Guyanatimes 8 october 2017

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Nationwide coverage from the best news team in Guyana guyanatimesgy.com

Issue No. 3355

THE BEACON OF TRUTH

Sunday, October 8, 2017

Jagdeo worried GECOM chair to be picked at Congress Place ‘backroom’ Page 2

...says maybe President has no authority to make this decision unilaterally

GCCI President warns Berbicians of massive layoffs to come

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WHAT'S INSIDE:

Agro-processing fair ‘Uncapped’ slated for October month-end

P16

Husband P8 charged for punching wife to face Gaming Authority in ‘violent flagrant breach’ of P3 confidentiality

Page 9

...turns over private financial information to AG, State media

Bus conductor charged for narcotics, spent shell P14 From right: Business Minister Dominic Gaskin, GCCI President Deodat Indar and Krish Raghunandan among officials at the launch of Berbice Expo on Friday

1 feared dead Father, sons following confess to killing Pomeroon boat Corentyne farmer mishap … and burning body in yard Page 14

Page 10

Father, P8 daughter charged for assaulting, threatening woman

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SUnDAY, october 8, 2017 guyanatimesGY.com

Jagdeo worried GECOM chair to be picked at Congress Place ‘backroom’ ...says maybe President has no authority to make this decision unilaterally

G

uyanese are now in the sixth week since the third set of nominees for the post of Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) Chairperson was sent by Opposition Leader,

Bharrat Jagdeo, to President David Granger and while Granger insists that the recent ruling from the Chief Justice, Roxanne George, does not impinge on his authority to make the appoint-

ment, his intimation relative to the possibility of a meeting with Jagdeo has sparked some level of optimism in the political Opposition.

At his last news conference, held on Thursday

(October 5, 2017), Jagdeo said, “I did not close the door to the meeting because I am hoping he is calling me to say „I have selected someone from your list. There is a difference here. In the past, he would write me and say, „I dont accept the list. I have not accepted anyone from the list.

So, there is a change here. He wants to see me… I am hoping the departure with how I get the news now means that it is positive news. So let us keep it at that. So lets keep our fingers crossed and hopes up, although many persons think that is naivety…I will attend the meeting.

Congress Place decision

Still on the delay in the appointment, Jagdeo noted that it was none other than one of Granger’s Ministers who was overheard in the corridors of the court saying: “That banna can’t decide. We at Congress Place (the People’s National Congress Reform’s (PNC) Headquarter) have to make that decision (on who is the new GECOM Chairperson).”

On that note, Jagdeo said, “Maybe it is that the President has no authority to make this decision that its dealt with elsewhere, and so somebody needs to say to the President you have to address this issue seriously,” he said.

Charades and diversions

However, even an optimistic Jagdeo has made clear that the delay in the appointment of a GECOM Chairperson will continue to be cause for worry, until such time as an appointment is made. “We have a written ruling from the court, which is the only body that can interpret the constitution… how long will this charade go on now in the face of the ruling from the court?” he questioned.

Three months ago, the Chief Justice made an oral ruling after local businessman, Marcel Gaskin, approached the court for an interpretation of the Constitutional provision related to the appointment of a GECOM Chairperson.

Gaskin asked four substantive questions of the court.

Last week, Justice George released her written ruling in the matter – a ruling that dismisses contentions held

by President David Granger, which included; that the nominees must be judges, former judges or persons eligible to be judges in Guyana or in the Commonwealth; that every member on the list of nominees must be acceptable to him before he proceeds to choose a Chairman; and that he is not required to give a reason for rejecting the list of nominees.

In response to the written ruling, Granger stated that nothing in the Chief Justice’s written decision prohibits or prevents his exercise of that authority or power; and he will move to appoint a “fit and proper” person to the post of GECOM Chairperson.

Opposition Leader Bharrat Jagdeo

Jagdeo, who noted Granger’s response to the Chief Justice’s ruling, particularly as it relates to appointing a “fit and proper” person, called out the President for his use of “diversionary tactics” in the face of substantive issues being pronounced on by the court.

Jagdeo said, “Whoever claimed, in this country, that the ruling interfered with his appointment of a fit and proper person? Definitely not the Chief Justice and I did not say that myself. Nobody said anything about the ruling interfering with his authority to appoint a fit and proper person.

What we said was that the ruling dealt with some positions that the president has taken publicly.

The first position was that only individuals from a certain category could be represented on the list and that category comprised of former judges, judges and people qualified to be judges… the ruling dealt with his false interpretations,” Jagdeo said.

According to the Opposition Leader, the ruling quintessentially renders Granger’s previously held contentions as invalid. “The Granger-led government runs from the truth when they have nefarious motives,” he posited.

Proviso issue

The Opposition Leader highlighted too that the Chief Justice also dealt with the matter of a proviso, as detailed in the Constitution. The proviso in the Constitution states that if the Leader of the Opposition fails to submit a list, as provided for, then the President can appoint a judge or former judge or qualified to be a judge in Guyana or the Commonwealth.

He said, “Even on the proviso issue, the Chief Justice has said that three lists have been submitted, so the matter is academic and does not apply to the current situation.”

The matter of the proviso arose during the proceedings, based on submissions by the Guyana Bar Association.

The Chief Justice in her ruling said: “While the applicant has not applied for a determination of this issue, it was raised by the Bar Association in its brief which was filed and served on all parties. It was sub-

mitted that the Constitution only contemplates the submission of one list. Neither the Attorney General nor the Leader of the Opposition sought to address this issue.

For completeness, since it was raised, I have decision to mention it more so because, as noted above, it speaks to the issue of why reasons for rejection of anyone listed or the entire list are important.

It does appear, as canvassed by the Bar Association, that Article 161 (2) dos not contemplate the submission of more than one list…It does appear to me that failure to submit a list as provided for speaks to the provision of an acceptable list, as discussed earlier. If by not choosing any of the persons listed the President thereby find the list unacceptable, the proviso to Article 161 (2) would apply and the President should then go on to appoint a judge or former judge or person who would qualify for appointment as a judge in Guyana or the Commonwealth to the post of Chairman of GECOM. But all of this in in effect academic because more than one list has been sought and provide.”

Granger’s Obligation

The Opposition Leader has also underscored the fact that Granger has an obligation to act. “Now that the ruling has dealt with all of those issues that I spoke about, that the president has an obligation to respect and apply the ruling to the list of candidates before him,” he said.

On the possibility that the third set of nominees will be rejected by Granger, Jagdeo insisted that all 18 nominees, including the 12 already rejected, were „fit and proper and were qualified to act in the post of GECOM Chairperson.

After the first two sets of nominees for the post of GECOM Chairperson were rejected by Granger, the latest nominees named

by Jagdeo included: Major General Joseph Singh, Teni Housty, Sanjeev Datadin, Mrs Annette ArjuneMartins, Onesi La Fleur and Krishnadatt Persaud.

Jagdeo said, “If our President cannot find from18 persons – 18 persons who are all professionals, who have some standing in our society, who have demonstrated independent positions and actions, who have been impartial….most of them are more technically qualified than the President himself and most of his Ministers – (if) he can’t find a single one of the 18 fit and proper, then something is wrong, not with those people anymore or the process, something is wrong with him, and maybe he is not fit and proper to make the selection.” GECOM has been without a chairman since February 2017, when Dr Steve Surujbally, a veterinarian, retired. The non-appointment of the Chairperson is stalling the Commission’s work.

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BRIDGE OPENINGS The Demerara Harbour Bridge will be closed to vehicular traffic on: Sunday, October 8 – 05:30h-07:00h and Monday, October 9 – 05:00h-06:30h.

Sunday, October 8 – 05:45h-07:15h and Monday, October 9 – 06:45h-08:15h.

FERRY SCHEDULE Parika and Supenaam departure times - 05:00h, 11:00h and 16:00h daily

WEATHER TODAY Sunny intervals followed by heavy to light rain showers can be expected during the day. Lightly cloudy skies are expected in the evening, with temperatures expected to range between 24 degrees Celsius and 30 degrees Celsius.

Winds: East North-easterly to Easterly between 0.89 metre and 2.68 metres.

High Tide: 06:02h and 18:16h reaching maximum heights of 2.83 metres and 2.87 metres respectively.

Low Tide: 11:51h reaching a minimum height of 0.44 metre.

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Gaming Authority in ‘violent flagrant breach’ of confidentiality ...turns over private financial information to AG, State media

The Berbice Bridge will be closed to vehicular traffic on:

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SunDAY, october 8, 2017 | guyanatimesgy.com

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DISCLAIMER: WE ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY ERRORS IN PUBLICATION. PLEASE CALL THE HOTLINE FOR CONFIRMATION - TEL: 225-8902

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ormer Attorney General Anil Nandlall, in a strongly worded missive over the weekend, railed against the Guyana Gaming Authority for its flagrant breach of confidentiality -- an obligation it was supposed to uphold when financial information regarding his client, Clifton Bacchus of Sleepin Hotel,’ was leaked and made public.

Nandlall, in a ‘lawyer’s letter sent on Friday last to the Gaming Authority, demanded an explanation as to how the State media and the Attorney General came into possession of the private, confidential financial information for Sleepin’s owners, Bacchus and other investors.

In a copy of the letter seen by Guyana Times, Nandlall, who has been retained as legal counsel by Bacchus, Yokohoma Trading (Guyana) Inc. and Pasha Global Inc, reported of receiving, on Friday last, affidavits filed by the Attorney General which included as attachments the completed applications for a casino licence for the Sleepin Hotel.

Nandlall, in his missive to Gaming Authority Chairman Roysdale Forde, said, “In the circumstances, I hereby request an explanation from the Gaming Authority on how this reckless, negligent and unauthorised disclosure of my client’s personal confidential information was made to the Editor of the Guyana Chronicle, the Guyana National Newspapers Limited, and the Attorney General.”

The former Attorney General and Minister of Legal Affairs has since noted that this private, confidential financial information has since been filed at the Supreme Court Registry, and the documents have therefore now become public documents, accessible to the world.

