politicians will continue to wrap themselves in it. It will take the collective force of “We the People,” to bring about the needed reform to our irrelevant, repressive, dictatorial constitution. And that’s not a red herring. Pastor Wendell Jeffrey
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The stench of the leptocorisaacuta bug in the rice industry DEAR EDITOR, We hereby reply to GRDB’s statement in the media dated April 6th, 2017. Is it not ridiculous at all that a simple statement to the press should evoke the ire of the folks at GRDB (Guyana Rice Development Board). It is downright disgraceful. And why so, is because it is the
truth. But to be truthful, it is only a tiny part of the whole truth. The whole truth would be that GDRB and its sister agencies have absconded in their duty and strayed away from whatever mandate they subscribed to. In our district where rice farming is the backbone of the economy they were the
sentinels and guardians of it but what happened was they were asleep while pestilence in the form of the paddy bug crept in to decimate our industry. And now, this group of armchair riceresearch professionals, say our claims are unfounded. If the stench of the bugleptocorisaacuta had
The “Fantastic Four” are out to victimize city businesses DEAR EDITOR, The greed, the incompetence and the graft of the Mayor and Councillors of the City of Georgetown is becoming more evident and more unbearable with each passing day. On the heels of the egregious parking meter scam, the ‘Fantastic Four’ have now come up with a new and equally devious racket; this time it is the introduction of an additional fee to businesses for the collection and disposal of their garbage. It is quite interesting to note that it is this very private sector group that effectively protested against the parking meter project that is being targeted by the Council for the imposition of another hardship measure. This would not only be double taxation and illegal, but would be spiteful and unscrupulous. Business owners ought to remind the Council that since 1998, they were made to pay a whopping 250% rate of the assessed value of their properties whilst residential property owners were made to pay 40%. Their justification given at the time for this steep increase was that it was necessary to cover
the cost of collecting and disposing of commercial waste. How then can they come again and say that they need another fee to collect the same waste that the 250% tax on business was created for? It means that businesses will have to pay twice to have their refuse collected. The Council cannot be allowed to eat their cake and still have it. To make it even worse just at the beginning of this year the City Council nonchalantly hiked property rates by 10% along with receiving the container tax. This is an anti-business municipality. The remedy to this purported cash crunch that is affecting the way Council manages Solid Waste is very simple and could be figured out by any kindergarten child, and that is to go back to what it did most effectively in the past and what many other cities do, and that is to provide the refuse collection and disposal service themselves rather than contract it out. Doing it themselves would cost a fraction, and would remove the conditions for backhanders and grease. Anu Bihari
GuySuCo is out to mislead and deceive the public DEAR EDITOR, The Guyana Agricultural and General Workers Union (GAWU) wishes to respond to a letter from the Guyana Sugar Corporation Inc. (GuySuCo) which appeared in the April 01, 2017 by the company’s Senior Communication Officer, Ms. Audreyanna Thomas. We strongly hold and maintain that the Corporation’s denial of redundancy payments, contrary to the laws of the land, and the GuySuCo’s compulsion for the 300-odd workers of Wales Estate to take up work at Uitvlugt Estate is tantamount to forced labour. Our history books are replete with such examples during the sad periods of slavery and indentureship in the sugar industry. It was as a result of the sustained struggles of the workers in those times that the system of forced labour was abolished and the industry went through the reforms Ms. Thomas referred to in her letter. Our Union will not repeat what is previously said about the non-wage benefits being championed by the Corporation’s Officer, except to say that those benefits were not given because of the Sugar Barons benevolence but were won through the
hard fought struggles of the workers. Ms. Thomas and GuySuCo may be enlightened by the Venn Commission’s report recommendations and findings. In order for workers to be paid they must first complete the tasks that they are given. This has been the general practice and still is the case in the industry. Thus, we find the letter’s reference to the target to be completely out of place and is another poor attempt by the Corporation to mislead and deceive the public at large. The inability of the Corporation to reach its set targets is rudimentary and involves having an adequate quantity of canes in the fields. It is saddening for us to note that despite almost 400 years of cane cultivation in Guyana, the sugar corporation is having such difficulties in the fields. The leadership of the Corporation, it seems, is obviously lacking. We see the talk about the provision of tools and personal protective equipment (PPE) as a red herring to further stir the pot of confusion the Corporation is brewing as seen in recent times. The provision of tools and PPEs are in keeping with GuySuCo’s obligations outlined in the Occupational Safety and Health Act. It is disturbing that on the first day
of Safety and Health month 2017, GuySuCo chose to make such incredulous assertions. While GuySuCo speaks about injustices, isn’t it an injustice to deny the workers their rightful, lawful entitlements; isn’t it an injustice to close estates and put at risk the livelihoods and well-being of thousands of ordinary, hard-working Guyanese; isn’t is an injustice for the Corporation to reestablish its Other Crops Division fully well aware of the past failures and an absence of a comprehensive study on this occasion; and isn’t it an injustice for the Corporation to deny pay rises to sugar workers for two years now, to deny Annual Production Incentive (API) for the first time in six decades, to arbitrarily withdraw long-standing conditions and benefits. To charge our Union with misleading our membership is a new low for GuySuCo and speaks to the desperation the Corporation’s leadership has reached. The fact is that our Union continues to provide principled leadership in the face of an unkind and uncaring Corporation whose seeming intent is to roll back the gains the workers have secured during the years. Seepaul Narine General Secretary GAWU
awakened them earlier we would not have been in the mess we are in presently. In Region 6 this is not an overnight invasion. GRDB were alerted a decade ago and have made half-hearted gestures towards control via its pamphlets and ‘briefcase’ jeep-visits. Being aware of the potential havoc this bug could cause, it is nothing less than a dereliction of duty of the GRDB officials for not making a concerted attempt to control it. Disputing farmer’s claims of the rice bug infestation is untrue as they now claim is criminal. It is as real as ever. Farmers were complaining all the time. Rice produced from their infected paddy stank and was unfit for human consumption. Exporters would not touch it hence; those farmers received incredibly low returns for labour. In response, what did GRDB do? They recommended knapsack spraying even when it was obvious the bugs chased out
of one field would take refuge in the next field. Rice farmers are a disparate lot and the issue of staggered growth is an eventuality to be taken into account and not to apportion blame. Yet the agency continued on with manual spraying in the face of scarce labour, and expensive drugs. The agency - GRDB and its officials were well aware of its backwardness. It had to be aware that aerial spraying was the only way to combat the milk-sucking bug. Not to promote it, not to introduce it, not to commit to it was myopia on their part. Blinkered by red tape and unable to raise an argument that is both cogent and rational; that the time had come for aerial spraying was a sad loss to this country. Further, they did not assist a private local Company that did its research, made its investment and was ready for aerial spraying. How could an agency be so derelict of its primary duty? Now that yields are severely affected and
farmers are faced with the cost of having to spray several times would the issue of the paddy bug be still underplayed by the GRDB? If it is that the rice paddy bug is finally recognized as a major setback for the rice industry would they now advocate for aerial spraying? Would they assist financially? Would they clear red-tape and sundry obstacles for it to be instituted ASAP? Consider the following: Rice is a major foreign exchange earner. Through sloth in modernizing and myopia in crop protection, we are in a situation where that stream of income is likely to dry up. Who would be answerable? Surely, not the rice farmers, millers and rice workers. Who will it then be and how will our watchdog agency the GRDB explain to the powersthat-be that they were negligent Communications Officer Central and Upper Corentyne Chambers of Commerce
The 14% VAT on Private Education... From page 5 nothing but swell the ranks of the unemployed. It should be noted that the private institutions in Guyana that offer the ABE course do so at a fraction of the cost charged for exactly the same programme in Trinidad · For those attending the private Aeronautical schools – there is no government alternative – if they cannot afford the 14% VAT they too will drop out. · Guyana now has 8 Off Shore Medical schools. About 40% of those attending these schools come from overseas – they are now confronted with massive increases in the middle of their programme · Part of the government rebuttal has been the idea that private schools should pay the 14% VAT themselves. The schools however already pay 35% or more in taxes. Is the goal to tax these schools out of existence? Nations already provides more than 160 scholarships – should we do more? · Another view was that parents have a choice – they can simply return to the very public schools that they chose to leave. Ministers Jordan and Roopnarine have both acknowledged that the public education system is “not all that it could be.” Indeed, a Commission of Inquiry has been established to address some of the challenges. Many Ministers themselves have made the choice to opt for private rather than public education for their own loved ones.
· If the thousands of students in private education were indeed to return to the public system would there be room to accommodate them? In other countries government subsidises private education … is the intention here to punish rather than support, nurture and encourage? · Other commentators have stated there is simply no need for private education as the results of public education are still noteworthy. If the contribution of private lessons was taken out of the equation would there still be the glowing CSEC results that are posted on the front pages of our newspapers each August? Lessons teachers in fact earn more per hour than most private schools – are they covered by the 14% VAT? · No commentator that has studied exam results over the past decade in the primary school can fail to record that private schools are greatly over represented in terms of the outstanding performers · Again yesterday, at the NCC, a government spokesperson quoted figures of $100,000 to $300,000 per year for fees at some private schools. When these same students leave these schools, and go overseas they will begin to pay up to 20 times those fees. Furthermore, in the debate over the projected increase in fees at UG another government spokesman, in support of the 35% increase in fees, states that you cannot expect to receive a quality
education if you are not prepared to pay for it. Is there some major inconsistency here? The meeting at the NAC ended with a “rebuttal” by the Prime Minister. He appeared to be reading from a prepared speech as he failed to respond to a single issue raised from the floor. As he concluded by saying that a “review on the VAT issue may take place in 2018” those attending were left to ponder whether this had been determined even before the meeting had taken place and as they walked out of the meeting while the Prime Minister was still talking they were left to wonder what then was the point of the forum? In all this then who are the winners? Are there any at all? Is the relatively small sum of money that may be raised worth all the angst? Could that same money not be raised by raising the tax on cigarettes or alcohol, or by cutting government expenditure, or simply by promoting a more conducive business climate in Guyana? The losers are far easier to identify. Students will drop out of the aeronautical schools, the medical schools, the ABE programme, the MBA programme, hundreds of others will drop out from the various private schools. Guyana will be further impoverished and what will the government have earned in return? Who will sleep easy at night? Dr. Brian O’Toole, Director, School of the Nations
Monday April 10, 2017
Govt. wants Public-Private Partnerships but…
No guidelines in place to prevent abuse - Gaskin Minister of Business, Dominic Gaskin, recently revealed that while Government and investors stand to benefit from publicprivate partnerships, there is no framework in place to ensure value for money and prevent any form of abuse. He made this observation last week at the Heads of Mission Conference which was held at the Pegasus Hotel. Gaskin said that many potential investors are looking for what are essentially public-private partnerships. He said this is problematic because, “we don’t have a framework in place for public-private partnerships in Guyana, and a lot of what is coming our way are unsolicited proposals that are only viable with the input of the government, or if government procures a particular service or protects a particular entity from competition.” In many cases, Gaskin said that what is being proposed would violate the nation’s procurement laws. The Business Minister stressed that it is difficult and unwise to deal with such proposals outside of a framework, or without even some basic guidelines. He said that until public-private partnership guidelines are put in place, the Government should not be encouraging unsolicited proposals. “It is important that we do this because the Government of Guyana will be looking for Public-Private Partnerships for certain projects. A lot of our infrastructure development over the next decade or more will need to be implemented through public-private partnerships.” Gaskin also intimated that the country does not have the capacity, the expertise or the finances to accelerate Guyana’s infrastructure development without the resources of private investors. “So we need them to be involved, but we need to control and regulate the process.” Additionally, the Executive Member of the Alliance For Change (AFC) disclosed that the reality facing the nation is that investors want to hear a “certain language”. He said that they want to hear about the ease of doing business here; they want to hear about public security and the integrity of officials. But most of all, they want to hear about the investment projects that Guyana has to offer. The Business Minister in this regard, said that
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Business Minister, Dominic Gaskin unfortunately, Guyana really has none to offer for the time being. Elaborating more on this matter, Gaskin stated that in terms of investment promotion, GO-Invest is continuously trying to get the message out that Guyana is a good place to invest and that there are numerous investment opportunities in various sectors for which concessions are available. He noted, however, that GO-Invest faces a similar challenge to what stakeholders in attendance are faced with in the area of investment promotion. “Investors generally want to know what specific projects we have for them to invest in. And we have none. And therefore we tend to lose the interest of the investor because there are other countries competing for those limited investment funds that have tangible investment projects to offer. “So the truth is that right now we’re not speaking a language that investors are looking to hear. So what is it that investors want to hear? You may have noticed that for the most part investors are looking for some kind of partnership with the government. That is their preference because it gives
them the confidence and security they are looking for. This is especially so for foreign investors, including Diaspora investors.” The Business Minister added, “Apart from that, investors are interested in political stability economic stability, rule of law, the integrity of Public Officials, physical Security and the ease of doing business. In these areas while we’re not high up in the ranking, we’re not that bad that investors will refuse to do business here. We just have a lot of work to do to improve the business environment so that we can gain an advantage over our competitors. As I said, the main problem is that investors are looking for specific projects to invest in and we have none. At least none that are ready to be presented to them.” The Executive Member of the AFC articulated that the Government is looking to develop a portfolio of investment projects which Go-Invest can promote to investors. He noted that this is something that his Ministry has started to work on. He said, however, that like the national investment and export strategies, this is not going to be ready anytime soon. Gaskin revealed that GoInvest and his Ministry have already discussed the kinds of businesses Guyana is interested in and the sectors that government is seeking to develop. “Our Ministry is actually going to work with all ten regions in Guyana to identify projects in each region and refine and package them and make them investor ready. We’ve already started meeting with the Regional Chairmen and we’re getting a good response. But like I said that’s not going to be concluded in a hurry. Not until sometime next year,” expressed Minister Gaskin.