“Quite apart from the fact that these applica-

Former Attorney General Anil Nandlall

Sleepin Hotel owner Clifton Bacchus

Attorney General Basil Williams

tions for casino licences are wholly irrelevant to the proceedings, and the affidavits to which they are attached do not explain their relevance, their attachment is an expression of manifest professional incompetence on the part of those who have done so; my clients’ greater concern is how these applications, along with their personal confidential financial information, have reached the hands of the Editor of the Guyana Chronicle, the Guyana National Newspapers Limited, and the Attorney-General.”

Nandlall is adamant that the action on the part of the Gaming Authority “appears to constitute a violent and flagrant breach of the confidentiality which the Gaming Authority owes to my clients to protect and secure personal confidential financial information supplied to it”.

The Sleepin owners had, in April last, applied to the Gaming Authority for certain casino licences, but were denied. The reason proffered for the denial was that the applications did not contain all the requisite information, which led to a similar application being re-submitted on Wednesday last. It is the confidential financial information which has been submitted along with these applications which the Gaming Authority is being accused of leaking to the

state media and Attorney General Basil Williams.

Nandlall was, on Friday last, served with the legal paperwork from Williams, which he noted had attached the confidential financial information, now made public records.

The former Attorney General, in his missive to the Gaming Authority Chairman, noted: “I have no doubt that you appreciate that these applications contain volumes of personal confidential financial information of my clients and others who have invested in the venture, and therefore, a lawful obligation devolves upon the Gaming Authority to ensure that this information is secured and kept with the highest degree of confidentiality.”

Nandlall also reminded: “I have instituted legal proceedings for libel on behalf of Clifton Bacchus, Yokohoma Trading (Guyana) Inc., and Pasha Global Inc. against the Guyana National

Newspapers Inc. and the Editor of the Guyana Chronicle...Those proceedings are pending in the High Court.”

Nandlall, in speaking to this publication over the “troubling development”, observed that already the Special Organised Crime Unit (SOCU) regularly publically divulges personal confidential financial information of persons who are under investigation.

Such disclosures are prohibited under the AntiMoney Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism (AML/CFT) Act. He also said, “We have also witnessed top officials of SARU (regularly making) public disclosures of a highly prejudicial nature of persons (whom) they say they intend to investigate; and in the process, divulging all sorts of personal confidential financial information about these persons.” turn to page 5

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guyanatimesgy.com

sunDAY, october 8, 2017

Views Editor: Tusika Martin News Hotline: 231-8063 Editorial: 231-0544 223-7230,223-7231,231-0544, 225-7761 Marketing: 231-8064 Accounts: 225-6707 Mailing address: Queens Atlantic Investment Estate Industrial Site, Ruimveldt, Georgetown Email: news@guyanatimesgy.com, sales@guyanatimesgy.com

Editorial

A callusing of the moral fibre

T

he gruesome murder of a young block-maker by his employer was bad enough, but to subsequently dismember and burn the youth to ashes displayed a level of callousness and indifference to a common humanity that should shock the conscience of this nation. But only a few days before, two God-fearing, very elderly women were killed by four young persons who had burglarised their home.

Since the women were already bound and gagged, the youths would have strangled them either to prevent identification or from pure psychopathic urges. It would not be hyperbolic to point out that hardly a week goes by when these acts of gratuitous violence are not perpetuated by Guyanese on other Guyanese. And the murders are only one end of a spectrum of violence that begins from the quotidian child beatings, through armed robberies, rape, and domestic violence of terrifying horror. If “man to man is a wolf”, then Guyana is being overrun by wolves.

What is at the root of these depravities? As with all human behaviour, there is no one clear-cut answer but if the phenomenon is so pervasive it would indicate that the causes are structural, rather than individual. And that the structural reasons go beyond the ethnic labels we assign to ourselves since the perpetrators of the horrors span the ethnic and racial divides. Violence, evidently, is the one type of behaviour that encompasses us all Guyanese.

And maybe we can do worse; to begin with, this fact as we start to address this sickness. Guyana, we have to admit, was spawned in violence when it was colonised by Europeans who insisted that the Indigenous peoples were not “civilised” and therefore found it was justified not only to seize their lands, but to exterminate them if necessary.

The symbolic violence inflicted on our first peoples by pronouncing definitively they had no culture or made no contribution to human knowledge, has become structurally entrenched in all operations of our state, society and individual psyches. The violence was broadened and deepened when Africans were brought as slaves and defined as “chattel” – property on which violence could be inflicted as an on the draught animals on the plantations. How do we expect this infliction of violence not to have an effect on the slaves and their descendants? Fanon might have proposed the violence damaged the psyches of the coloniser and the colonised, but the former have moved out leaving the latter to, at best, free themselves with “the tools of the master”.

The indentured that were brought to replace the exslaves, who refused to go along with the pretences of “free labour”, were interpellated in a Foucauldian regime of “discipline and punishment”, which turned the violent control mechanisms inwards and outwards. The point of this historical exercise is our present day violent expressions is part and parcel of inherited, all-encompassing structures that envelop us all. Take the Police Force that is supposed to “Serve and Protect” and has been conferred with the State’s ultimate sanction to take the lives of citizens is pursuit of this goal. But this Force, as its name declares, was born, nurtured and is still sustained by an institutional culture of “force”.

Many of whom who see the public as targets for graft and violence.

We can look at all the institutions in Guyana – public and private and if a handful of them have reformed their authoritarian culture that would be surprising. Starting with the immanent colonial authoritarian state augmented by the PNC under Burnham, this can be taken to absurd levels such as having a “Human Rights Association” whose eponymous name is supposed to define its functions. How many citizens have actually seen or even know the names of the members of this organisation? Citizens are treated as objects and given no agency in articulating which of their rights are actually being violated. What do they know?

Can we be surprised citizens are increasingly violent?

Canadian High Commissioner to Guyana, Lilian Chattergee paid a courtesy call on Leader of the Opposition Bharrat Jagdeo on Thursday October 5, 2017 at his Church Street office

Counselling absolutely necessary for individuals who exhibit suicide warning-signs Dear Editor, The Caribbean Voice (TCV) joins with others in expressing our angst that a young man had to take his life because of the stigma attached to his sexuality. Amidst the many issues arising out of this tragedy, we would like to emphasise the necessity of counselling.

News reports indicate that the young Cop was out partying with friends, some of whom knew of his intentions to take his own life and thought they had convinced him otherwise. The reality is that with respect to suicide ideation and/or warning signs, a layperson, no matter how well meaning, can end up pushing the individual faster towards suicide. And, as TCV and so many others have constantly been advocating, once suicide ideation is expressed or warning signs noted, it is critical to get someone with necessary counselling credentials and experience to deal with the situation.

In addition to the Suicide Helpline, coun-

selling can be accessed through the National Psychiatric Institution at New Amsterdam, the Psychiatric Ward at the Georgetown Public Hospital, the counselling centre at Corriverton (started by former Magistrate Krishnadat Persaud), Help and Shelter, Guyana Foundation, SASOD, Monique’s Helping Hands, Crossroads Suicide and Mental Health Awareness Services and The Caribbean Voice, among other NGOs and entities providing such services, mostly for free.

As well, every region has sociologists and/ or welfare officers who do have some amount of counselling training as do a number of Government agencies such as the Public Health Ministry’s Mental Health Unit, Childcare and Protection Agency, various regional health authorities, and so on. We urge all media to get hold of all contact information through which counselling can be accessed and

publish them even if once a month as a public service. As well, we urge the Public Health Ministry to compile all the available counselling services, private and Public Sector, and make them widely available via various avenues, including traditional and social media and flyers and posters The fact is that counsellors possess requisite training and experience to help patients improve their mood, cope with their diagnosis and change harmful behaviours. Counselling often focuses on stress management, coping skills and therapeutic education. The medium of communication is emphatic, geared towards being non-judgmental, non-threatening, and building comfort and trust, thereby making it easy for patients to verbalise their feelings and enabling them to work towards positive goals. Counselling also helps people to be able to dissect their problems then figure out how to solve them.

In Guyana there is a stigma attached to counselling as many feel that only ‘mad people’ need counselling. It is important for this stigma to be eliminated so that seeking counselling becomes a normal, everyday desire as long as the need for such counselling becomes necessary. And, again, The Caribbean Voice believes that the media can play a significant role in eliminating this stigma.

Incidentally, we repeat our appeal for media to stop using the term ‘commit suicide’ and instead use ‘died by suicide’ or is/was a suicide victim. ‘Commit’ has connotations that criminalises suicide but suicide is most certainly not a criminal act.

The Caribbean Voice can be reached via email to caribvoice@aol.com or via Check out our website at www.caribvoice.org or our Facebook group page at facebook.com/caribvoice.

Sincerely, The Caribbean Voice

guyanatimesgy.com

SunDAY, october 8, 2017

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You can send your letters with pictures to: Guyana Times, Queens Atlantic Investment Estate Industrial Site, Ruimveldt, Georgetown, Guyana or letters@guyanatimesgy.com

Questioning Govt’s policy on medical assistance for Guyanese Dear Editor, I have observed the public disclosure on financial assistance for medical purposes that was rendered to the distinguished gentleman and former magistrate, Fazil Azeez, who suffered at the hands of a criminal. Let me take this opportunity to publicly declare that I am in full support of my brother and friend, Fazil Azeez’s full recovery, and look forward to his continued contribution to Guyana.

As a result of the public’s knowledge of Government’s assistance to deserving persons, I write to enquire about the guiding policies that determine the beneficiaries of such assistance. In my individual capacity, as a Member of Parliament, and in engagements with members of the public at

the Office of the Leader of the Opposition, there have been numerous requests for assistance for medical treatment, both locally and overseas.

Based on my knowledge as a former member of Cabinet, I did refer several families to the Ministry of Public Health for assistance, only for them to be told by Ministry officials that the medical assistance facility was not accessible in their circumstance.

I therefore invite the Public Health Minister -or the Cabinet, through the Minister of State -- to make public Government’s policy on medical assistance to families who are in dire need, particularly those needing to travel abroad to access health care.

I expect this approach

would lend itself to equal opportunity and access in a non-discriminatory manner, where political affiliation, religion, race and class are not criteria for favourable consider-

Gaming Authority in...

According to Nandlall, “Now we have cold, hard evidence of the same transgressions occurring at the Gaming Authority... Every citizen of this country must find this deeply troubling.

Which investor (would) want to invest in a country where their personal confidential financial information is not secure?”

He told Guyana Times, “That the Attorney General,

the principal legal advisor to the Government, is the perpetrator of this serious infraction is a shocking demonstration that, even at the highest level of Government, there appears to be an inability to differentiate between basic right and wrong... The professional incompetence, negligence and recklessness showcased here are simply unparalleled.”

ation. I am sure that the line for such assistance is being formed, and has probably encircled the perimeter of the Ministry of Public Health.

Clarity on

from page 3

Speaking to the questionable practices being employed, Nandlall said, “We have seen a series of controversial legislation (being) passed in the National Assembly despite vehement public criticisms, which allow for the Guyana Revenue Authority to invade persons’ bank accounts without any notice to them; that authorize the Guyana Revenue Authority to seize

monies in persons bank accounts without a court order and without affording them a hearing, if the Commissioner-General adjudges that they owe taxes; that empowers the Commissioner-General to prevent persons from leaving the country without an order of court, and again without hearing them, if he adjudges that they owe VAT.”

Government’s medical assistance policy would answer many questions that are being asked.

Firstly, the Guyanese people need to be aware of the ceiling as it relates to benefits for access to medical care locally; is it $1million or $6million? If medical assistance is available locally at public institutions, under what circumstances do persons qualify for benefits? If medical assistance is available locally at private institutions, under what circumstances do persons qualify for benefits?

Secondly, when referrals are made for patients to seek further medical care abroad? Under what circumstances do they qualify for assistance,

and what is the ceiling?

Is it $1million or $6 million? Is there a network of medical professionals and institutions that the Government is partnering with?

Thirdly, to what extent does your financial standing, or lack thereof, qualify for, or prohibits from being able to, access medical assistance?

Finally, who is the officer authorised to approve medical assistance?

Who makes the final determination about access and the amount of assistance accessed? Is it the subject Minister? Is it the Cabinet? Or is it a technical officer?

Sincerely, Bishop Juan Edghill PPP/C MP

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Foundation

Think for 2; don’t drink or smoke for 2

(The following was written as the intro to a CAPE project five years ago. Intimations of future career specialisation?)

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Anu Dev

t is said we are what we eat. When it comes to a pregnant woman, her child is not only what she eats but whatever enters her bloodstream by whatever route. During pregnancy, all nine months of it, it therefore behoves the mother to always remember that whatever she eats, her baby eats and whatever she drinks, her baby drinks. In the same way most mothers would not contemplate putting alcohol in their baby’s milk, they should not even consider drinking alcohol or using drugs while pregnant because the effects on the developing foetus are just as toxic.

The baby may not be conscious of the effects while in the womb, but after birth, and years after, the baby will continue to suffer from the effects of its mother's folly.

Alcohol passes easily through the placental barrier and the foetus is less equipped to eliminate alcohol than its mother. Furthermore, the babies are affected more by the exposure to alcohol

than the mothers, since the developing foetus cannot break down the alcohol as the mother and consequently, the foetus receives a higher concentration of alcohol.

Babies born to mothers who used alcohol are likely to be born with low birth weight, small head circumference, developmental delays, organ dysfunction, facial abnormalities, epilepsy, and poor coordination.

Nerve and brain disorders are especially prominent if the alcohol is imbibed during the second and third trimesters of pregnancy, since it is during this timeframe that complex brain development occurs.

Such exposed babies are born with poor motor skills and poor learning abilities.

Physical deformation of the brain itself may also occur, with small head size and other abnormalities such as cerebellar hypoplasia. If alcohol is consumed during the first trimester, it interferes with the migration and organisation of brain cells, causing structural deformities.

During the third trimester, damage can be caused to the hippocampus, affecting

memory, emotion and the encoding of auditory and visual information. Babies who suffer from growth deficiency, the three facial deformities, central nervous system damage and prenatal alcohol exposure are said to suffer from Foetal Alcohol Syndrome.

Drinking alcohol is not the only bad habit a pregnant woman should endeavour to break: smoking is another one that is just as deadly.

Cigarette smoke contains over 4000 chemicals, with lead and cyanide being just two of the 60+ carcinogenic nicotine chemicals. The from cigarette smoke narrows blood vessels in the umbilical cord[1]; effectively decreasing the amount of oxygen available to the baby.

Additionally, the carbon monoxide present combines with the haemoglobin of the red blood cells carrying the oxygen thereby decreasing the oxygen capacity of those cells.

Babies born to women who smoke are usually underweight due to their underdeveloped bodies. Their lungs may not even be able to work on their own due to

delayed lung development caused by nicotine. These babies are also especially vulnerable to asthma and other respiratory ailments.

Furthermore, babies whose mothers smoked during the first trimester of pregnancy are more likely to suffer from heart defects at birth.

Nicotine also retards brain development: the developing brain being particularly sensitive to low oxygen levels, especially affecting the areas of the brain that control breathing.

Additionally, nicotine is poisonous to the areas of the brain directly involved with heart and breathing functions.

Passive smoking – inhalation of second-hand smoke – also affects the baby and may lead to underweight babies being delivered. The smoke that burns off the end of a cigarette and escapes into the air actually contains more harmful substances (tar, carbon monoxide, nicotine) than the smoke inhaled by the smoker.

So pregnant mothers-tobe, stay on the straight and narrow. At least for the nine months.

guyanatimesgy.com

Tips for a healthy pregnancy

By Laurie Herr

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Staying healthy during pregnancy

f you're thinking about getting pregnant – or if you already are – you probably know some of the basics about taking care of yourself and the baby.

Don't smoke. Don't drink.

Get your rest. Here are more tips, from taking vitamins to what to do with the kitty litter that can help ensure a safe and healthy pregnancy.

Take a prenatal vita-

min Even when you're still trying to conceive, it's smart to start taking prenatal vitamins. Your baby's neural cord, which becomes the brain and spinal cord, develops within the first month of pregnancy, so it's important you get essential nutrients, like folic acid, calcium, and iron, from the very start.

Prenatal vitamins are available over the counter at most drug stores, or you can get them by prescription from your doctor. If taking them makes you feel queasy, try taking them at night or with a light snack.

Chewing gum or sucking on hard candy afterward can help, too.

Exercise

Staying active is a must for most moms to be.

Regular exercise will help you control your weight, improve circulation, boost your mood, and help you sleep better. Plus, getting into an exercise habit now

will help you set a good example for your child after she's born.

Pilates, yoga, swimming, and walking are all great activities for most pregnant women, but be sure to check with your doctor first before starting any exercise program. Aim for 30 minutes of exercise most days of the week. Listen to your body, though, and don't overdo it.

Educate yourself

Even if this isn't your first baby, attending a childbirth class will help you feel more prepared for delivery.

Not only will you have the chance to learn more about childbirth and infant care, but you can ask specific questions and voice any concerns.

You'll also become more acquainted with the facility and its staff.

Now is also a good time to brush up on your family's medical history.

Talk to your doctor about problems with past pregnancies, and report any family incidences of birth defects.

Practice kegels

Kegels strengthen the pelvic floor muscles, which support your bladder, bowels, and uterus. Done correctly, this simple exercise can help make your delivery easier and prevent problems later with incontinence. The best part: No one can tell you're doing them, so you can practice kegels in the car, while you're sitting at your desk, or even standing in line at the grocery store. Here's how to do them right: - Practice squeezing as though you're stopping the flow of urine when you use the bathroom.

- Hold for three seconds, then relax for three.

- Repeat 10 times. (parents. com)

TO BE CONTINUED

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sunDAY, october 8, 2017 | guyanatimesgy.com

IDB’s Senior VP in Guyana to review bank’s portfolio …Finance Minister says review triggered by changing dynamics tatives.

Meanwhile, IDB’s Vice President, Katzman disclosed that the consultations dealt with current portfolio; the emerging oil

Finance Minister Winston Jordan presents to Senior Vice President of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) Julie Katzman an artist’s impression of the walk-over at Peters Hall, East Bank Demerara

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he Senior Vice President of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), Julie Katzman, is currently in Guyana to review the IDB portfolio, with the government, and to look at areas for continued collaboration.

Finance Minister Winston Jordan spoke to the Department of Public Information (DPI) and relat-

ed that the call may be a response to a speech made at the IDB, in his call for “out of the box thinking.”

The Finance Minister deems the world to be “a dynamic place” where agencies such as banks and multilateral organisations frequently have to respond to the changing dynamics in their respective countries.

At the local level, he recognised that the dynamics

in Guyana have shifted with the change in Government (after 23 years), thus resulting in a shift in the area of priority and focus.

The visiting team emphasised on several issues and concerns, while identifying and proposing practicable solutions. The IBD representative has already visited several IDB funded projects and met with various Government represen-

and gas sector, more particularly how Guyana can benefit in this regard while taking into consideration means to accelerate the execution of loans in the portfo-

lio. The DPI also heard that the organisation’s Head of Infrastructure met with local infrastructure Minister, David Patterson, to discuss future projects.

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SunDAY, october 8, 2017 | guyanatimesGY.com

IN THE COURTS Husband charged for punching wife in the face

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resident of La Parfaite Harmonie, West Bank Demerara (WBD) has been charged with the offnce of punching his wife in the face.

Forty-year-old Shawn Primo denied the allegation when the charge was read

to him at the Georgetown Magistrates’ Court on Friday last by Magistrate Judy Latchman.

It is alleged that he, on August 13, 2017 at the Number 47 Bus Park in Georgetown, unlawfully assaulted Carla Primo.