Rice Board being blamed for paddy bug problem in Region Six
The Central and Upper Corentyne Chambers of Commerce are accusing the GRDB of not handling the paddy bug infestation properly The Central and Upper Corentyne Chambers of Commerce are casting blame on the Guyana Rice Development Board and its sister agencies for allegedly absconding their duty and straying away from their mandate leading to a paddy bug infestation. The Chambers released a statement attempting to counter comments made by a GRDB official on April 6, 2017 regarding the issue. The GRDB official said that the paddy bug infestation will
always be a recurring problem but can be controlled if the correct manual procedures are followed. However, both chambers contend that in a district where rice farming is the backbone of the economy, the GRDB ‘fell asleep’ allowing the pestilence in the form of the paddy bug to creep in to decimate the industry. The statement said that in Region Six, paddy bug infestation is not an overnight invasion. “GRDB was alerted a decade ago and has made
half-hearted gestures towards control via its pamphlets and ‘briefcase’ jeep-visits. Being aware of the potential havoc this bug could cause it is nothing less than a dereliction of duty of the GRDB officials, for not making a concerted attempt to control it.” According to the Berbice Chambers, rice produced from their infected paddy was ‘stinking’ and unfit for human consumption. As a result, exporters had rejected the (Continued on page 12)
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Younger patients with cervical cancer worrying - CIG Director
Dr. Sayan Chakraborty (left) and General Manager of CIG, Fiona Legall By Rehana Ahamad With a large percentage of the adolescent population being sexually active, medical professionals are beginning to diagnose much younger women infected with cervical cancer. Medical Director of the Cancer Institute of Guyana, Dr. Sayan Chakraborty highlighted that the majority of his cervical cancer patients are below the age of 30. “I have seen patients who are even as young as 18 years-old. Some are 22 years of age, 25 years of age, 30...these are women who are very young,” the oncologist explained during an interview with Kaieteur News. According to a publication from the United States Department of Health and Human Services, all women are at risk for cervical cancer. However, it occurs most often in women over the age of 30. The human papillomavirus (HPV) is the main risk factor of cervical cancer. HPV is a common virus passed from one person to another during sexual intercourse. The document explained that most sexually active people will have HPV at some point in their lives, but few women will get cervical cancer. While the early stages of cervical cancer may not come with signs and symptoms, the advanced stages may cause vaginal bleeding or discharges that are not normal. This includes bleeding soon after sexual intercourse. According to Dr.
Chakraborty, a young girl can be infected with the HPV virus even during her first sexual experience. “A lady, before the age of first sexual intercourse, should therefore receive the HPV vaccine,” the CIG official said. He went on to laud the efforts of government to offer the vaccination to school aged children, saying that it is likely to reduce the growing number of women with cervical cancers. “HPV not only causes cervical cancer, but it can also cause anal cancer and even head and neck cancer, because the HPV virus may also be transmitted orally, during oral sex,” Dr. Chakraborty informed. He said that the Cancer Institute has many patients infected with oral cancer, but medical science has not been able to detect which resulted from infected oral sex. While the use of condoms does not fully protect against contracting HPV, it does significantly lower the risks of being infected. General Manager of CIG, Fiona Legall, bemoaned the country’s state, as it relates to children being sexually active. “You see, the social problem in Guyana, we have 12, 13, 14, 15-year-olds being sexually active already,” she pointed out. The existence of cervical cancers in younger Guyanese women also brings into focus, the relevance of a comprehensive revamp of the sexual education curriculum being offered in schools, since large numbers of youths are recipients of
The Cancer Institute of Guyana
inadequate guidance about sex. This was made abundantly clear during a ‘snap survey’ conducted last year by the Guyana Responsible Parenthood Association (GRPA), which revealed that 50 percent of Guyanese youths are sexually active. Large numbers of them were also engaging in risky sexual behaviour. Approximately 35 percent of 392 respondents were under the age of consent, and some 20 percent of them even reported that they were either raped or coerced into sexual activity. Along this line, there have been many calls for a comprehensive review of the sexual and reproductive health courses being taught in schools. Making the most recent call was Peace and Governance Practitioner, Lawrence Lachmansingh. He believes that the consequences of the Ministry’s outdated abstinence approach are clear indications of the changes that need to be made. Relevant to note also, is the fact that Guyana is known for its appallingly high rate of teenage pregnancy. “Sex education should not just be about the mechanics of sex…my parts and your parts, and how the two parts fit, and what happens when the two parts fit,” Lachmansingh had said. Only recently, the Ministry of Education, backed by several nongovernmental organizations embarked on an initiative aimed at lowering the risks of sexual behaviours among the country’s adolescents. One of the components of the programme involves deploying counselors into approximately 33 schools in Georgetown. Patricia SheeratanBisnauth, head of the Guyana Responsible Parenthood Association (GRPA), had told this newspaper that the sessions in schools are expected to comprehensively tackle about 13 topics. “The counselors will be
talking to the students about controlling their sexuality, sexually transmitted diseases, moral values, personal development, the different types of abuses, including sexual abuse and gender justice and so on,” SheeratanBisnauth said. It was explained that the programme, which promotes safe sex, is expected to minimize the existence of risky sexual behaviours. If it is to work as organizers are hoping, this plan will also aid in the fight against sexually transmitted diseases like the HPV, which can cause cervical cancer. Nonetheless, for those who have already been infected with cervical cancer, emerging technologies have led to less hectic and more effective therapy sessions. These can be accessed by Guyanese, via the Cancer Institute which recently commissioned its High Dose Rate (HDR) Brachytherapy, which replaces the Low Dose Radiation (LDR) treatment that had been in use since 2009. “With the LDR treatment, the patient had to be immobilized for three long days at the hospital,” Dr. Chakraborty told Kaieteur News during a viewing of the apparatus. He highlighted that with the new HDR treatment, the same therapy can be successfully administered in just 15 minutes to 20 minutes. “They can go home right after the treatment,” he added. Chakraborty explained that the multimillion dollar equipment requires the temporary implantation of a catheter, a small plastic tube, directly on the tumor itself. “Only the tumor will get the required amount of radiation, nowhere else…the other parts of the body will be absolutely safe from the radiation,” the oncologist noted. Chakraborty highlighted too that after the treatment is administered, a remote controlled program is used to retract the catheter. The entire procedure, Dr. Chakraborty pointed out, is
The new state of the art brachytherapy equipment now being used to treat patients at CIG recorded and monitored by a fully trained medical practitioner, stationed in a nearby room. This is done with the use of cameras. “This ensures that nobody, except the patient, is exposed to the radiation…not the doctors, not the relatives or anybody…just the patient and just the part of the body that is intended to receive the treatment,” the CIG official said. Dr. Chakraborty further noted that the treatment upgrade was much needed to complete a comprehensive treatment procedure needed for cervical cancers. “With the external radiation and chemo treatment along with the HDR, we are confident that we can effectively treat cervical cancer in patients today up to international standards,” he pointed out. The new treatment, which is administered at the most advanced medical centers across the world, is not only
ideal for controlling cancerous tumours, but it also significantly lowers the chances of a recurrence. “I did a small study which shows that the patients, who did not do the brachytherapy, had a 43 percent chance of reoccurrence of the disease…that is, the disease coming back at the same site,” Dr. Chakraborty noted. He said that even though the machine was brought into the country with the aim of treating gynaecological cancers like cervical cancer, it can treat many others. “It can also treat breast cancers and many others,” Dr. Chakraborty posited. As of last month, three persons were treated using the new brachytherapy. Since its opening in 2006 to last year, the Cancer Institute of Guyana has treated a total of 380 cervixrelated ailments. A total of 1,248 persons, both men and women have also received radiation therapy.
Monday April 10, 2017
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Kaieteur News
Coalition politics and Constitutional reform If the APNU is committed to coalition politics; if it accepts that this type of politics is best suited to Guyana’s ethnically divided politics, then it must by extension accept that the notion of an Executive Presidency is not consistent with Coalition politics. Under Guyana’s Constitution, all executive authority resides in the President. Members of Cabinet are merely advisors to the President. He can overrule them. He can ignore their opinions. He can override their decisions. In others words, what we have
is an all-supreme President, who can dictate what happens in the government. This cannot be consistent with Coalition politics, which must be involved in negotiated decision-making. If the President has full executive authority, then the President does not need to negotiate with anybody. He can dictate what happens. He may not do this, but the mere fact that he has this power means that it is possible. The other problem is if the party in power has the majority of seats in Cabinet and also has the Presidency, then unless there is an
agreement on specified majorities to ensure approval of measures in Cabinet, then the party which holds the presidency will always hold sway over decision-making in the Cabinet. A culture has developed within Cabinets around the world. That culture sees other Ministers not keen on opposing measures and projects of their fellow Ministers for fear that when the time comes, their own policies and projects will be disproved. The Executive Presidency is therefore not consistent with encouraging dissent and
Dem boys seh...