The father of two re-

portedly approached the virtual complainant (VC) as she was headed to work, and an argument ensued.

The accused then proceeded to cuff the VC to her face, which resulted in major swelling. The matter was reported and the accused was arrested and

charged by Police.

The prosecution had no objection to bail being granted to the accused, and this was set at the sum of $60,000. The matter will be called again before Magistrate Latchman on October 9, 2017 for fixture.

Judy Latchman.

The charge against the teenage girl alleged that on June 20, 2017, at Christian Street, North Ruimveldt, she unlawfully and maliciously assaulted Drecelle Cox so as to cause her actual bodily harm.

Her father’s charge alleged that he, on the same day at the same location, use threatening language

against the said Virtual Complainant (VC).

According to facts of the matter, the teenager and the woman had an argument which escalated into a fight. As a result of that fight, the VC sustained injuries to her left side neck for which she had to seek medical treatment.

However, the father of the teenager intervened and also threatened to

harm the VC. As such the matter was reported and both defendants were arrested and charged.

Police Prosecutor Shawn Gonsalves had no objections to bail and this was granted in the sum of $70,000 for the assault charge against the teenager. Her father was granted $30,000 bail. Both are scheduled to reappear in court on October 9.

Father, daughter charged for assaulting, threatening woman

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father and daughter duo appeared at the Georgetown Magistrates’ Courts charged for attacking a woman on Friday.

Seventeen-year-old Rushanna Dudson and 64-year-old William Dudson; both of Lot 310 North Ruimveldt, Housing Scheme, Georgetown denied the charges read to them by City Magistrate

Institutions…

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…to recognise and honour

nce again, your Eyewitness is more than a tad befuddled - this time by the National Awards handing out ceremony. Here it was, Prezzie explained, “The national honour system is about service”: concrete service to the country and community in some way or other. But he was hard pressed to understand both the rhyme and the reason for some of these awards.

Right up there were the awards to the three journalists who’d been servicing the PNC’s interests through thick and thin these past three decades - Adam Harris, Enrico Woolford and Julia Johnson. Is the PNC equivalent to “Guyana” once again - as Comrade Forbes had decreed - so that service to the PNC is service to Guyana? Your Eyewitness knows this newspaper isn’t in the running but was there not even one veteran reporter from the Stabber News worthy of recognition?

And if (as APNU/AFC maintains) removing the PPP from office in 2015 was the greatest service to the nation in 23 years, just from the journalistic sector, didn’t Freddy Kissoon and his boss, Glen Lall, perform greater yeoman service??

And while not full timers, who filled more column inches that Chris Ram and Anand Goolsarran to get the PPP out? Are their services not worthy also? Do they not also bleed? But these fellas have shown some independence afterwards. The lesson is: only total loyalty will be rewarded!

Another enigma was 10th VC of UG, Ivelaw Griffith who, your Eyewitness believes, wouldn’t mind if Prezzie address him as Chancellor Griffith X. And that’s not the “X” of Malcolm X, who rejected the slave title “Little” and used the “X” to signify his unknown lineage. No siree Bob! This Griffith is talking about Chancellor Griffith the 10th!!

Now, your Eyewitness doesn’t mind old pals getting a squeeze; but honestly, Prezzie, what “service” has ex-YSM member Griffith done for Guyana since he was hired in a not-so-transparent process one-and-a-half-years ago? Is it because of the brown nosing “Renaissance Magazine” that burnishes his crest? Or because he just made the Army Officer’s training module a UG Diploma…or proposed the army retirement age be raised?

So, with the press and the university in hand, Prezzie handed out awards to the new Chancellor and Chief Justice of the Judiciary. Your Eyewitness won’t even mention the incestuousness of the Chancellor, who heads the Committee proposing awards, bagging the top award!!

But what took the cake of the evening of backslapping was the Prison Chief getting an Award!! After 17 prison deaths, two escapes, and the torching of the Camp Street jail!!

…for elections

In the wake of Prezzie taking his sweet old time getting around to looking at Opposition Leader Jagdeo’s THIRD list of nominees for the GECOM Chair, the state controlled Chronic bigged up a statement from the US Ambassador.

In bold Banner headlines, it screamed: “GECOM not in crisis!!” Implying that everything was hunky dory with Prezzie’s foot-dragging.

The headline demonstrated that the DPI -- into which GINA’s being merged -- has already taken over the propaganda machinery. It failed to mention that the ambassador actually said GECOM wasn’t in crisis - as yet!!

And who’ll quarrel with that? The ball’s in Prezzie’s court to ensure the crisis never materialises!

Because as sure as the sun will rise tomorrow morning, when Prezzie unilaterally appoints Justice La Bennet - who he’s had in his sight from day one - and the Opposition Leader takes him to the courts…there is gonna be a crisis.

Even if Prezzie thinks the local Justices are “safe” (esp after their awards!) the various appeals will take time.

And elections have to be held in 2020!!

…on procurement

The deadline for bids to be prequalified to construct the “Demerara Ming Swing Bridge” has been extended.

Nothing to do with the late entry of the UK firm BAM!!

The bidders have already signed that they can’t protest!!

Readers are invited to send their comments by email to eye@guyanatimesgy.com

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SunDAY, october 8, 2017 | guyanatimesgy.com

GCCI President warns Berbicians of massive lay-offs to come ...says households will feel the bite of unemployment

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ational earnings in Guyana’s agriculture sector have steadily declined by billions annually in recent years, despite an expanding global market for food and other such commodities but remedying this anomaly will require a coordinated effort on both the public and Private Sectors.

The critical observation was made by President of the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GCCI), Deodat Indar, who on Friday lambasted Government’s mis-management of the nation’s agricultural industries, saying the “current trend in Guyana serves to illustrate a demise of the industry’s contribution as the economy undergoes some structural change, especially due to the downsizing of the industry such a sugar.”

Indar was at the time addressing the opening ceremony of the Annual Berbice Expo held at the Albion Sports Complex.

The economy, he said, is heavily reliant upon the performance on the agricultural sector and lamented that over the past decade, agriculture has moved from contributing a quarter (24 per cent) of the national earnings into but this has since slipped to 17 per cent last year.

“As the industry’s contribution to the overall [Gross Domestic Product] GDP declines similar-

The 13th Berbice Expo and Trade Fair was opened on Friday night at the Albion Sports Complex. The four-day event, which ends on Monday, has more than 100 exhibits

ly you will also see decline in employment and this markedly reduces strength and resilience of the local economy... If we don’t produced our food locally, it means we have to do without it, or import it, which an importer will need mostly US currency to do so and when happens we are at the mercy world market prices,” he said.

The GCCI President used the occasion to highlight that sugar’s contribution to the overall earnings for the country has moved

from 16.2 per cent in 1997, to seven per cent 2007.

The industry, he said, is currently responsible for contributing to a mere one per cent of the annual national earnings.

“This underpins the drastic decline of a key sector which not only provides high levels of employment for your region but is a key foreign exchange earner that acts as a tool to stabilised price inflation... Households will feel the bite of unemployment, displacement due to lack of income and

depressed economy in the region.”

He opined that in the sugar industry has decline for many reasons, including workers strikes which accounted for 42,500 lost man hours in year 2014, resulting from the 198 different strike occurrences.

The Sugar Corporation has, at the time of the Commission of Inquiry into its operations, 16,464 employees and “with the impending closure, a lion’s share of those workers will be on the breadline without space in alternative sec-

tors to mop up the unemployment arising out of GuySuCo.” The annual affair venued in the Ancient County was organised by the Central Corentyne Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

He noted too that the rice sector which is another key sector in agriculture contributed 10.4 per cent of GDP in 1997. By 2007, this had slipped to 5.4 per cent and further decline to four per cent 2016.

According to the GCCI President, “As it relates to rice in Berbice fall in employment can lead to rise in social ills such as suicide, alcoholism and abuse.”

He did note to those in attendance that “while rice contribution relative to GDP has fallen it has experienced real continuous growth over the years on the export side of the sector.”

Business Minister Dominic Gaskin, during brief remarks reminded Berbicians that Government has not forgotten them.

The Minister recalled that earlier this year, the Government has allocated over $500 million towards the development of the region, which is more than what was budgeted for all other regions.

Minister Gaskin said agriculture has always been, and will continue to be, a key industry and the driver of economic growth in Guyana.

10 news

sunDAY, october 8, 2017| guyanatimesgy.com

1 feared dead following Pomeroon boat mishap O

ne man is feared dead after the boat in which he was travelling capsized in the Pomeroon River just after midnight on Friday.

The man has been identified as 36-year-old David De Souza of Lower Pomeroon River.

Based on reports received, De Souza and several others were in a paddle boat when a speedboat drove alongside theirs, causing it to topple.

Three of the men reportedly held on to the boat, while De Souza and another fell

into the river. De Souza, reportedly in a drunken state, never surfaced. The other man swam to shore.

A report was lodged at the Charity Police Station, and two men have been taken into custody to assist with the investigations.

Meanwhile, in another accident on the Pomeroon River on Friday evening, the Guyana Times understands that a 3-month-old baby sustained injuries and is consequently battling for his life in the Intensive Care Unit

(ICU) of the Suddie Public Hospital.

Details surrounding that incident are yet to be verified, but Police on the Esssequibo Coast have launched in investigation.

In the past, several persons have lost their lives as a result of boat mishaps in the Pomeroon River. A recent fatal boat mishap claimed the life of 18-year-old Ravin Piper.

The teenager and members of his family were heading home in a small boat

when a collision with a larger boat occurred. The body of the young man was fished out of the river a few days later.

Two days after, 19-yearold Denroy Henry had to be hospitalised after a boat ferrying passengers to a funeral collided with a log along the waterway.

In light of these occurrences, officials from the Maritime Administration Department (MARAD) have intensified their education awareness programme on the safe use of the waterway.

Doomed people

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atiricus walked over to the Back Street Bar with an added bounce to his step. His old buddy Cappo was back, and it wasn’t just that he was taking care of the beer, he was giving his friends the lowdown on life in the Big Apple and beyond.