Watch how you going to wedding Wedding does still attract a crowd. Even if people ain’t invited, dem does still go to peep. Dem women does go to see how de bride dress and wha she husband look like. Long time when dem had wedding, people use to tun down dem pot because dem didn’t have to cook. Dem use to live off wedding house food fuh days. If was an Indian wedding dem use to serve nowta. A man use to walk round de village and share out yellow rice. That was de invitation. Once you get de rice, you know you was invited. If is a rich man, he use to send a man round de village wid a bell inviting people. Black people and Indian alike use to accept de invitation. Was feast fuh so. Things get modern when people use to print fancy invitation and send to who dem want at de wedding. That system get even more sophisticated, because inside, people use to put a list. Sometimes de list does indicate wha de bride and groom want fuh dem gift. Sometimes de list inside does
actually tell people wheh to shop fuh de gift. Then dem does have people who does indicate that de bride and groom only accepting cash. De other day, dem boys get an invitation to go to a wedding that was at a hotel. Dem feel so nice that dem decide to tun up wid dem two long hand. Dem go to de front door and dem see a sign mark enter. When dem enter dem see two door. One mark ladies, de other mark men, Dem enter de door wha mark men and see two more door. One mark relative or friend of de groom; de other mark
relative or friend of de bride. Dem push de wan wha mark relative or friend of de groom. Right away dem see two door. One door mark gift and de other mark no gift. Well since dem boys didn’t have gift dem push de door wha mark no gift and find demself outside de hotel. Pun de door dem see a sign. “Wha you think at all? In this hard economic time you got de nerve to come here wid no gift, swing you two long hand, and expect to eat free food and drink free likker? Get you ass from here.” Talk half and watch how you going to a wedding.
negotiations within Cabinet, because the ruling party, which holds the Presidency and, in the case of Guyana, the majority of seats, can override any criticisms from its coalition partners. Two examples will illustrate the dilemma which faces the AFC within Cabinet. Firstly, it is hard to imagine that the AFC would have given its consent to the approval of the parking meter by-laws. It was the AFC’s constituency which has rallied against the present contract signed between the City Council of Georgetown and a private firm. The AFC would, however, have found itself outvoted on this issue, even if it was opposed to the approval of the by-laws, because the AFC does not have the numbers to defeat the APNU within the Cabinet. The second example is about the VAT on private education. It is hard to imagine the AFC being in agreement with this measure. But given the domination of the APNU in Cabinet, and the fact that the APNU’s leader is also the President who holds full executive authority, a yes or no vote by the AFC is immaterial to the outcome. The AFC is therefore at risk,
if it is not so already, of becoming a rubber stamp within the government. The power of the presidency means that collective responsibility becomes the rule by the majority party which in Guyana is the APNU. The AFC is in no position to stop the APNU from doing what it pleases. Constitutional reform should therefore be not about stripping Presidents of immunities. Those who are advancing these positions are really interested in settling political scores with the PPP/ C, rather than trying to protect the institution of the presidency. When former President Bharrat Jagdeo asked the SOCU investigators, who illadvisedly arrested him, whether they wanted to question him in relation to acts which he did as President, he was not invoking his presidential immunities. He was pointing out to this unit, which is supposed to be fighting organized crimes rather than addressing alleged administrative malfeasance, the absurdity of them questioning him about acts which he would have committed while in office. He cannot be personally
prosecuted for acts done in his official capacity as President, but those actions are subject to judicial review in that the State can be held culpable for them. This is the common law position and therefore this nonsense that is being pedalled by the WPA about Jagdeo hiding behind presidential immunities is in itself farcical. The WPA, if it had its way, would reduce the presidency to a rubber stamp. What the AFC should be more concerned about is ensuring that there is a postCummingsburg Agreement, which would allow for decisions within Cabinet to require a 75% agreement from all the members before it is carried. It will change the whole dynamic of Cabinet. It will neutralize the impact of an Executive Presidency on consensus politics. It will become an experiment in effective coalition government and depending on how it works, can lead to the sort of constitutional change which would be more suited to that reality.
Monday April 10, 2017
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Kaieteur News
Paramakatoi speaks…
Residents boast transformative Sundried Tomato Project ‘will surprise the world’ Today, Kaieteur News wraps up its five-part series focusing on the Sundried Tomato Project undertaken by the Institute of Applied Science and Technology in Paramakatoi, Region Eight, with a cross section of viewpoints from residents.
Maxine Aaron, Paramakatoi Resident: Ms. Aaron has lived in Paramakatoi all her life and is employed with Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM). She said, “If I didn’t have other employment, and was farming, the tomato project would have been ideal for me, as I would not only commit to farming one or two acres, but several more. The project offers the opportunity to have a local, immediate market. It will encourage our farmers to embrace a larger-scale approach to farming so that more money can be made, because of the immediate and guaranteed market. I see very big benefits for the community if we can all agree to embrace the project. I think when others see the members of the cooperative making money, many more people, especially school-leavers, will join the cooperative. I think this will enable Paramakatoi to become more independent and not rely on Government hand-outs and other aid packages. This in the long run is very important to the development of our community”
Sherry Anna Balkaran, former Teacher and Resident: “I think it is a great initiative for sustainable development of the community. It will offer
employment alternatives to mining and logging for our young people, resulting in them staying within and growing the community, both in numbers as well as in new ideas. The project can demonstrate what this community can bring – it’s a way of branding the community and its potential. I think our people have so much potential that we do not get to show, because of distance, challenges with communication infrastructure and economic opportunities. We are resourceful, smart people that can do so many things, in fact all of the things that other races of people can do, we can do, and we can do many of those things in unique and valuable ways. I am very appreciative that this project was developed here in Paramakatoi, for it will allow us to demonstrate to the rest of the country and to the world, the value of this community.”
Rabindra Singh, Regional Education Officer, Resident in Paramakatoi: Mr. Singh grew up on the coast and has worked in several regions across Guyana. He said, “I think this is an excellent initiative by the Government. It will really help to improve employment in the region, which has been stifled for a long time. It will provide encouragement for the farmers to grow more, and once the farmers can become more educated and see progress for themselves, this will become a major industry for Paramakatoi. I think the project will also help the school’s mission by assisting our agricultural and technical vocation students by immersing them in all aspects of the project, from the agricultural production to the processing and packaging
and marketing. The facility itself shall help tremendously in our students doing more realistic school based assessments. The project will serve as a way of demonstrating the importance of education to our students, through the promise of tertiary jobs right in the region. It has multiple benefits across several sectors and strata of the society, and I know it is already becoming one of the ways in which Paramakatoi defines itself.” Roger Alfred, Paramakatoi Resident and Member of the Village Council: “We have been looking forward for an
opportunity like this for a long time. Most of us are farmers here in Paramakatoi.
And we have been seeking a project like this for a long time. We are already organizing a ‘kayap’ or self-help initiative, to plough the compound of the facility and to make tomato beds. I think the decision to invite the farmers to farm in the compound is a good one, because the community is taking ownership of the project. Initially, some residents were a little concerned about the $20 per pound for fresh tomatoes, but myself and other councilors have been working with them to break that down into how much they can earn per half acre or acre, and to explain that the
initial payment is then expected to be followed by a further payment once the products are sold. Farmers are very committed to supporting the project, it is one of the first times in a long time that something like this is available to Paramakatoi and we appreciate how well this one has been managed and put together. Also, we know that once we make the sundried tomatoes a success, we will then also begin to include other produce, such as yams, to diversify and maybe go to a system where we are less dependent on the weather and can utilize more advanced ways of farming, like drip irrigation. This is a really exciting time for Paramakatoi and we are already proud of this project.” Continued on page 21
PAGE 12
Guyana, Venezuela border controversy…
UN ‘Good Officer’ to meet with Granger on Wednesday Ambassador Dag Nylander, the personal representative of United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres will visit Guyana on Wednesday, April 12 to meet with President David Granger and Minister of Foreign Affairs Carl Greenidge. Nylander was appointed by Guterres in the border dispute between Guyana and Venezuela as part of the ‘Good Officer’ process. At a press conference culminating the end of the Heads of Missions Conference on Friday, Greenidge said that Nylander will be in Guyana for two days. He said that the visit will focus on choosing an option to the resolution of the contention by Venezuela to the effect that the Arbitral Award of 1899 is null and void. Greenidge said that the visit is part of the exercise in which Nylander is to have discussions with Venezuela and the Government of Guyana with a view to seeing how far both parties can move in relation to resolving the controversy. According to Greenidge if such a move cannot be achieved, then the matter will be referred to the International Court of Justice. Based on a statement issued by the Ministry, it was stated
Monday April 10, 2017
Kaieteur News
UN Good Officer: Dag Nylander that the UN Secretary General had outlined in his decision that if by the end of 2017, the Secretary General concludes that significant progress has not been made toward arriving at a full agreement for the solution of the controversy, he will choose the ICJ as the next means of settlement, unless Guyana and Venezuela jointly request that he refrain from doing so. The Guyana government has always maintained its commitment to friendly and neighbourly relations with the Government and people of Venezuela. On July 10, 2015, Venezuela had formally asked the UN to appoint a
Good Officer to mediate in the dispute with Guyana and declare its sovereignty and rights over the county of Essequibo. Meanwhile, Guyana has always maintained that the dispute, which is over 100 years old, should be settled in an international court. For the last 25 years, the two nations have been utilising the Good Officer process which is supervised by the UN Secretary General. Last year, Guyana discovered oil in its offshore concessions with Venezuela immediately moving to restate its claim to Essequibo as well as the waters where the oil was discovered. The claim was done on the same day that Guyana celebrated its independence. The matter ended up before the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon, last year October, where both Guyana and Venezuela agreed to have the UN Chief decide the best way forward to decide once and for all on a solution. Since then, UN officials have visited Guyana and Venezuela to gather information. Guyana has been using a number of international forums to complain about Venezuela’s aggression, including CARICOM. Venezuela’s claim is almost for the entire Essequibo, the largest county in Guyana, a mineral rich area known more for its vast areas of untouched forests. It is home to thousands of Guyanese and several Amerindian villages.
Local group wants to manage problem-plagued Skeldon Factory The troubled factory
A local group has approached the government to manage the troubled Skeldon Sugar Factory. The group from the East Berbice Development Association is the third group that has approached the government to take over the management of that factory. Previously, a Trinidadian company, along with an Indian company, have expressed an interest in the management of the new factory. Minister of Agriculture Noel Holder said that he welcomes the most recent interest and the three groups have been given until mid-year to present a proposal. Holder said that the local group that expressed an interest, indicated that they are looking to mobilize local people and Guyanese from across the diaspora, who have an interest in helping to resurrect the industry. Holder said that this interest was communicated when a group of Berbicians and the Ministry of Agriculture held discussions on the future of the industry. He said that the local group indicated that they are familiar with the local sugar industry and they were of the view that the familiarity and
the fact that they are Guyanese stand them in good stead to make a meaningful contribution to the industry’s rebirth. Holder explained that government is actively looking to privatize the estate since it is very burdensome for the state to continue to undertake this work. He observed that it is very frustrating that after the new factory was installed by a Chinese firm to the value of US$200M it is still dogged with a plethora of issues. At the moment, the factory is inoperable, since there has been a technical fault that local engineers could not fix. Kaieteur News has learnt that South African engineers are currently working to fix the problem. Holder said that the ‘modern’ Skeldon sugar factory is the single largest investment in Guyana’s history and one of the greatest failures. The minister said that what is also a source of concern is the fact that the Chinese company that did the construction of the factory cannot be held accountable, since too much time has passed and the government is now saddled with the cost for remedial work.
Minister of Agriculture Noel Holder It was for this and other reasons that Holder believes that the Skeldon factory should be privatized. Asked about alternative and inexpensive ways that can be tapped into to rectify the problem, Holder pointed out the while the old sugar factory would have been welcomed that option is no longer available. The government was approached to implement legislation which will allow for private players to make contributions to the industry without hindrance. The government is to make known its plans for the industry going forward.
Rice Board being blamed for... (From page 7) product and farmers received incredibly low returns for their labour. “In response, what did GRDB do? They recommended knapsack spraying even when it was obvious the bugs chased out of one field would take refuge in the next field.” In an earlier statement on the issue, the two Chambers had recommended that GRDB embrace mechanisation to deal with this issue. For example, it was suggested that aerial spraying be adopted which would cover greater area and prevent bugs from moving to a safe haven in other fields. “The agency - GRDB and its officials were well aware of its backwardness. It had to be aware that aerial spraying
was the only way to combat the milk-sucking bug. Not to promote it, not to introduce it, not to commit to it was myopia on their part.” Paddy bug is a threat to rice crops since the insect feeds on the sap which fills the paddy pods before they harden to become rice grains. In addition, the Chambers accused the GRDB of not assisting a private local company which would have done its research, made its investment and was ready for aerial spraying. The Chambers questioned how the GRDB could be so derelict of its primary duty and whether the agency will still underplay the issue in light of farmers having to pay the cost of spraying their crops multiple times.
“If it is that the rice paddy bug is finally recognized as a major setback for the rice industry would they now advocate for aerial spraying? Would they assist financially? Would they clear red-tape and sundry obstacles for it to be instituted ASAP?” Further, the Chambers said that rice is a major foreign exchange earner, and though there is a delay in modernisation and short sightedness in crop protection, the industry is in a situation where the stream of income is likely to dry up. “Who would be answerable? Surely, not the rice farmers, millers and rice workers. Who will it then be and how will our watchdog agency the GRDB explain to the powers-that-be that they were negligent?”