“Budday! Ah wan good t’ing me lef,” Cappo said as they settled down to bend their elbows. “Look how dem maan close de estate!”

“But now you’re back, what will you do?” asked Hari. “They’re looking for cane cutters at the remaining estates!”

“Cut cane?!” Cappo snorted so vigorously his beer almost vented through his nose. “Wha’ me guh do dah fa?”

“Well, what else will you do?” Satiricus asked in concern, even as he polished off his beer, and Bungi joined them.

“Me an’ me fr’en Bungi guh tu’n contracta,” said Cappo with a smile, as Bungi greeted him with a slap on the back.

“Abee guh buil’ house.”

“Contractor?” exclaimed Hari. “What the heck do you know about constructing houses?”

“Wha’ yuh t’ink me bin a do since me lef’ Guyana?” asked Cappo. “Me l’arn fuh buil’ house in wan place name Ske-neck-tady.”

“Really?” asked Satiricus sceptically.

“Ske-neck-tady like how Wales an’ Rose Hall guh tu’n,” Cappo said gravely. “Dem use fuh gat wan fa’ktry da does mek big-big generata. But ‘e close dong an’ 30,000 people lose dem jab!”

“Jesus Christ!” exclaimed Hari. “What happened?”

“Well, most people lef’ and de res’ start fuh use drugs and t’ing,” Cappo reported. “De whole tong tun run dong, like Wales a’ready.”

“And…?” prodded Satiricus.

“Some Guyanese fram Richman’ Hill buy up plenty house fuh wan dallah a piece, an’ start fuh fix dem up and sell dem to adda Guyanese!” said Cappo “You kidding me!” exclaimed Hari.

“No really,” insisted Cappo. “Today Guyanese rebuil’ mos’ a Ske-neck-tady. And da how me get wuk and larn fuh buil’ house!”

“Let’s drink to that!” said Hari.

“Leh abee pray fuh Wales an’ Rose Hall,” said Cappo sadly.

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SunDAY, october 8, 2017 | guyanatimesGY.com

Over 1 year later

Enforcement of Telecoms Bill 2016 still being ironed out – but Minister promises Bill will bring end to Internet, phone woes

By Jarryl Bryan

This Cussed Government

By Ryhaan Shah

“W

e live under the curse of the six sisters,” President David Granger said in his address to the Guyanese Diaspora in New York recently. It is a clear and simple statement that can hardly be misconstrued or misunderstood.

Taken in the context of Granger’s intent that this curse – as he puts it – has been a stumbling block to the establishment of a manufacturing sector, the statement is even more troubling.

He bemoaned yet again the lack of manufacturing industries and, as before, this was nothing but fatuous talk since, to date, there has been no follow-through on Government’s part to initiate and establish the policies, and the physical and financial infrastructure needed to attract and drive large-scale investments and development.

The move by the Private Sector Commission to hold a summit this week would provide leadership and direction for the business sector and help them to formulate strategies that should reverse the downward economic trend and boost the country’s development. They would hope, at least, that Government would support their efforts.

Perhaps, Government’s continued harangue is intended to throw the blame elsewhere for the economic decline that the country has suffered since the APNU/AFC Government took office. But going to the extreme of calling the commodities of sugar, rice, timber, bauxite, gold and diamonds curses appears even unpatriotic.

All economies are reliant or dependent on certain commodities or services and, far from being cursed, Guyana is blessed with a diversified economic portfolio. Many of our Caribbean neighbours who are wholly dependent on tourism would gladly welcome the diversity that Granger sees as a stumbling block to progress.

It is short-sightedness on Government’s part to believe that creating a manufacturing sector cannot be accomplished while providing continued support for the traditional industries on which this country is built. Why not have seven thriving economic sectors? Why does a possible new opportunity mean cursing the old? In a country with rising unemployment and a high migration rate, would this not be a winning strategy?

Government’s complete abandonment of the rice industry hardly creates investor confidence in Guyana and points up the repeated lament over the lack of manufacturing industries as being wholly fatuous. Thankfully, Mr Nand Persaud of the Corentyne has stepped in and opened up a Cuban market for Guyana’s rice and, hopefully, there will be other like-minded business people who will ensure the future prosperity of our traditional crops and commodities which, far from being curses, are vital to the local and the world economy.

Guyana does suffer from the curse of divisive race politics which politicians mine for their own gain and glory while assuring our continued impoverishment despite the blessings of a diverse economy. When he invited hurricane stricken Dominicans to come to Guyana to settle then brushed off his critics as lacking compassion, one can only ask: where is Granger’s compassion for our own Guyanese people?

Shutting down the Wales sugar estate has thrown hundreds of workers and their families on the breadline and there are no citizens worthier of Granger’s compassion than these. Charity always begins at home and grants of land can help these now unemployed workers to rebuild their lives. But they are mostly Indian Guyanese so this will never happen.

Granger’s invitation was a naked ploy to gain African votes for the PNC. President Burnham tried that tactic and since Granger is a beloved follower, it is not surprising that he should attempt to do the same. No doubt, the PNC base would have no issue with this strategy since it could mean winning elections without having to resort to electoral rigging as the party has done in the past.

The invitation does also reveal Granger’s obvious compassion for his own race. Since he has a perfect understanding of identity politics, this should move him to press for constitutional change that will establish a system of government whereby every race and ethnic group will have fair and equitable representation.

As it stands, Guyana is being strangled by a Government that does not even attempt to hide its anti-Indian racism.

There is no shame and no guilt and the “coolie” pejorative can now even be used by Office of the President employees as long as it is used in a proper context, according to Granger.

It is unlikely that the public will follow suit. Being mostly decent and upstanding citizens, no one ethnic group will ever think it appropriate to use racial slurs against another.

There is a curse, indeed, that stalks this land. It is the corrupt, racist and shameless Granger Government.

W

ith regular complaints being voiced about utility services in Guyana, Government passed the Telecommunication Act of 2016. Over a year later, chinks are still being ironed out, but Government is optimistic that the bill will be enforced and used to bring about change.

At a recent engagement with the press, Public Telecommunications Minister Cathy Hughes stressed that she was working as fast as possible to ensure the bill is enforced. But she noted that it will take some more time before Guyanese can feel the benefits of a liberalised sector.

Responding to questions about the continually poor internet service plaguing some Guyanese, Head of the Industry and Innovation Unit of the Ministry of Public Telecommunications, Lance Hinds, spoke about the Ministry’s plans.

“The Public Utilities Commission has a mandate to oversee the service provider in terms of speed, in terms of cov-

erage. In the new legislation, we have a specific provision (and) regulations for quality of service,” Hinds related.

“One of the things we can do on that in far more detail is to ensure we can monitor their performance; compare what our mechanisms are versus what the public is experiencing. So when the new legislation comes into being, we’re going to do a lot better than we are (doing) at the moment,” Hinds promised.

In the meantime, however, he noted that the PUC would continue to exercise its mandate. There is a snag in this proposal, however, with Minister Hughes admitting that she did not have a specific date by which to introduce the proposed legislation. She noted that there are other works.

“I can’t say, unfortunately. We’re working as fast as we can. Just last week, I was able to bring a cabinet memo and got approval to hire a core staff of individuals who will start to design and implement the Telecommunications Agency,” she said. “So, before we start the process of actually hiring the permanent staff and every-

Public Telecommunications Minister Cathy Hughes

thing that will go with it, we certainly have the possibility of hiring people who will start to put things in place.” She expressed hope that the legislation could come on stream by 2018.

Hughes also pointed to negotiations with the Guyana Telephone Telegraph Company (GTT) and Atlantic TeleNetwork (ATN). “Those discussions have been going very well.

I have had conversations with

both the international owners and the local company. And it’s just the time to go through all that detail. I had hoped to complete this before, and we haven’t. But I am going as fast as possible.”

Hinds said that issues regarding poor landline service are also expected to be addressed by the legislation. He noted that residents who are at the mercy of telephone providers and are without service can expect some relief.

“We have an exclusive licensee, so you run into these challenges in terms of areas that are not served as they should be. And one of the things that happen is that if you have a liberalised environment, because the competition is there, it then gets everyone up, because competition demands that.

“So one of the weaknesses of being in this monopoly is that some outlying and remote communities (will be affected).

So the idea is that when there is this new environment and the legislation, that will ensure these things are covered,” he explained. turn to page 18

12 news

SunDAY, october 8, 2017 | guyanatimesgy.com

Govt scrapping of Amaila Hydro threatens forest pact with Norway – Jagdeo

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pposition Leader Bharrat Jagdeo believes the loose statements being made by Minister of State Joseph Harmon and col-

league Minister of Public Infrastructure, David Patterson, not only threaten the forest pact agreement with the Kingdom of Norway -- which has seen

the country already earning some US$250 million; but could cause the country to lose out on another US$3.3 billion (GY$700 billion) in savings by canning the flag-

ship Amaila Falls Hydro Electric Project.

Jagdeo, this past week, lambasted the Minister of State over reports that the Government has scrapped the project because of a lack of finances to go out to tender. He said the consultants, Norconsult AS, have also raised concerns about the project. Jagdeo was adamant that the Government spokesmen were demonstrating unbelievable levels of incompetence.

“Now they are talking about natural gas, a project

for which there has been no feasibility studies undertaken. It is a tragedy, the display of ignorance and incompetence is unbelievable and embarrassing,” Jagdeo declared.

Responding to Harmon’s statements that Government did not have the funds to put into the project, and that the independent study recently undertaken was critical of the project, Jagdeo said, “This leaves me to conclude that neither Harmon nor Patterson, nor any other official of Government,

has read the report from Norconsult...They are jeopardising our agreement with Norway with loose comments, and harming the future of Guyana with this ignorance,” he said.

Contrary to what the APNU/AFC Administration has claimed, Jagdeo told reporters, the Norconsult assessment actually says, “The only realistic path for Guyana towards an emission-free electricity sector is by delivering its hydropower potential”.