Monday April 10, 2017
Kaieteur News
World Bank: Caribbean should spend better, not more WASHINGTON, United States – Amid concerns about high spending by some Caribbean governments, the World Bank says there’s nothing wrong with spending. But rather than spend more, they need to spend better. It says Latin America and the Caribbean can dramatically improve its infrastructure by better assessing priorities and improving spending efficiency. In an April 7 report titled “Rethinking Infrastructure in Latin America and the Caribbean – Spending Better to Achieve More”, the World Bank argues that although the region trails others in infrastructure investment, it should focus on spending better before thinking of spending more. While Latin America and the Caribbean spends 3 percent of GDP on average – compared to 7.7 percent in East Asia and Pacific for instance – many countries spend more than 4 percent. “Infrastructure investment can be a powerful engine for growth in Latin America and the Caribbean as the region emerges from six years of slowdown, including two of recession,” said Jorge Familiar, World Bank Vice President for Latin America and the Caribbean. “In today’s tight fiscal context, it is essential that investments are as efficient as possible, and that the full potential of the private sector be tapped.” Rather than focusing on often poorly defined financing gaps, the report advocates for addressing “service gaps,” according to countries’ development priorities. This means putting in place efficient ways of addressing these needs, and developing clear rules for deciding when taxpayers should finance services, instead of users. Improving performance in a constrained fiscal environment will require wellidentified priorities. The report singles out sanitation and transport, in which Latin America and the Caribbean lags behind other middleincome regions, as potential focus areas. In addition, the region should also factor concerns such as climate change, urbanization and its changing socioeconomic profile, in particular a larger middle class, which are changing infrastructure service demands –especially on energy and transport. “Latin America and the Caribbean has long been an
Jorge Familiar innovator in infrastructure,” said Marianne Fay, Chief Economist for the World Bank’s Sustainable Development VicePresidency, and one of the authors of the report. “With its expertise in sophisticated regulations and its experience with public-private partnerships, the region has the means to improve its infrastructure services by spending better and on the right things.” Spending more efficiently could have enormous benefits. In the case of the energy sector, where transmission and distribution losses are high, Latin America and the Caribbean would need $23 billion per year if it were to follow the same investment path of the past. Costs would at least halve under an approach that favors efficiency, climate resiliency
and renewable energy solutions. According to the report, many of the causes for inefficient infrastructure investment have roots beyond the sector, including lack of institutional capacity for planning, regulatory uncertainty, and budgeting and implementation issues in many countries. Inefficient procurement processes, for instance, contribute to excess costs. Adequate pricing for infrastructure services is another important potential area for increased efficiency. The report argues that pricing should go beyond simple cost recovery and take into account issues like social acceptability, quality, equity and attraction of commercial financing. In order to preserve taxpayers money, the report says that public and concessional resources should only be deployed where commercial financing is not viable or cost-effective. Finally, the report concludes that allowing infrastructure operators to diversify their revenue can contribute to easing the fiscal cost. Water treatment plants, for instance, can generate electricity for selfconsumption and even sale, and sanitized sludge can be sold as fertilizer, instead of having to be disposed at high cost in sanitary landfills, options not currently available. (Caribbean360)
Residents boast... From page 11 Clarence Alfred, Paramakatoi Resident and Overseer for the Church of Christ: “This project is excellent. We do not have employment here. This project will allow us to produce and reap the benefits. There is nothing like this that was tried before here, and I really appreciate that this project is here. We produce organically here, with no chemicals and fertilizers. I believe this project will surprise the world, will demonstrate how much this community can produce and the quality of our products.”
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WANTED We are buying WamaraTonka Bean Logs, cash down as document ready. Call:6645150
SERVICES
VEHICLE FOR SALE
PLANNING AN EVENT? BIRTHDAY PARTY, GRADUATION,WEDDINGS, ANNIVERSARY,ETC.-CALL DIAMOND TENTS: 2161043; 677-6620
1-Leyland DAF GRR Series; excellent condition. Call: 6804101
Visa Application: U.S.A, Canada & UK; Guyana passport application. Graphics design, advertisement. Tel: 6267040; 265-4535. INNOVATIVEMARKETING & PUBLISHING INC –TEL: 600-4212: We create A/ works, logos, busi ness cards, posters, etc, placements of ads included. Passport, permanent & visitor visa application, Professional Immigration Consultant – Sabita Immigration Services. Call: 225-6496/ 662-6045 Eagle’s: Re-gas -$8,000, Washing machine repairs, Gas Stove, Plasma flat Screen computer repairs & more. Call: 697-2969/646-0966 Floor sanding & Lacquering, house plans, estimate & painting, boat for Santa Mission. Call: 650-4362
Allion, Primo, Fielder Wagon, Spacio, Bluebird, 212 Carina, NZE, Honda CRV, Toyota IST, RZ & Pit-bull – Call: 650-7501 Toyota Vigo pickup -$3.5M and Nissan Pathfinder Jeep $1.5M negotiable. Call: 6097766/ 225-8427 (must be sold) RZ minibus -$700,000. Call: 697-2550, 613-1810 1 Toyota Vigo, with 3 RZ engines - $2M. Call: 698-7807
TAXI SERVICE GR TAXI SERVICE. CALL: 219-5000; 227-1982 & 225-7878 (24HRS)
Contract hire car to work @ GR Taxi. Contact Ganesh: 6146202 Straight stitch/over edge machine operators/labourer. Call: 222-2541 8:00am-4:00pm (Mon-Fri) One male or female to look after layer birds in Interior. Call: 668-6421 One female domestic worker to work in Trinidad. between ages of 25-35. Call 1868- 6831528 Live in waitress to work in a bar- Call: 604-6606;692-4646 Welder/Fabricator. (Must have at least 3 years’ experience). Apply with written application: Technical Services Inc, 18-23 Eccles. Corilla Bush (Dried) & Lemon Grass in large quantities. Call: 665-1397
SALON - Make-up Courses with Mac, Bare Minerals, etc. - Cosmetology Courses: $120,000 - Technician Course: $45,000. Call: 6471773/660-5257
Two female domestic to work at Andre Mineral Trade, 75 Church Street (40yrs and older). Call: 657-6009 One waitress to work at a bar. Please call: 647-2622 Investors for Tilapia Farm, double your investment within two years US $1,000 or multiles desired. Call: 2256485/ 665-3622/610-5437
Computer repairs, cellphone unlocking, website building, data recovery, visa application. Call: 227-7556/ 615-8734 (we also buy computer parts) Repairs at affordable prices: fridge, air conditioner, washing machines, dryers, TV, microwaves & freezerCall: 610-5846 or 661-8158
TOURS
Males between 25-45yrs to work as operator @ Ice Factory in Rosignol. Call: 6183800 between 8am-5pm.
Rodeo, Lethem Rodeo, Brazil, Falls and sightseeing, April 13- 17th. Call: 665-5171, 639-2663, 2237589,658-3758,673-2348
Live in domestic must know to cook Indian dishes 25-40yrs, live in or live out waitress 18-25yrs from E.C.D – Call: 698-7172
Somaru’s Tavel Service, best rates around Georgetown, local tours, hotel accommodation, etc. Call Vee: 670-1162/223-4187/616-2727
CAR RENTAL
AIDAN’S CAR RENTAL: PICKUP, 9-11 SEAT MIN BUS, GOOD FOR AIRPOTR & FAMILY OUTING, CHEAPEST RATE . Call: 698-7807
CAR RENTAL DOLLY’S CAR RENTALCALL: 225-7126/226-3693 DOLLYSAUTORENTAL@ YA H O O . C O M / W W W. DOLLYSAUTORENTAL.COM WING’S CAR & PICKUP RENTAL: LOW DOWN PAYMENT, CHEAP REATES,SPECIALOFFERS FOR THE SEASON. CALL: 690-6494
FOR SALE LARGE QUANTITIES OF HIGH PURITY MERCURY (QUICK SILVER) 99.99995% PURITY$19,000 PER POUND CALL: 592-227-4754. One Ford Van E350, one Toyota Tundra, One Caterpillar back hoe 4x4, one bobcat Tel: 660-2212 Spare for washing machine, microwaves, fridges, stoves, timers, gearbox, motors, etc. Call:225-9032;647-2943;604-5198 1 Double twin steer Atkinson Truck. Call: 684-2708 Complete game shop equipment. Call Leon: 2318424 or 610-0808 Great Deals on video games & all gaming consoles. PC, video games & repairs – Call: 672-2566; 265-3231 1 Diesel Welder, 1 Generator. Call: 627-7835
1 Experienced general domestic to work in G/town, must know to cook Indian dishes. Call: 656-6388 Experienced curry cooks, puri cook, waiters & cleaners. Apply Hacks Halaal, 5 Commerce Street, Day Shift Only. HEALTH Dietitians Clinic: nutrition guidance for diabetic, obese, high cholesterol, cancer, renal, pregnant patients and more. Call: 231-9335/ 699-7083
PROPERTY FOR SALE
VACANCY
Transported property @ Grove and Diamond $16M negotiable. Call: 625-5461
Office Clerk (senior/junior) with CXC English/ Mathematics, computer knowledge an asset. Call: 223-7500
House & Land available for sale. Contact Pacific Development Inc @ Lot 3 Church Street, G/Town. Call: 223-6035/227-8274 Tuschen: 2 storey building, 2031 ft2 - $9.8M Negotiable. Tel: 231-9690 (During working hrs). Parfaite Harmonie: 2 storey building, 1245 ft2 - $9M Negotiable. Tel: 231-9690 (During working hrs). Tain, Corentyne: 2 storey building 3309 ft2 - $8M Negotiable. Tel: 231-9690 (During working hours). Newly built @ Craig E.B.D land 91X50, house 40X28, 3 rooms, 1 self-contained$23M. Call: 718-213-6496/ 617-7691
Mitsubishi Canter Truck, GMM, price negotiable. Call: 698-5604 1 Complete Sawmill at Ya r r o w k a b r a Linden Soesdyke Highway and 1 F66 – Clarke, Ranger Skidder. Call: 609-8041/ 6441190 One tower light Mileage. Call: 680-5356 Design & Make Aluminum windows, doors, stainless rails, showcases, rolling shutters, make & install automatic doors. Call: 2336818/677-5599/659-9999 Delta Table saw & more, wood work tools, construction accessories, saws -all electric plane, angle grinder & more, AC. Call: 6553874
Land to buy La Parfaite Harmonie, Herstelling, Eccles, Uitvlugt, Tuschen or anywhere. Call: 666-2326 1 Handyman to work @ the Kalyan Mall & Shopping Plaza, 162-163 Lamaha Street, Cummingsburg, Georgetown. Call: 227-6681/655-9187/6273390/647-0933
PROGRESSIVE CAR RENTAL: SUV FOR RENTAL- $4,000 & UP PER DAY- CALL: 677-7827, 6435122 ,EMAIL:PRO_AUTO RENTAL@YAHOO.COM
Monday April 10, 2017
Kaieteur News
FOR RENT PLANNING AN EVENT? BIRTHDAY PARTY, GRADUATION,WEDDINGS, ANNIVERSARY, ETC. CALL DIAMOND TENTS: 216-1043; 677-6620 Lot 14 Croal & Longden Street: 4 Storey building (infront Demico). Call: 6631876 2 Bedroom Executive furnished Apartment in residential Area, close to Ogle Airport with all modern amenities.Call:622-5725/6641070
Live in or live out babysitter/ domestic –Call: 223-7500. Monday-Saturday 8:154:15pm Exist for Cashiers/ Salesgirls, apply with written application at Nirva Supermarket, 49 Sheriff & Craig Streets. Call: 227-5771 Trainee A.C, Refrigerator, Technician –Call: 231-0655 Room attendant, male security age 30-55, 233 South Road, Lacytown. Call: 225-0198 Experienced carpenters – apply in person to Alabama Trading Georgetown, Ferry Stelling Stabroek. General Domestic to work 3 days per week, wash & clean. Apply in person @ Alabama Trading, 65 Robb Street, Bourda. One A/C Technician, must have own tools. Call: 698-7807
LAND FOR SALE 1 Transported land in Tuschen Phase 1 -$2M, Tuschen Phase 2 - $1.4M, La ParfaiteHarmonie (main road) -$2M, La ParfaiteHarmonie $1.4M. Call: 642-1252 Diamond Scheme ( 2 nd Avenue), Eccles Scheme (middle) negotiable. Call: 6097766/225-8427 (must be sold) Transported land for sale size 37X270 @ Coglan Dam, Vreed-en-Hoop, W.B.D. Call: 650-5644/677-9938 La Parfaite Harmonie $1.2M, $1.4M, $1.6M, Tuschen Phase II $1.3M, $2M, Uitvlugt -$2M, Herstelling -$3.5M .Call: 6046724 La Parfaite Harmonie -$1.4M, $1.6M, $1.8M, Tuschen Phase II - $1.3M, Uitvlugt $2M, V/Hoop -$27M. Call: 666-2326
One experienced legal computer clerk. Call: 6247087/ 226-4283/258-0213/ email:husainsaphier@ yahoo.com Looking for experienced all round IT specialist. Send CV to jobs@ expresstruckingcorp.com or call 227-6025. Accounts Clerk for Eccles, Industrial Site area knowledge of NIS, PAYE, VAT, Quickbooks. Call: 6144358 TO LET 4 AC Rooms/2 large hall with 1 extra room, suitable for business/ offices @ 21 Seaforth St. Campbellville, Georgetown. Call: 226-4877, 624-7436, 654-9350 3 Bedrooms fully furnished upper flat size 38X40ft -$160,000 monthly. Call: 644-5151 3 Bedroom upper flat at 143 Pike Street. Call: 234-0733 Fully furnished vacation home with all amenities Call during working hours 227-1218
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2 & 3 Bedrooms, fully furnished luxury apartments, long and short term rental. Call: 665-3505/ 655-6270 LEARN TO DRIVE C. Persaud & N. Outar Driving School formerly Soman & Sons Driving School @ Maraj Building- Call: 644-5166; 6222872; 615-0964; 689-5997 (affordable packages).
Monday April 10, 2017
Kaieteur News
Palm Sunday bombings of Egyptian Coptic churches kill 44 Reuters - At least 44 people were killed in Egypt in bomb attacks at the cathedral of the Coptic Pope and another church on Palm Sunday, prompting anger and fear among Christians and leading to troop deployments and the declaration of a three-month state of emergency. Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attacks, which also injured more than 100 people and occurred a week before Coptic Easter, with Pope Francis scheduled to visit Egypt later this month. The assault is the latest on a religious minority increasingly targeted by Islamist militants, and a challenge to President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who has pledged to protect them as part of his campaign against extremism. The first bombing, in Tanta, a Nile Delta city about 100 km (60 miles) north of
Cairo, tore through the inside of St. George Church during its Palm Sunday service, killing at least 27 people and injuring at least 78, the Ministry of Health said. The second, a few hours later in Alexandria, hit Saint Mark’s Cathedral, the historic seat of the Coptic Pope, killing 17 people, including three police officers, and injuring 48, the ministry added. Coptic Pope Tawadros had been leading the mass at Saint Mark’s Cathedral at the time of the explosion but was not injured, the Interior Ministry said. “These acts will not harm the unity and cohesion of the people,” he was later quoted as saying by state media. Islamic State said two of its fighters wearing suicide vests carried out the attacks, and it warned of more to come.
Assad allies say U.S. attack on Syria air base crosses ‘red lines’ Reuters - A joint command centre made up of the forces of Russia, Iran and militias supporting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad yesterday said the U.S. strike on a Syrian air base on Friday crossed “red lines” and it would respond to any new aggression and increase its support for its ally. The United States fired dozens of cruise missiles at a Syrian air base on Friday from which it said a deadly chemical weapons attack had been launched earlier in the week, escalating the U.S. role in Syria and drawing criticism from Assad’s allies including Russia and Iran. “What America waged in an aggression on Syria is a crossing of red lines. From now on we will respond with force to any aggressor or any breach of red lines from whoever it is and America knows our ability to respond well,” said the statement published by the group on media outlet Ilam al Harbi (War Media). U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, meanwhile, blamed Russian inaction for helping fuel the chemical weapons attack it had reacted to, saying Moscow had failed to carry out a 2013 agreement to secure and destroy chemical weapons in Syria. He said the United States expected Russia to take a tougher stance against Syria by rethinking its alliance with Assad because “every time one of these horrific attacks occurs, it draws Russia closer into some level of responsibility.” Rebels and residents in northwestern Idlib province said jets believed to be Russian conducted eight raids yesterday on the town of Khan Sheikhoun where the chemical attack took place but no casualties were reported. Raids hit several other rebel-held towns including Saraqeb and Sarmin in the
President Bashar al-Assad province, where the rebels and activists said incendiary bombs were dropped. The death toll from an air strike on Saturday on the rebelheld town of Urum al-Joz in Idlib province rose to 19 people, including six children, activists and residents said. In the southern city of Daraa, jets believed to be Russian escalated strikes on Free Syrian Army (FSA) and jihadist groups on Saturday and yesterday in an attempt to roll back their gains in the Manshiya district where battles have been raging for nearly two months. Russian President
Vladimir Putin and Iran’s Hassan Rouhani said in a phone call that aggressive U.S. actions against Syria were not permissible and violated international law, the Kremlin said yesterday. The two leaders also called for an objective investigation into an incident involving chemical weapons in Syria’s Idlib and said they were ready to deepen cooperation to fight terrorism, the Kremlin said in a statement on its website. Syrian army forces had been losing ground across the country until Russia intervened militarily in September 2015, propping up Assad and protecting its own interests in the region. Assad has also drawn heavily on foreign Shi’ite militias sponsored by Iran, led by Lebanon’s Hezbollah group, for his most important gains since the Russian intervention. The joint command centre also said the presence of U.S troops in northern Syria where Washington has hundreds of special forces helping the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) to oust Islamic State was “illegal” and that Washington had a long-term plan to occupy the area.
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Jamaica saves $30B on oil imports The Gleaner - Jamaica reduced its oil import bill by US$242 million ($30 billion) last year, which helped to slash the trade deficit by nearly nine per cent, according to new data from Statin. Motorists are, however, only partially benefiting from the price drop due to two sets of fuel taxes imposed in 2015 and 2017. Oil imports categorised as mineral fuels fell by 20.6 per cent to US$935 million between January to December from $1.17 billion spent a year earlier, stated Statin. “This was due to lower imports of petroleum oils, Bunker C grade fuel oil, automotive diesel oil, motor spirit (gasolene), propane, and butane,” the data agency said. The overall trade deficit shrank to US$3.55 billion for the calendar year. During 2016, the average West Texas Intermediate (WTI) oil prices declined by 11.3 per cent to US$44.5 per barrel. Currently, oil prices are hovering around US49 a barrel, still below the average US$100 a barrel for much of the decade. Last week, Fadel Gheit, a noted oil analyst with US-based investment firm Oppenheimer, told Jamaican securities dealers that oil should trend towards US$60 and remain there for the foreseeable future.
Fadel Gheit Gheit said that the growth in US shale oil production and record production by the members of OPEC, led by Saudi Arabia, have significantly reduced the returns to the sector. As a consequence, the sector will seek to go from its current state of break-even at about US$50 a barrel to making an economic return, but not far beyond that level. Shale or clay-like rock that generates oil and gas changed the energy outlook, creating the ‘shale revolution’. Gheit said that the shale revolution added resources to the global supply, which would reduce the world’s reliance on the oil cartel OPEC and would therefore, mitigate against the return of US$100 a barrel oil. The Bank of Jamaica noted in its Fiscal Stability Report released last week that
one aspect aiding the 2016 price related to OPEC. “The moderation in the oil price trend reflected the anticipated signed agreement among OPEC members and other major producers to limit supply,” stated the central bank. Jamaica’s trade deficit for January to December 2016 was US$3.56 billion. This represented a US$345 million, or 8.9 per cent, annual decline. Jamaicans spent US$4.75 billion on imports, compared to US$5.16 billion a year earlier. Exports dipped by 4.8 per cent by US$60 million to US$1.19 billion. Jamaica recorded an improve-ment in the trade deficit with the United States, its main trading partner, by 12.3 per cent to US$1.35 billion, moving from US$1.54 billion during 2015. Globally, the imports of ‘manufactured goods’ fell by US$76 million to US$571 million last year, while food purchases declined by US$2.6 million to value US$840.9 million. Traditional domestic exports valued at US$626.7 million in 2016 fell 8.1 per cent from US$765 million the previous year. This was due to declines in commodity groups mining and quarrying and in manufacture, said Statin. Meanwhile, nontraditional domestic exports at US$463.9 million increased by 6.3 per cent from 2015.
St. Vincent and the Grenadines signs new open skies agreement with US
Prime Minister of St Vincent and the Grenadines, Dr Ralph Gonsalves (left) with Political Economic Director at US Embassy Bridgetown, Yaryna Ferencevych, after the signing of the open skies agreement. BRIDGETOWN, Barbados — A new open skies agreement between the United States and St Vincent and the Grenadines was signed on April 7, 2017, entering into force with immediate effect. This agreement replaces a more restrictive air transport agreement. The US embassy in Bridgetown welcomed the signing of the new open skies agreement as strengthening the partnership between the two countries and deepening commercial and economic ties between the United States and
St Vincent and the Grenadines. “It will provide opportunities for airlines, travelers, businesses, airports and localities by allowing increased market access for passenger and cargo to fly between our two countries and beyond. In doing so, the new agreement will facilitate future travel and commerce between the United States and St Vincent and the Grenadines,” the embassy said. (Caribbean News)
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Tillerson - Syria strike a message to others, including North Korea
U.S. President Donald Trump (R) speaks next to Secretary of State Rex Tillerson during a bilateral meeting with China’s President Xi Jinping (Not Pictured) at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, U.S. - RTX34M2P Reuters - U.S. military strikes against Syria over its alleged use of chemical weapons are a warning to other nations, including North Korea, that “a response is likely” if they pose a danger, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said yesterday. As a U.S. Navy strike group headed toward the Korean Peninsula, Tillerson said China agrees that action is necessary to address North Korea’s nuclear arsenal, following last week’s meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping. Asked if Friday’s strikes against Syria were a message to North Korea, Tillerson told ABC’s This Week: “The message that any nation can take is, ‘If you violate international norms, if you violate international agreements, if you fail to live up to commitments, if you become a threat to others, at some point a response is likely to be undertaken.’” “In terms of North Korea,” he added, “we’ve been very clear that our objective is a denuclearized Korea peninsula.” In a separate interview, Tillerson told CBS’ Face the Nation: “President Xi clearly understands, and I think agrees, that the situation has intensified and has reached a certain level of threat that action has to be taken.”
Trump will soon review options for removing the “threat” posed by North Korean missiles, White House national security adviser H.R. McMaster said yesterday. North Korean officials, including leader Kim Jong Un, have repeatedly indicated an intercontinental ballistic missile test or something similar could be coming, possibly as soon as April 15, the 105th birthday of North Korea’s founding president and celebrated annually as “the Day of the Sun.” Reuters was first to report on Saturday that the Navy strike group Carl Vinson, whose flagship is a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier of that name, will make its way toward the Korean peninsula from Singapore as a show of force after Pyongyang tested a liquid-fueled Scud missile this month. “It’s prudent to do it, isn’t it?” McMaster said of the deployment on Fox News Sunday. “This is a rogue regime that is now a nuclear-capable regime, and President Xi and President Trump agreed that that is unacceptable, that what must happen is the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula,” he said. A U.S. national security review of options on North Korea include economic and military measures. But they lean more toward sanctions and increased pressure on Beijing to rein in its neighbour.