He observed that the independent report had said, “We regard the soundness of AFHP as evident, and in order to follow up the intentions of the LCDS as fast as possible, we recommend the preparations for AFHP to be resumed.”

The consultants posited, “It is our opinion that the BOOT type public-private partnership model should be maintained for the project’s implementation. An internationally well-merited investor and operator in the hydropower industry should be invited to take the majority position.”

According to Jagdeo, “Notice that Harmon says we don’t have the money, but if he understood the BOOT model, then he would not have said that, and he would have realised that there would not have been a cent of debt to the treasury.” turn to page 17

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SunDAY, october 8, 2017 | guyanatimesgy.com

CoI into African ancestral lands

Vergenoegen businessman denies claims of land dispossession

On coolies, ass-kissing and racism

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month ago, President David Granger’s Public Information and Press Services Officer Lloyda Nicholas-Garrett wrote in a leaked private Facebook conversation: “I got people in my office so I cannot listen to Les vn (voice note) yet. Well she was in here making sure to try to turn my staff against me. She don’t know these coolie.

They still friendsing she while kissing my a**.”

Reacting to charges that Ms Garrett was “racist” because of her usage of the word “coolie”, and she should be disciplined, President Granger promised to conduct “an investigation” and take action. Last week, one newspaper reported he had concluded:“…the word that was actually used was not done with Ravi Dev any malice…many people are aware of the language we speak in Guyana and you mustn’t try to separate it from the context in which it was used.” According to the paper, he then made “reference to a recent article written by Ravi Dev in one of the daily newspapers in which the same word allegedly spoken by Garrett was used.”

The article referred was on the Devonshire Castle killings of 1872, “Killing Coolies”. It is ironic that even while insisting that context is crucial to discern the import of words, Mr Granger, a trained historian could still equate my use of the word “coolie” with Ms Garrett’s. At the time of the Devonshire Castle killings, the British routinely referred to the Indian immigrants as “coolies”, much as they had used the word “niggers” to African slaves, to deny their humanity. After listing the eight other instances when the Indian immigrants were shot in cold blood by the state (“the leaden argument”) when they were protesting the violation of their conditions of labour, I concluded bitterly: “They were just coolies.”

As to whether Ms Garrett’s usage of “coolie” was racist in her context, does not depend on whether she had “malice”.

She attributed a negative social trait (“kissing asses”) to an individual based on her race (“these coolie”) and asserted that unlike her colleague who was evidently naïve, she knew “coolies” well enough to discern their deviousness beyond their apparent bonhomie (“friendsing she”). This is almost the classic British definition of “the coolie” in the 19th century, when even his sworn evidence in court could not be trusted.

But to give Ms Garrett the benefit of the doubt at this stage, we can conclude she is at least “prejudiced” - a condition, her personal experiences might have stimulated.

To be “racist”, this prejudice must have been so naturalised with her (and the coterie to which she was communicating) that she and is beyond self-critical interrogation of her assessment when speaking either to, or about Indians.

It is just taken for granted: “that’s just how those people are”. That Ms Garrett had an extensive stint at the Ethnic Relations Committee, which did not disabuse her from using the world “coolie” with the meaning based on fixed essences of a group of people, confirms the normalisation.

But even with this second level of scrutiny we can still give Ms Garrett the benefit of the doubt as to being “racist”.

In the US, for instance, it is commonly conceded that Blacks can yell “Honky” all they want coming out of their experiences and their essentialisation of Whites, but they can’t be “racist” since they have no power to oppress the latter. I was in 6th form at Indian Education Trust in 1970 when Stokley Carmichael made that point. It still holds.

But in the case of Ms Garrett, who works for the President of this country, the negative essentialism she concludes constitutes Indian Guyanese, is given force by her or the group that shares her belief, to normalise and institutionalise oppression of the latter. For instance, since Indians are “coolies” who constitutionally “kiss ass”, Ms Garrett and company can never give “these people” a fair shake in being evaluated in their workplaces or in governmental offices. This is racism.

The sickest part of this kind of racist oppression, which is what Gayatri Spivak called “epistemic violence” is that it not only silences some “Indian Guyanese”, but these accept being the “coolie” as they are defined and become even more adept at ass kissing. We see them every day.

V

ergenoegen businessman Shiraz Ali is refuting claims made

by Joan Straughn, at last Wednesday’s Commission of Inquiry (CoI) into African ancestral land matters, that her family, under former President Dr Bharrat Jagdeo, were dispossessed of lands that were handed to him.

Straughn said that in March of 2000, former President Jagdeo caused their family land at Parika, East Bank Essequibo (EBE) to be taken away and given to Ali, the owner of Two Brothers Gas Station.

According to Straughn, the land which was leased to the gas station owner contained a parcel which legitimately belongs to her family as well as a section of the sea defence reserve that provides access to it.

Straughn told the CoI that the land in question was given to Ali by the Sea Defence Board (SDB) in 2009, and the businessman is now in the processes of building a Bulk Fuel Storage thereon -- a project that has since been approved by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) after having met all the require-

ments.

But Ali, in a release, posited that he has “all the legal documentation for the land that is being claimed by Straughn. “And I am willing to make them available to the commission”, Ali has said.

Ali said the claim that Jagdeo gave him the land was preposterous, since he was never friendly with the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) Administration, given his well-known support of the People’s National Congress (PNC) long before Jagdeo even held a ministerial position.

Straughn told the CoI that her family had spent in excess of $10 million battling Ali; but the Two Brothers Gas Station proprietor, in refuting her contentions, has said that this is not true.

In substantiating his claims, Ali, in his statement, said: “On August 12, 2010, in the High Court of the Supreme Court of Judicature, before Chief Justice Ian Chang, I won a case against Violet Baptist, Garfield Strans (Straughn) and Guy Gold Inc., throwing out an injunction filed by the aforementioned.” turn to page 17

14 news

SunDAY, october 8, 2017 | guyanatimesgy.com

Father, sons confess to killing Corentyne farmer … and burning body in yard

By Andrew Carmichael

A

father and his two sons have confessed to killing one of the father’s employees, reportedly by clubbing him to death and then chopping his body into pieces and burning it in their yard at Corentyne, Berbice.

Reports are that 21-yearold Mahendra Ghanie, also known as “Sanjay”, of Lot 198 Bloomfield Village, Corentyne, was killed and then dismembered before

being set on fire. The burnt bones from the dismembered body were discovered on Friday afternoon after relatives of the missing man went in search of him.

Ghanie had reportedly gone to the home of his employer on Monday last to collect $70,000 which was owed to him. He never returned home and his family was told that he never got there which prompted a frantic search and the subsequent gruesome discovery a few days later of burnt human

Murdered labourer, Mahendra Ghanie The pieces of bone that were found at the burn site

remains and bones.

According to a source close to the Police, the employer has confessed that he and his sons accused Ghanie of stealing two of their goats and one of his sons lashed him with a piece of wood to the head and he fell dead.

In an attempt to dispose of the body, they chopped it into pieces and then took it to the side of the yard on Monday evening and used dried coconuts and dried palm branches to burn it.

The hole in which pieces of bone were found

Relatives of Mahendra Ghanie moments after finding what appeared to be his remains

Meanwhile, villagers told this publication that the fire had been burning for several days. On Thursday, it is believed that the remains were placed in a hole which was dug two feet in depth and situated about 30-feet away from the house.

However, apparently as they were taking the remains to the hole, they left some evidence on the ground. The block maker, along with his 18 and 14-year-old sons lived alone on the premises.

“Palie” a few years ago who lived close to the block maker and who use to frequent his home and also periodically work for him.

Reports are that villagers had questioned the block maker about the whereabouts of “Palie” and were told that he had gone out to sea with a crew fishing.

According to reports, “Palie” who is from the East Coast of Demerara, has not been seen in his native village in recent times. The trio is expected to be charged

Photo shows the place where the murder reportedly occurred

Meanwhile, villagers are now questioning the disappearance of a man called

shortly with the capital offence of murder.

Bus conductor charged for narcotics, spent shell

T

hirty-year-old Anthony Ferreira of La Parfaite Harmonie, West Bank Demerara (WBD) pleaded guilty to being in possession of 1 gram of cannabis on September 29, 2017 on Croal Street, Georgetown when he appeared before the Georgetown Magistrates’ Courts last week.

Ferreira accepted responsibility for his actions, explaining that he was in-

structed by someone to buy the narcotics, and he was on his way back when he was accosted by the lawmen.

However, the accused denied a subsequent charge which detailed that on the said day and location, he was in possession of a component of ammunition; that is to say, one .32 spent shell, without being the holder of a firearm licence in force at the time.

The bus conductor and father of one, who appeared unrepresented before the court of Magistrate Leron Daly, was ordered to pay a fine of $5000 and do one month of community service with respect to the former charge, while being granted $25,000 bail on the latter charge of ammunition possession.

He is slated to return to court on October 25, 2017.

news

15

sunDAY, october 8, 2017 | guyanatimesgy.com

‘Standards make cities smarter’ – National Quality Week begins tor on the Regional Energy Efficiency Building Code; and the giving of awards to GNBS staff for long-service and appreciation.

In addition, on the eve-

Financial sector and its role within the economy: An introduction

I

n today’s article, I present an introduction of the financial sector and its role within the broader economy. Therefore, it is presented within the framework of an academic and theoretical underpinning. This will of course be followed by a series of a few practitioner-based articles in the coming weeks.

Generically, the financial sector includes everything from banks, stock exchanges, insurers, to money lenders, microfinance institutions, and credit unions. In other words, the financial sector is all the wholesale, retail, formal and informal institutions within an economy, offering financial services to firms (businesses), consumers (householders) and other financial institutions.

In order for there to be a well-functioning economy, central to this concept is an efficient financial sector. Thus, it should serve in improving the efficiency of the economy as well as increasing its productivity. Put differently, the financial sector is the heart of the real economy, and hence, if the financial sector crashes or hits a crisis, the economy will also follow suit.

The financial sector, according to Umberto Pisano et,al (2012), generally has “a very straightforward set of tasks: Firstly, it has to allocate capital, ie making sure that capital goes to areas where its return is highest. Secondly, it should manage risk in a way that, using the ability to absorb risks, it allows capital to go where higher return on investments can be made. It is also supposed to perform these tasks efficiently – therefore at a relatively low cost (Stiglitz, 2010).”

The structure of the financial sector constitutes three components – financial markets, financial institutions and financial regulators. Each of the components plays a specific role and has singular characteristics, but most important is constantly involved with the others within the political, social and economic frameworks in which the system operates. Each component also has a function: financial markets provide liquidity and price discovery to funds used in finance and investments by households, firms and governments; financial institutions are the most important participants in the financial markets as they are intermediaries that gather data and coordinate the allocation of assets between suppliers and users of funds; and financial regulators are in charge of providing stability to the system by creating the necessary legal framework and ensuring that market participants comply with its rules and regulations.

With respect to financial sector development and growth, modern growth theory identifies two specific channels through which the financial sector might affect long-run growth: the first being through its impact on capital accumulation including human as well as physical capital and; through its impact on the rate of technological progress.

These effects arise from the intermediation role provided by financial institutions which enable the financial sector to mobilise savings for investment; facilitate and encourage inflows of foreign capital (including FDI, portfolio investment and bonds, and remittances); and optimise the allocation of capital between competing uses, ensuring that capital goes to its most productive use.

Levine (1997) identifies five basic functions of financial intermediaries which give rise to these effects: savings mobilisation; risk management; acquiring information about investment opportunities; monitoring borrowers and exerting corporate control; and facilitating the exchange of goods and services.

Financial sector development and poverty reduction

In the same way that financial services increase income growth generally, expanding the supply of financial services which can be accessed by the poor will increase income growth for the poor, thus having a direct impact on poverty reduction (Jalilian & Kirkpatrick, 2001). The provision of savings facilities can enable the poor to accumulate funds in a secure place over time in order to finance a relatively large, anticipated future expenditure or investment, and can sometimes provide a return on their savings.

The mobilisation of savings also creates the opportunity for relending the collected funds into the community. The availability of credit can strengthen the productive assets of the poor by enabling them to invest in productivity-enhancing new ‘technologies’ such as new and better tools, equipment, or fertilisers, etc, or to invest in education and health, all of which may be difficult to finance out of household income, but which could provide for a higher income in future.

The availability of credit can also be an important factor in creation or expansion of small businesses, thus generating self-and-wageemployment and increasing incomes. Further, access to credit can reduce the vulnerability of the poor to shocks in the absence of savings or insurance which could have knock-on benefits. Eswaran and Kotwal (1990) argued that just the knowledge that credit will be available to cushion consumption against income shocks if a potentially profitable but risky investment should turn out badly, can make the household more willing to adopt more risky technologies. Such behaviour may increase the use of modern technologies with productivity –increasing, and hence income enhancing benefits.

Finally, remittances from abroad and domestic transfers are an important source of income for the poor, and provide an additional means for them to diversify their sources of income, thus reducing vulnerability. Where financial sector development leads to lower costs, more secure and rapid transfers, and easier access to transferred funds, this would be of significant benefit to poor recipients. However, in developing countries (like Guyana) often do not have access to ongoing, formal financial services and are forced to rely on a narrow range of often expensive and more risky informal services. This constrains their ability to participate fully in markets, to increase their incomes and to contribute to economic growth.

(For comments, questions and responses on articles featured in this column, readers can reach the author at jbinsights@outlook.com).

GNBS PRO Lloyd David

A

s the Guyana National Bureau of Standards (GNBS) observes National Quality Week (October 8 to 14), in a joint message, the International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO), International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) and the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) have noted that while there are complexities in the building of a smart city, International Standards significantly simplify this task.

These standards support the development of appropriate solutions that can be adapted to the particular circumstances of a given city. They contain expert knowledge and best practices, and are essential enablers in guaranteeing quality and performance of products and services. They also open the door to a larger choice of products and services, and increase competition and foster innovation.

It was further noted that international standards allow for efficient functioning at every level in cities.

For example, they provide the foundation for electricity access and the many devices and systems that use and contain electronics. They support information and communication technologies that enable data collection, information security and exchange, and data analysis.

According to the Department of Public Information, they also provide important guidance for aspects of city life, including energy-efficient buildings, intelligent transportation, improved waste management, and building of sustainable communities.

According to Lloyd David, PRO of GNBS, a number of activities have been scheduled for the week, including radio programmes; pop-up interviews with consumers and businesses; an Open Day and exhibition at its Main Office in Sophia; a consultation session for stakeholders in the building sec-

ning of Friday, October 13, the GNBS will host its first National Quality Awards, and eleven local companies will be awarded for their outstanding implementa-

tion of standards.

World Standards Day is commemorated annually on October 14. This year’s theme is ‘Standards make cities smarter’.

16 news

SunDAY, october 8, 2017 | guyanatimesGY.com

Agro-processing fair ‘Uncapped’ slated for Oct month-end

G

uyana’s newest trade and agro-processing fair, ‘Uncapped’, is billed for the Sophia Exhibition Complex from October 27 to 29, 2017.

The three-day exhibition, food festival and culture show is a collaborative effort

between the Government of Guyana, private enterprises, and the Guyana Manufacturing and Services Association (GMSA).

President of the GMSA, Shyam Nokta, is quoted by the Department of Public Information (DPI)

as saying that the idea behind ‘Uncapped’ is to bring together both large and small agro-producers, entities involved in supporting agro-processing, and agencies and institutions to ensure their products can meet market requirements and ac-

GMSA President Shyam Nokta

cess markets.

Nokta said the trade fair would also feature a food festival which would provide opportunity to showcase what is being produced locally.

Moreover, Uncapped would allow businesses to explore the prospect of working together to create awareness, and promote and expand the agro-processing sector to meet domestic needs, Caribbean needs, and markets further afield.

Acknowledging that there are many challenges faced by the local agro-processing sector, Nokta said the work must begin somewhere if the sector is to move forward.

“For many years, we have been talking about our potential to not only feed the Caribbean, but to look wider afield. The GMSA recognises that there are many

challenges for us to be able to do this, and they range from packaging and marketing to being able to access regional and international markets, and meeting all the requirements. But we felt that, first, we need to start creating the awareness right here at home, because there are many people doing good things that we are not aware of. Why should we have products coming from external sources when those very same products we can make right here?” Nokta reasoned.

Meanwhile, Ramsay Ali, Vice President of the GMSA and Events Manager of ‘Uncapped’, emphasised the importance of business owners moving the local agro-processing sector forward. “We are encouraging the shop owners of Guyana -all the shop owners -- to come to this event to see exactly what Guyanese are producing that can be used locally instead of imported stuff. We have some good Guyanese products here, but (producers) need help from the Guyanese storekeepers to put those products on their shelves and promote them.”

The three-day event will feature an opening ceremony at 17:00hrs on Friday, 27th October. A number of Government officials, including President David Granger and Minister of Business, Dominic Gaskin, are slated to be at the event.

A Culture Night, featur-

Event Manager for ‘Uncapped” Ramsay Ali

ing many local artistes, inclusive of Terry Gajraj and the cast of ‘Nothing to Laugh About’ and Shakti Strings band, will be on Saturday, October 28.

The agro fair culminates on Sunday, October 29th, with “a grand” local food festival sponsored by the Demerara Distillers Limited (DDL). According to the organisers, twelve iconic food restaurants in Guyana have been invited to participate, so persons attending would be able to experience and enjoy all the local flavours offered.

Other sponsors of the first-time event include IPED, Edward Beharry and Company, Sterling Products Limited, Impressions, Republic Bank, and Banks DIH.

news

17

SunDAY, october 8, 2017 | guyanatimesgy.com

Cabinet approval granted for several overseas-based seminars

C

abinet has granted its approval for several Government officials to attend a number of overseas-based fora in the months of October and November. This was disclosed

by Minister of State Joseph Harmon during his Friday post-Cabinet press briefing.

It was disclosed that David Ramnarine, Commissioner of the Guyana Police Force (GPF), will attend a Carry Secure technical exchange to be convened in Montreal, Canada from November 14 to 15. The exchange is organised and funded by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and Eastern Caribbean States to develop a Crime Information Management System (CIMS).

It will expose participants to global best practices and innovations in the automation of crime data collection and analysis, as well as observation on how data translates into evidence-based policy.

Adding to the list of approvals, a Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) representative will attend the Caribbean Customs Law Enforcement Liaison Officers meeting in Miami, Florida from November 1 to 2. The seminar will discuss common threats and current trends in the Caribbean, review Caribbean customs law enforcement practices, and plan joint future operational work.

Apart from that meeting, the 13th Annual InterAmerican Network on Government Procurement (INGP) conference will convene later this month in Santiago, Chile. As such, Christine Singh, Procurement Officer, National Procurement and Tender Administration (NPTA), will attend.

The conference will focus on value for money in public procurement, including methods on tools used to achieve value for money, digital economy, the use of technology, and

Vergenoegen businessman...

FROM PAGE 13

Moreover, “On January 6, 2011, Chief Justice Ian Chang ordered the case by Straughn, this time by her Power of Attorney Mark Levy, ‘deemed abandoned and incapable of being revived’.”

According to Ali, upon being granted the lease by the Sea Defence Board, he had to satisfy a number of requirements of the board, one of which was ensuring that the sea defence is kept.

Ali said he spent millions to reach the Sea Defence Board’s and the Environmental Protection Agency’s requisite standards for the land, and that the High Court ruling against the Straughn injunction compounds the legality of the land belonging to him.

The Vergenoegen businessman maintains that he would willingly appear before the CoI, once called-upon, with all the required and legal documentation. Ali also maintains that he is not allied to the PPP, and moreso former President Jagdeo.