South Europe leaders to seek stronger EU after Brexit shock Madrid (AFP) - Leaders of southern EU nations will meet in Madrid today in a show of unity and to back greater EU integration after Britain began the process of leaving the bloc. Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy and the leaders of France, Italy, Portugal, Greece, Cyprus and Malta will gather at El Pardo palace outside Madrid. The meeting will be a chance to “launch a message of unity and commitment to the project of European integration at a decisive moment in our h i s t o r y, ” t h e o ff i c e o f
Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy said in a statement. “Europe must continue to work to address the issues of greatest concern to its citizens and strengthen its project of integration,” the statement continued. Also today’s summit agenda is the issue of immigration, of particular interest to southern EU states which are on the frontline of the problem. The leaders will also discuss economic, social and defence policies. The meeting of the leaders will be the third by the group following gatherings in
Athens in September and Lisbon in January. Southern European leaders have sought at past meetings to forge a common front on growing challenges, from the refugee crisis to Brexit, and to counter the influence of nations in northern Europe within the bloc. The date of the Madrid meeting was announced on March 29, the day that Britain formally began the two-year process of quitting the EU. The Syria crisis will also be discussed in Madrid, a French diplomatic source said.
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Far-left Melenchon’s surge shakes Erdogan warns Turkey EU bid up French presidential race ‘on table’ after referendum Marseille (AFP) - French Communist-backed presidential candidate JeanLuc Melenchon drew tens of thousands of supporters to an open-air rally Sunday, underlining his surging popularity just two weeks from the unpredictable election. Polls show far-left Melenchon closing in on the frontrunners, 39-year-old centrist Emmanuel Macron and far-right leader Marine Le Pen ahead of the April 23 first round, adding new drama to a rollercoaster campaign. After strong performances in two televised debates, several new surveys this weekend showed him climbing to third position, with 18-19 percent of voters saying they would vote for him. Speaking in Marseille, Melenchon said voters had a choice other than the extremeright “condemning our great multi-coloured people to hate itself” and fans of the freemarket that “transforms suffering, misery and abandonment into gold and money”. Left-leaning news magazine L’Obs commented that “the sudden emergence of Jean-Luc Melenchon among the four candidates with around 20 percent has shattered all the predictions, (and) is sowing doubt among the favourites.” Analysts say forecasting the two-stage election is even more difficult than usual, with an unusually high number of voters saying they plan to
Jean-Luc Melenchon abstain or have not made up their minds. Scandal-hit rightwinger Francois Fillon also held one of his biggest rallies so far, gathering thousands of supporters at a Paris conference hall. The ex-premier is desperate to pick up momentum after a campaign dominated by allegations he paid his wife hundreds of thousands of euros for a fake parliamentary job. “I’m not asking you to love me — I’m asking you to support me, because it’s in France’s interest,” he told the crowds. One former minister and Fillon ally admitted to AFP on condition of anonymity: “If he doesn’t rise a few points (in the polls) this week, it’s over.” Le Pen meanwhile sparked criticism from Jewish groups with an interview in which she denied the French state was
responsible for the wartime round-up of more than 13,000 Jews at Paris’ Vel d’Hiv cycling track who were then sent to Nazi death camps. “I think that generally speaking if there are people responsible, it’s those who were in power at the time. It’s not France,” she told LCI television. The CRIF umbrella grouping of Jewish organisations called the comments “an insult to France, which honoured itself in 1995 by recognising its responsibility in the deportation of France’s Jews”. Le Pen and her closest allies had hit the airwaves Sunday selling their vision of a nationalist France, unburdened by the European Union and the euro currency and tougher on crime and Islamists. Her telegenic niece Marion Marechal-Le Pen made a rare television appearance to deny reports of differences in the family, which led to speculation this week she might quit. “I’m 100 percent behind Marine Le Pen,” she told BFM television, adding she planned to stand in parliamentary elections in June. Macron meanwhile detailed what his priorities would be for his first few months in office, telling the Journal du Dimanche newspaper that one of his first measures would be to pass a law setting new ethical standards for parliament.
Russian computer programmer arrested in Spain – embassy Reuters - A Russian computer programmer, Pyotr Levashov, has been arrested in the Spanish city of Barcelona, a spokesman for the Russian embassy in Madrid said yesterday. It was unclear why
Levashov was arrested. The embassy spokesman declined to give details for his arrest, and Spanish police and the interior ministry were not available for comment yesterday. Russian television station
RT reported that Levashov was arrested under a U.S. international arrest warrant and was suspected of being involved in hacking attacks linked to alleged interference in last year’s U.S. election. Peter Carr, a spokesman for the U.S. Justice Department’s criminal division, said: “The U.S. case remains under seal, so we have no information to provide at this time.” The criminal division is separate from the national security division, which is responsible for investigating state-sponsored cyber crimes. A U.S. Department of Justice official said it was a criminal matter without an apparent national security connection. Spanish authorities notified the Russian embassy of Levashov’s arrest on Friday, the embassy spokesman said.
Istanbul (AFP) - President Recep Tayyip Erdogan warned yesterday that Turkey’s embattled bid to join the EU will be back “on the table” after next week’s referendum on enhancing his powers, raising new doubts about the future of the membership drive. In a speech in the Aegean city of Izmir, Erdogan described Europe as a “sick man”, using the jibe that nineteenth century European politicians used to describe the decaying Ottoman Empire. He once again threatened after the April 16 referendum to sign into law the reinstatement of the death penalty — if it was passed by parliament — a move that would automatically end the European Union membership bid. “Europe will pay for what they have done. God willing, the question of the European Union will again be on the table after April 16,” said Erdogan. He said that Turks living in Europe were “oppressed” and “humiliated”: “God willing, our people will bring them (Europe) to account,” he said. “They said a century ago that we were the ‘sick man’. Now they are the ‘sick man’. Europe is collapsing,” he added, claiming the European economy weakened every year. The EU is facing the gravest crisis in its
six-decade history after last year’s British vote to leave the bloc, while populist and eurosceptic movements have gained ground across the continent. Erdogan reaffirmed that if a bill on restoring the death penalty — abolished in 2004 as part of the EU bid — was brought to him he would sign it “without hesitation”. The president has raised hackles in Europe over recent weeks by claiming some EU states were behaving like the Nazis by preventing his ministers from holding pre-election rallies. While the ‘No’ campaign has struggled to make its voice heard as the ‘Yes’ campaign dominates the airwaves, analysts believe the outcome is still too close to call as the race enters the last week of campaigning. Sunday marked the last day of expatriate voting in the referendum which is expected to be crucial to the outcome with some three million expatriate voters registered, almost half of them in Germany. The ‘Yes’ campaign is also backed by the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) which on Sunday held a giant rally led by its leader Devlet Bahceli in Istanbul at precisely the same shoreside venue used by Erdogan for a giant meeting the day earlier.
Embattled Venezuela President says keen for local vote CARACAS, Venezuela (AFP) — Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro insisted yesterday he was “eager” for delayed regional elections to go ahead, despite being criticized for resisting a national vote on removing him from power. The socialist leader spoke after tension in the povertystricken, oil-producing nation mounted last week when mass protests by his opponents sparked deadly clashes with police. Regional governorship polls were postponed indefinitely in December and municipal ones are due later this year amid a chaotic political struggle. “I am eager for elections to be convened for governors and mayors” to teach the opposition a lesson, Maduro said yesterday on his weekly television programme. He said he wanted elections “so as to hand a defeat to those people very
Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro soon, so that they will stop the rioting and violence; to respond to them with votes.” The next presidential election is scheduled for December 2018. The centreright opposition has demanded a referendum on removing Maduro from power, but he has resisted and
negotiations have broken down. The opposition blames Maduro for an economic crisis aggravated by falling oil prices, which has caused acute shortages of food and medicine. Maduro says the crisis is the result of what he calls a US-backed capitalist conspiracy. International criticism of his government mounted in recent weeks after the Supreme Court moved to curb the powers of the oppositionmajority legislature. It intensified further after state authorities on Friday said they were disqualifying senior opposition figure Henrique Capriles from holding public office. Maduro’s Foreign Minister Delcy Rodriguez in comments to reporters yesterday called for other Latin American powers who have criticized him to “get their noses out of Venezuela.”
Security Minister denies interfering in process to select Police Commissioner The Gleaner - National Security Minister Robert Montague has denied interfering in the process to select the next police commissioner. There has been speculation that the PSC recommended the appointment of Miss Grant to replace Dr Carl Williams. But that recommendation was
reportedly rejected by the government. Speaking to the Gleaner/Power106 news centre Saturday, Montague said the government respects the selection process and, like the rest of the country, is awaiting the decision of the PSC. He described the members of the PSC as patriotic
Jamaicans and said they must be allowed to do their job without pressure. Montague said the position of police commissioner was too important at this time to be subjected to rumours and innuendos and urged Jamaicans to respect the process and the integrity of the members of the PSC.
Monday April 10, 2017
Milo 18 and Under Schools Football Competition
Chase Academy retain title in penalty shootout
- Masters finish third Action in the Milo final between Chase Academy and Morgan’s Learning Centre at the Ministry of Education ground, Carifesta Avenue yesterday. Defending champion Chase Academy retained their title after securing a 3-2 win in a penalty shootout in the final of this year’s Milo 18 and under Schools Football Competition which concluded yesterday, at the Ministry of Education ground, Carifesta Avenue. Played before a massive crowd, touted to be the biggest in the competition’s history, the much vaunted Chase Academy were pushed to the brink by a determined and well prepared Morgan’s Learning Centre in an epic game that finished 1-1 at the end of regulation and overtime. The game was a fitting conclusion to a tournament that will surely help produce quality players in the future. Morgan’s Learning Centre took the lead in the 15th minute through a spectacular left-foot missile from Chris Macey from a tight angle on the left flank that raced into the roof of the net to send their cheerleaders and supporters into frenzy. Not accustomed to playing catch up, Chase Academy seemed unusually unsettled, but somehow weathered the storm and even had opportunities to level with the crossbar coming to the rescue of
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Morgan’s on one occasion. They looked particularly dangerous on set pieces with their lanky defenders causing havoc in those situations and it was one such play that earned them the equalizer. It came from a corner taken on the right side which was sent in on the back post and Shomol Smith leaped high above the Morgan’s backline to deliver a cracking header past the goalkeeper in the 26th minute. Buoyed by the leveler, Chase found another gear and created chance after chance, but somehow failed to breach the goalkeeper’s outstanding efforts. The half came with no addition to the scoreline and the fans braced themselves for a riveting final period showdown. However, the pace of the game slowed down as both teams searched for goals from
counterattacks, but again the defence was superb. After eighty minutes and an extra ten in overtime it was left to a penalty shootout to determine the outcome and Chase got home following some magnificent goalkeeping to keep their title. It was another example of high quality football at the junior level and augurs well for the future of the sport here. In the third place playoff, Masters Academy who many felt were unfortunate not to be in the championship game inflicted a 5-1 drubbing on Sir Leon’s Lessons. Calvin Peters netted in the 4th, 75th and 88th minutes, while Tyrone Khan added a brace in the 73rd and 81st minutes to complete their tally. Omari James was the lone response for Sir Leon Lessons in the 20th.
Manchester United cruise to victory at Sunderland (Reuters) Manchester United put a spate of recent draws behind them to boost their top-four hopes with a routine 3-0 victory at bottom club Sunderland to move fifth in the Premier League yesterday. Once again it was veteran Swede Zlatan Ibrahimovic who provided the inspiration for Jose Mourinho’s side, scoring the opener and setting up a late goal for Marcus Rashford. Henrikh Mkhitaryan was also on target while Sunderland had Seb Larsson sent off shortly before halftime. Six draws in their last nine league games had eroded United’s hopes of a top-four finish and victory over Sunderland was imperative if they were to stay in touch. They were frustrated for 30 minutes but once Ibrahimovic produced a clinical finish for his 28th goal of the season in all competitions they were untroubled. “The result was good. We resisted the results of yesterday when Manchester City and Liverpool won, they left us in a position of ‘yes’ or ‘no’. It was ‘yes’,” Mourinho, whose side moved above Arsenal and are four points behind Manchester City with a game in hand, told Sky Sport. “We got three points and it was a solid display. It was against a team that is sad, it’s normal. Against a team that is
Manchester United’s Marcus Rashford scores their third goal against Sunderland. (Reuters / Russell Cheyne Livepic) sad, if you score before then it’s difficult for them to react. “You could feel the negative feeling around the team. That is felt with a team close to relegation.” Sunderland have gone seven league games without scoring and with seven games remaining they are 10 points adrift of safety and seemingly doomed to relegation. Manager Davis Moyes said Larsson’s red card for going in on high on Ander Herrera had killed the game. “I don’t want to blame referees for my position and us losing,” he said. “Today the result was helped by the referee. “Manchester United were playing well but it was a decision that went against us.” United took the lead at a
sun-drenched Stadium of Light when Ibrahimovic, receiving the ball with his back to goal, shook off his marker and buried a low 20metre shot past Jordan Pickford. Victor Anichebe went close to an equaliser but his close-range effort was blocked by United keeper Sergio Romero who was starting in place of the injured David de Gea. Any Sunderland hope disappeared with Larsson’s red card and 46 seconds after the break Mkhitaryan fired past Pickford. In the 89th minute Ibrahimovic combined with substitute Rashford who beat Pickford with a cross-shot for his first league goal since September.
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Rana, Pandya brothers stage stunning heist ESPNcricinfo - On a highscoring, field-first ground, and fighting considerable dew, Kolkata Knight Riders nearly won with an under-par 176 but failed to defend 59 in the last 23 balls. In the cauldron, with the home crowd burning their ears and a wet ground underfoot, the visiting Knight Riders just froze in the field after taking out almost all the big guns from Mumbai Indians. Almost. Because at 119 for 5, Mumbai sent out Hardik Pandya, whose cameo met Nitish Rana’s hitherto solid innings to stage a heist. Rana went from 29 off 23 to 50 off 28, and Hardik hit the winning runs in his 11-ball 29. The night belonged to the brothers after Krunal Pandya dragged Knight Riders back with his left-arm spin of 4-024-3. Two of these wickets read c Pandya b Pandya. Looking London, going Tokyo with K Pandya Chris Lynn came into this match on the back of an explosive 93, but he goes at only 6.16 against left-arm spin. It was expected, then, that Krunal would bowl early in the innings. Knight Riders had already run away to 44 in four by the time he came on, and Lynn was not on strike first ball. Doesn’t matter, because Krunal took two bonus wickets of Gautam Gambhir and Robin Uthappa in that over. Sometimes a wide is better than going for a boundary The other thing about Lynn was his wagon wheel in his 93. He scored 52 off those runs in 17 hits to leg, and not one behind square. So Mumbai bowled to him with a long-on and a cow corner, short and into the body, denying him the swing of the arms. The quicks even bowled two wides to him down the leg side. In the end, against Jasprit Bumrah, Lynn went to hit square, to miss that man at cow corner, and moved too far across to be lbw with Knight Riders at 67 for 3 in the eighth over, with a middleovers slowdown to follow. Pandey to the rescue Manish Pandey, who before this match had scored 53 off 53 Harbhajan Singh deliveries, was part of that slowdown when Harbhajan and Krunal turned the screws. Pandey, though, can shift gears dramatically. His overall strike rate in IPL is 111 over the first 30 balls of an innings, and 173 off the next 30. Here he went from 35 off 30 to 81 off 47, taking Mitchell McClenaghan apart in a 23run final over. Confusion at the top
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Kaieteur News
Perhaps Mumbai don’t trust Parthiv Patel to bat anywhere other than against the new ball. Perhaps they want a big batsman in the middle. Perhaps they are not giving it enough thought, but their top four remains a muddle. Knight Riders bowled superbly against Jos Buttler, Parthiv, Rana (promoted ahead of Rohit Sharma) and Rohit to reduce them to 74 for 3 in 10. There was swing for Trent Boult, pace from Ankit Rajpoot, and guile from the two spinners, Kuldeep Yadav and Sunil Narine. Pollard gone, game over? This was now becoming Kieron Pollard v Knight Riders. Pollard even blocked out a whole over from Kuldeep to turn 73 off 41 into 71 off 36. Soon it went past two runs a ball and nudged 2.5 a delivery as Pollard struggled against fellow Trinidadian Narine. Pollard was now ripe for the taking, and Chris Woakes did so with a wide bouncer. This was the 17th over, the wheels were about to come off. Own goal after own goal The ground was pretty wet by now. The pitch was still flat. The boundaries were still small. Mumbai still needed just one man to get on a roll. It all began with a fielding error. Rana set off for a desperate single, the throw from mid-off came in, and Woakes didn’t have the ball in his hands when he removed
the bails. Rana should have been out for 28 off 22. And then both of them got on a roll. With Gambhir off the field, Suryakumar Yadav bucked the trend of bowling the best bowler in the 19th, and kept 18th and 20th for Boult. Nineteen came off the 18th over with Boult missing the yorker twice. It is arguable if they should have been bowling yorkers with the wet ball, but at Wankhede, length is not the answer either. Youngster Rajpoot kept going for the yorker in the 19th, conceding two sixes but also taking out Rana with one. With 11 required off the last over, Boult went full for the first two balls. Two legbyes and a single should have been the result but the ball slipped under stand-in captain Suryakumar’s hands at long-on. Now with Hardik on strike instead of Harbhajan, Boult went for the bouncers. A dot ball and a wicket should have been the result, but substitute Rishi Dhawan slipped under a sitter. What should have been a single became a boundary, what should have been an easy catch became two runs, and Knight Riders weren’t left with anyone else to blame. Scores: Mumbai Indians 180 for 6 (Rana 50, H Pandya 29*, Rajpoot 3-37) beat Kolkata Knight Riders 178 for 7 (Pandey 81*, K Pandya 3-24) beat by 4 wickets.
Warner, Rashid give Lions a thrashing
Moises Henriques scored his second half-century of the season © BCCI ESPNcricinfo - Sunrisers Hyderabad dominated all aspects of a T20 game - batting, bowling, fielding and winning a toss - to consign Gujarat Lions to their second rout of the season. Sunrisers cruised to their second comfortable victory, with nine wickets in hand and 27 balls to spare. Lions stuck to the same combination as the first game - four overseas batsmen and five Indian bowlers - and lacked balance and penetration again. With the bat, they could muster just 135, their second-lowest firstinnings total. With the ball, they’ve taken just one wicket in two games. Sunrisers, on the other hand, were outstanding in planning and execution. Rashid Khan flummoxed the Lions batsmen with his variations to become the highest wicket-taker of this season’s IPL. Then chasing 136, Moises Henriques struck his second fifty of the season, and David Warner made an unbeaten 45-ball 76, going past 1000 IPL runs at the Rajiv Gandhi Stadium and 7000 runs in T20 cricket. The IPL’s most significant trend Sunrisers captain Warner was clear at the toss. He knew the surface would be slower in the afternoon and his spinners would be useful against Lions’ four overseas stars. After putting Lions in to bat - the fifth time in six games a team has chosen to chase this season - Warner started with left-arm spinner Bipul Sharma. The pitch played pretty much as expected: slow, low, and timing spinners wasn’t easy. Sunrisers’ spinners - Rashid and Bipul - returned combined figures of 8-0-43-3 leaving the Lions to play catch-up thereafter. Legspin winning T20s Picking Rashid’s variations from his stock ball has been one of the harder tasks in Associate cricket. That is why he is regularly employed towards the end overs in T20Is for Afghanistan. In just two games, Rashid has shown discerning legspin isn’t simple for the elite either. Batsmen often look for a cross-batted
option against spin they aren’t able to read. That seemed the case when Brendon McCullum chose to sweep in Rashid’s first over. He missed the googly and was struck in front of the wicket. Aaron Finch and Suresh Raina were deceived too: Finch by a googly and Raina by a regulation legbreak. Both batsmen missed the ball by a considerable distance, an indicator that they failed to pick Rashid. It was the first time a bowler took three lbws in an IPL game. Two of the best legspinners in the world currently, Rashid and Imran Tahir, both attack the stumps - a legbreak to a left-hander and a googly to a right-hander - to new batsmen. It has worked, and not just in the IPL. Not timing a T20 chase Sometimes, a higher total to chase frees up a batting team. Pacing an innings while chasing a relatively small total can also be fraught with danger because of the unpredictability of the end overs. Warner, however, didn’t change his normal approach to Sunrisers’ 136 target. With two left-handers opening for Sunrisers, Suresh Raina bowled the first over. He had bowled only 30 balls in the Powerplay and conceded 32 runs prior to this game. His first delivery was flat and straight, skidding on with the arm. Warner gave himself room and cut to point off middle stump. While that was a risky stroke, it showed Raina his best delivery could be taken for runs. That risk paid off in the next over, when Raina was forced to change his length. Warner used his feet against Raina’s flight to hit a straight six, and then used the depth of the crease to pull for six off a shorter delivery. He had raced away to 32 off 17 balls in the Powerplay, and Sunrisers were 59 for 1. By then, the game was effectively won. Scores: Sunrisers Hyderabad 140 for 1 (Warner 76*, Henriques 52*) beat Gujarat Lions 135 (Smith 37, Roy 31, Rashid 3-19) by nine wickets.
RICCIARDO AND PEREZ
reprimanded for anthem breach
Hardik Pandya gets a kiss from brother Krunal after taking Mumbai Indians home, Mumbai Indians v Kolkata Knight Riders, Mumbai, IPL, ©BCCI
(Reuters) Australian Daniel Ricciardo and Mexican Sergio Perez have become the first Formula One drivers to be reprimanded under a new rule requiring timely attendance at the prerace national anthem ceremony. The two Red Bull and Force India drivers failed to join the rest in standing at the front of the grid 14 minutes before the start of the formation lap at Sunday’s
Chinese Grand Prix in Shanghai. The sanctions, while nothing to do with actions on the track, could have championship ramifications with three reprimands in a season triggering an automatic 10 place grid penalty for the next race. The penalty is only imposed, however, if at least two of the three reprimands were imposed for a driving infringement.
Force India’s Perez has now collected two reprimands from two races, his first a driving offense during qualifying in Australia last month. Sunday was Ricciardo’s first. The requirement that all drivers attend the pre-race national anthem ceremony was written into this year’s sporting regulations after pressure from former commercial supremo Bernie Ecclestone.
Monday April 10, 2017
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Kaieteur News
Volcanoes beat Scorpions by LBFCC/Baker Memorial Cycle Classic 8 wkts – 3rd day, 9th round KINGSTOWN, St Vincent, CMC – Windward Islands Volcanoes defeated Jamaica Scorpions by eight wickets on the penultimate day of their ninth round match in the Regional four-day championship at Arnos Vale Stadium here yesterday. Scores: SCORPIONS 56 (Kyle Mayers 6-29, Delorn Johnson 426) and 262 (Fabian Allen 77, Paul Palmer 46, Devon Thomas 42; Shane Shillingford 7-91, Kyle Mayers 2-36). VOLCANOES 223 for nine decl. (Devon Smith 100 not out, Andre Fletcher 57; Nikita Miller 5-58, Derval Green 2-35) and 96 for two (Tyrone Theophile 36, Devon Smith 23 ret. Hurt).
Kenyan Lonyangata wins Paris marathon
‘Obeahman’ Jeffrey blows field away in senior segment - John and Barret are junior and female winners By Franklin Wilson Back home following another successful stint on the USA circuit, Raynauth ‘Obeahman’ Jeffrey made an immediate impact on return to the local scene with a commanding victory in 6th annual Baker Memorial Cycling Classic which was held yesterday in the Bauxite Mining Town of Linden. In the senior category which saw the riders battling over 80 miles, Jeffrey, who chalked up his second win in the six year history of the event, showed his class yet again and in the process halted the winning streak of fellow Team Coco’s member Jamal John who have won the last two road races but had to set for the third place, yesterday. Jeffrey stopped the clock at Two Hours 25 Minutes 31 Seconds in a race that was blessed with good weather, a bit of overcast skies, sun as well as some rain.
Copping the second place was Team Alanis’ Alanzo Ambrose with United’s Andrew Hicks claiming fourth, the fifth and sixth positions was occupied by Hamza Eastman (Team Coco’s) and Paul De Nobrega (Digicel Team Evolution). It was clear after the 40 plus riders were sent on their way that Jeffrey meant business as himself, Ambrose, Hicks, John and Deeraj Garbarran went on the break early to the extent that the lead they established virtually defined the final outcome in terms of the top six. While Garbarran eventually buckled under the pressure to maintain the lead, De Nobrega and Eastman, who were in the chasing second pack, eventually reaped the rewards of consistent pursuing to close out the top six positions. The race course was by no means easy as required
Paul Lonyangata of Kenya crosses the finish line to win the 41st Paris Marathon in Paris, France. (REUTERS/Benoit Tessier) (Reuters) Kenya’s Paul Lonyangata won the Paris marathon, clocking two hours six minutes and 10 seconds over 42.195km on a bright morning yesterday. Lonyangata pulled clear when his compatriot Stephen Chebogut, who started with the best personal best of the field, cracked with 5.7km left. The 24-year-old Lonyangata, a winner of the Lisbon and Shanghai marathons, beat his personal best by almost a minute. Purity Rionoripo of Kenya won the women’s race.
Lukaku double as...
From page 32 brought down but the referee, wisely, played advantage and the ball fell to Tom Davies who shot home. Leicester struck back three minutes later though with a trademark counter-attack, Demarai Gray bursting deep into home territory before he slipped the ball to Islam Slimani and the Algerian coolly side-footed past Joel Robles. Robles was beaten again in the 10th minute when he misjudged a curling free kick from the left from Marc Albrighton as the champions took a 2-1 lead. Everton looked the sharper in midfield with Mirallas particularly lively and it was no surprise when they got back on level terms in the 23rd minute, Ross Barkley whipping in a superb cross from the right which Lukaku met with a perfect glancing header –- the Belgian scoring for the eighth straight home game. Four minutes before the end of an intense first half, Everton grabbed the lead. Barkley should have scored when one-onone with Leicester keeper Kasper Schmeichel but the Dane managed to palm it wide for a corner and from the resulting kick Phil Jagielka rose at the back post to power in a header. Lukaku struck again, with his 23rd league goal of the season, in the 57th minute, firing home at the back post after Leicester failed to clear a corner. Robles made amends for his error with a superb diving save, three minutes from the end, to keep out a fine header from Leicester sub Leonardo Ulloa.
The top three veterans U-50 battling on the LSH being led by Lear Nunes (2nd), Junior Niles (winner) and Warren ‘Forty’ Mc Kay. (Franklin Wilson photo)
Raynauth Jeffrey being rewarded by former National cyclist Lindon Baker for his triumph yesterday in Linden. the riders traversing through the Town of Linden before entering the Linden Soesdyke Highway maneuvering two hills, turning back at Moblissa Hill. The senior, junior and veterans Under-50 were required to repeat this route three times before approaching the finish line. United’s Briton John also rode well to come out as the top junior ahead of Jason Cameron and Adealie Hodge. Hazina Barret rode away with the top female prize with 16 year-old Abigale Jeffrey and last year’s winner Byonka Barker, having to settle for the second and third places respectively. Junior Niles continued his dominance of the veterans Under-50 category with yet another victory over fierce rival Lear Nunes covering the distance in Two Hours 37 Minutes 46 Seconds; Warren ‘Forty’ Mc Kay occupied the third place. Veterans Over-50 were required to cover the race route once and it was Andrew Spencer who ended as the winner in 54 Minutes 01 Second ahead of Garfield Lorimer and Kirkwood Kellman. The Bakers’ Family was on hand to assist with the presentation of cash prizes and trophies and expressed their gratitude to the organizing club, Linden Bauxite Flayers Cycle Club,
led by President Okel Arthur for bringing off another successful event which has been growing each year. They {Bakers Family} has committed to continued support of the event which saw sponsorship coming from the Bakers Family and Friends, Sports Plus Store, Squadra, the Guyana Sports Development Foundation and Clear Waters.
Female winner, Hazina Barret.
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Monday April 10, 2017
Kaieteur News
Hamilton beats Vettel for Garcia defeats Rose to Chinese Grand Prix win claim Masters Green Jacket
Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton of Britain celebrates with champagne on the podium after winning the Chinese Grand Prix at the Shanghai International Circuit. (REUTERS/Aly Song) SHANGHAI (Reuters) Lewis Hamilton mastered Shanghai’s changing conditions and stayed clear of squabbling rivals to win the Chinese Formula One Grand Prix yesterday. The Briton eased his Mercedes across the line 6.2 seconds ahead of Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel. Max Verstappen, who started 16th, finished a surprise third to hand his Red Bull team their 100th podium. It was Hamilton’s 54th career win and a record fifth in Shanghai. But it was the triple champion’s first this season and returned Mercedes to the top of the podium after Vettel won last month’s season-opening race for a resurgent Ferrari. “I’m so happy with my first win of the year and I can’t believe it if I’m honest,”
said Hamilton after the race, which also handed him his 106th podium, putting him joint second with Alain Prost on the list of drivers with most rostrum results. “What I said to Sebastian as I left the last race … I said I’m coming back in the next one. When I got on the podium it was like ‘I told you’.” Hamilton, who finished second to Vettel in Melbourne, heads into the next race in Bahrain in a week’s time tied on points with the German. Mercedes, meanwhile, lead the constructors’ standings by one point over Ferrari. Hamilton started from pole position, but the conditions were a bit of a lottery for all the drivers with the track damp in patches but
Mohyryan Baksh and... From page 35 Liam Carpenter 11 – 7, 11 – 6 The final results in each category are as follows. Category A Winner – Shomari Wiltshire Second - Alex Cheeks Third – Taylor Fernandes Category B Winner – Makeda Harding Second – Samuel Ince – Carvalhal Third – Rebecca Low Fourth – Gianni Carpenter Category C Winner – Abosaide Cadogan Second – Madison Fernandes Third – Kirsten Gomes Fourth – Lucas Jonas Category D Winner – Mohyryan Baksh Second – Zachary Persaud Third – Louis Da Silva Category E
Winner – Mikhail Persaud Second – Nicholas Verwey Third – Chad De Abreu Category F Winner – Osmond Mack Second – Beau Fernandes Third – Teija Edwards Category G Winner – Dhiren Persaud Second – Aishani Persaud Third – Rayad Boyce Fourth- Angel Rahim Category H Winner – Joshua Verwey Second – Jared Saul Third – Noah Rahaman Most improved girl – Aliyah Persaud Most improved boy – Louis Da Silva Most outstanding girl – Abosaide Cadogan Most outstanding boy – Mohyryan Baksh The prizes were distributed by Robin Low, President of the Guyana Squash Association on behalf of the sponsors Toucan Distributors.
drying quickly. He kept the lead off the line ahead of Vettel, who came under investigation for lining up out of position on his grid slot. The German, though, stayed second, fending off Valtteri Bottas in the other Mercedes, who had started third. Lance Stroll, the 18-yearold rookie, spun off the track on the first lap after making contact with Force India’s Sergio Perez. The Canadian beached his Williams in the gravel, bringing out the virtual safety car. Vettel took the opportunity to dive into the pits to change to dry weather tires. His gamble backfired when Antonio Giovinazzi — standing in for Pascal Wehrlein at Sauber — crashed, bringing out the actual safety car two laps later. The four-times world champion found himself bottled up behind Ricciardo and his slower team-mate Kimi Raikkonen, costing him valuable time. As the trio squabbled for position, Hamilton pulled clear at the front. By the time Vettel managed to get past, with a series of spectacular overtaking moves that included banging wheels with his former team-mate, Hamilton was too far ahead. “The safety car came just when I was about to start to feel that the dry tire was a lot quicker,” Vettel said. “So I couldn’t use the momentum, the advantage and I lost a lot of positions. “But then I had a very exciting race.” Ricciardo finished fourth for Red Bull, crossing the line just 0.8 seconds behind Verstappen after hassling the Dutchman in the closing stages of the 56-lap race. Raikkonen crossed the line a frustrated fifth. Bottas finished sixth. The Finn, who has replaced retired champion Nico Rosberg at Mercedes, dropped him down the field after spinning behind the safety car. Fifteen cars finished Sunday’s race, with neither McLaren making it to the flag. Fernando Alonso, who “pushed like an animal” on Saturday to qualify 13th, had gone into the race aiming to capitalize on the mixed conditions to score his first points of the year, but his hopes were dashed by a driveshaft failure. Team-mate Stoffel Vandoorne was sidelined with fuel pressure problems.
Sergio Garcia of Spain celebrates winning the Masters with caddie Glenn Murray during a playoff against Justin Rose of England in the final round of the 2017 Masters golf tournament at Augusta National Golf Club in Augusta, Georgia, U.S. (REUTERS/Mike Segar) AUGUSTA, GEORGIA (Reuters) Spain’s Sergio Garcia ended nearly two decades of major disappointment when he beat England’s Justin Rose in a playoff to win the U.S. Masters yesterday, donning the Green Jacket on what would have been the 60th birthday of his hero, the late Seve Ballesteros. After 73 majors, four heartbreaking runner-up finishes and years of self doubt, Garcia finally delivered the long awaited title when his 12-foot birdie putt at the first extra hole dropped into the cup at the par-four 18th,
triggering a massive cheer from a gallery that had been on the edge of their seats. Deadlocked after nine holes, the two friends and rivals produced an enthralling back nine showdown worthy of any Masters champion in what became a head-to-head battle. Garcia and Rose both carded 69 to finish tied on nine-under-par 279 at the end of regulation and send the year’s first major to a playoff when both missed birdie putts and settled for pars at the 72nd hole. It marked the first Masters playoff since Adam Scott beat
Angel Cabrera to become the first Australian to wear the Green Jacket in 2013 at Augusta National. All the omens had seemed in place for a Spanish victory with Garcia starting the day perched atop the leaderboard alongside Rose on Ballesteros’s 60th birthday. Ballesteros, the Spanish talisman who died of brain cancer in 2011, inspired a generation of golfers in his country, winning Green Jacket twice in 1980 and 1983. Garcia becomes the third Spaniard to wear the Green Jacket, joining Jose Maria Olazabal, who also triumphed twice at Augusta, in 1994 and 1999. “It is amazing. To do it on his (Ballesteros’s) 60th birthday and to join him and Jose Maria Olazabal, my two idols in golf, it is something amazing,” said Garcia before accepting the Green Jacket from last year ’s winner Danny Willett in Butler Cabin. “Jose Maria texted on Thursday saying how much he believed in me and to believe in myself. “Everybody has been great. My whole family, my fiancée.” Garcia, who has been plagued by self doubt when it came to majors, once said he did not have what it takes to be a major champion but demonstrated on Sunday during an enthralling rollercoaster battle with Rose that he does indeed possess the tools, demeanour and determination of a champion.
Lukaku double as Leicester’s winning run ends at Everton
Everton’s Romelu Lukaku scores their second goal vs Leicester City. (Action Images via Reuters / Carl Recine Livepic) (Reuters) Romelu Lukaku scored twice as Everton defeated champions Leicester City 42 at Goodison Park in a game which saw four goals inside the opening 23 minutes. Leicester, who face Atletico Madrid on Wednesday in the first leg of their Champions League quarter-final, made five changes ahead of their trip to Spain and the defeat ended the run of five straight wins since Craig Shakespeare replaced Claudio Ranieri as
manager. For Everton, it was a fine bounce back from their derby defeat to Liverpool and the disappointment of conceding an injury-time equaliser to Manchester United in their 1-1 draw on Tuesday. Ronald Koeman’s team grabbed the lead after 30 seconds when Kevin Mirallas broke through from midfield and appeared to be Continued on page 31