Meanwhile, Ali has also been accused by Norman Dalrymple, Secretary of the Vergenoegen Agri Producers Co-op Society Limited, of claiming the society’s land.

Dalrymple told the CoI that the Agri Producers Co-op Society had experienced “Government

interference and racism under Jagdeo’s rule of Guyana, owing to Ali’s political connection.”

However, Ali categorically denied this, and in refuted Dalrymple’s statement, has called them “blasphemous and liable” while reiterating that he’s not friendly with the PPP. Ali, in his statement, said that since 1987 he was granted legal documented permission by the Government of Guyana to occupy the land for cattle grazing purposes -- something he posits he still does until this day.

According to the businessman, “In 1995, Honourable Justice Burch-Smith ruled against the Ankoko Sugar Producers Co-op Society in a case that had been before the High Court since 1991. In fact, the Ankoko Sugar producers Co-op Society (now Vergenoegen Agri Producers Co-Op Society Limited) were ordered to pay Ali $10,000 after the matter was dismissed for the now contested land.”

Ali maintains that he had always followed the legal process when conducting business, and that under the PPP rule, more so that of Jagdeo, he had faced several up-hill tasks, especially with the establishment of Two Brothers Gas station because of his political affiliation with the PNC.

Govt scrapping of...

Critical of the decision to can the project, which he spearheaded under the Low Carbon Development Strategy, the Opposition Leader also noted, “Constructing Amaila Falls would cut electricity costs by more than 50% for the energy produced by AFHP, or US$3.3 billion (GY$700 billion) over 20 years.”

He recalled, too, that the project would have begun delivering electricity to the National Grid this year had it not been demolished by the then opposition APNU/ AFC (A Partnership for National Unity and Alliance for Change) when it voted against measures introduced in the House; causing the investors, Sithe Global of Blackstone, to pull out of the

from page 12

project.

The Opposition Leader quipped, “Since early 2016, we heard about an IDB energy mix study, and to date we have heard nothing. Is natural gas part of that study? The IDB and international organisations now have to look at their credibility. We will raise these transgressions, including where foreign funds are used.

“This project will have such a big impact for Guyana.

If we had done this in mid2016, we would have (had) hydropower by now. Politicians have to let the numbers guide them. Instead, what we have is a Government with some hair-brained scheme that they are running after,” Jagdeo posited.

challenges implementing value for money in procurement.

Also slated for this month is UNESCO’s 10th Educational, Scientific and Cultural youth forum, and Youth activist Marcel Langevine has been selected to participate. The meeting will seek to foster long-term and meaningful engagements between youths, and discuss ways UNESCO

can enhance its engagements with young change-makers.

Following this meeting, the ideas created will be further presented at the 39th Session of the UNESCO General Conference.

Meantime, UNESCO has organised an orientation and capacity building workshop on the education's sector responses to school gender-based vio-

lence in the Caribbean region.

Guidance Counsellor attached to the Ministry of Education, Vikram Mohabeer, is expected to participate in the workshop, to be held in St. Lucia from October 16 to 18.

Approval was also granted for a representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to participate in the 2017 seminar on Chinese language and

culture for South-South cooperation for developing countries, scheduled to be held in Beijing, China.

The seminar will focus on a range of issues relating to China’s relationship with developing countries, including its open door policy, inter-cultural communication, and Chinese culture.

18 news

sunday, october 8, 2017 | guyanatimesGY.com

Business Summit a reform catalyst for Govt’s economic agenda ...analyst finds APNU/AFC policy measures lack depth

I

nternational Financial Analyst Sasenarine Singh has expressed optimism that the Private Sector Commission’s Business

Summit, to be held in this coming week, would offer some level of “reform to this backward Granger economic agenda. It is time to put wealth creation

at the heart of human development.”

The former Alliance For Change (AFC) Executive Member made the scathing

remarks over the weekend, during an exclusive interview with the Guyana Times, saying: “The only word that comes to my mind when I observe the operations of this Granger regime is a word that President Obama popularised –shambolic. Since President Granger took the reins of power, it has been all pain/no gain for the people, and this is the indisputable fact.”

In fact, Singh believes, “If, at this point in time -- after two and a half years in power; if even 1/10 of that set of promises from Mr Granger in the 2015 elections manifesto (were) achieved, we as a people would have something to point to. But the reality (that) they have not even achieved 1/50 of their promises exposes the Granger cabal as anti-business and anti-human development and clueless.”

Singh told Guyana Times, “The facts are: there isn’t job creation going on in this economy. Actually, since Mr. Granger came to power, there has been a net destruction of jobs in Guyana...That is some-

The fact remains (that) without the Private Sector investing, they will not be creating new jobs, and the economy will stagnate.”

The evidence of this is already present in Guyana in 2017 Singh said.

He told Guyana Times that unless the barriers to showcasing Guyana as a world-class investment destination are broken down, the foreign direct investment will not come.

“Until the local and foreign investors open their checkbooks, we are not going to see piles being driven into the ground to build new factories, and we will not see the new people being hired.”

According to the international Financial Analyst, it is extremely challenging “to escape the fact that all of this economic retrogression is self-inflicting, totally created by the decision makers in the Granger regime. One example of this disaster can be highlighted by that monstrous decision to kill the Amaila Falls Hydro Project, (which) is directly contributing to this eco-

“Clearly, under President David Granger, the Guyanese economy has gone in the wrong direction, and that is what is worrying; because, if you reflect on the policy measures over the last few years, they lack depth and intellectual breadth, and (are) populated by vindictive pettiness that clearly does not belong in a 5-year national development plan.” thing that all of the people living in Guyana should be really worried about.”

He said, “That is why I welcome this Private Sector Business Summit... It is my fervent hope that, as an outcome of this Summit, the Private Sector can raise their issues and their voices, and the State Sector can respond positively with new mechanism and incentives to break down the barriers to investing in Guyana. It is my dream that the Private Sector can take their rightful place as the engine of growth.”

According to Singh, it is unfortunate that President Granger “is more obsessed with Burnhamism, rather than the fundamental concept of growing the economy...

nomic implosion.”

The International Monetary Fund had stated in its 2010 Report on Guyana that this project would have injected some 2% expansion in the economy above the normal rate for four years during construction. “Granger killed this project and that 2% growth opportunity,” according to Singh.

He also observed that since Granger became President, the management of the Public Sector Investment Programme has been executed in the most horrendous way imaginable. “So much so that even Burnham looks like a genius at economic planning when compared to Granger, which he was not. And then, if we observe how the procurement system is

Enforcement of Telecoms Bill ...

The Telecommunications Bill was first introduced in 2011. However, it was revised in 2013 before being sent to a Parliamentary Special Select Committee in the 10th Parliament.

When the legislation was taken before the National Assembly by the Government, the Opposition People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) had called for the Bill to be sent to a Special Select Committee for further consideration, but Minister Hughes had argued that the Bill had been long promised, and was overdue.

The sector, she had emphasised, must be an open one, so that the country can progress and not lag behind its sister Caricom countries and the rest of the world. The bill was passed in July, 2016.

PUC

As of March 2017, there have already been over a hundred complaints to the Public Utilities Commission for at least two utility companies -- Guyana Telephone Telegraph (GTT) and Guyana Power and Light (GPL).

There were 94 complaints for GTT. In an interview with this publication, the PUC’s Complaints Division Manager, Destra Bourne, had revealed that her agency resolved 44 of those GTT complaints.

International Financial Analyst Sasenarine Singh

being managed, it resembles a cake shop operation, with contractors selected on the basis of “enie meenie minie moe…

“Can you imagine that a major bridge consultant was selected by a process that can be classified as one of the (fishiest) deals in the history of Guyana, using methods that are the furthest from international best practice? It is just appalling to observe how inept this Granger cabinet really is. Or (are these) deliberate acts of corruption?”

The analyst pointed out that the world has not been doing too badly economically over the last year, and “even the Minister of Finance, Mr. Jordan, quite unashamedly was willing to concede that the world will grow by 3.5% in 2017 when he is piloting an economy that has grown at 2.2% in the first half of the year (see the 2017 Mid-Year Report).”

Guyana, Singh said, is one of a minority of countries that have moved from an average growth rate of over 5% during the previous administration to one that is even struggling to meet 3% in 2017. He added, “Clearly, under President David Granger, the Guyanese economy has gone in the wrong direction, and that is what is worrying; because, if you reflect on the policy measures over the last few years, they lack depth and intellectual breadth, and (are) populated by vindictive pettiness that clearly does not belong in a 5-year national development plan.” from page 11

Explaining the work the Commission does in these instances, Bourne stated that the PUC would arrange rebates for customers who would have been paying for a service that was not working for a period of time.

“Once the service has been restored, they’re entitled to some amount of rebate for the period the service would not have been working.

That’s for GT&T,” she had said.

Bourne had also encouraged customers who have been under siege from poor utility service and lack of resolution to bring the matter to the PUC’s attention. Bourne emphasised that the process was actually a simple one.

“The procedure is quite simple. If you have a problem with one of the utility (companies), your first step is to visit the utility and make a complaint in relation to your problem. That is giving the utility the first option to deal with whatever issue you have.

“If you are not satisfied with how they dealt with the problem of the resolution, then you can seek redress from the PUC. If the complaint has merit, we will follow that complaint up with the utility. If we notice that the utility would have made the correct decision based on the matter in front of us, we will advise you on that.”

sunDAY, october 8, 2017

19

Kuldeep, Bumrah thrive on tough pitch – India go 1-0 up A

ustralia's batsmen had a dire time coping with a slow and low surface at the JSCA International Stadium and never recovered from the early muddle, eventually conceding the first T20I by nine wickets to India. Rain came down after Australia had limped to 118 for 8 in 18.4 overs, and by the time it subsided, India's chase had been shortened to six overs. They mowed down the 48-run target with minimal fuss despite the loss of Rohit Sharma.

It was a pitch that had everything a batsman does not desire to see in a T20 game - variable bounce, lack of pace, grip, turn, and early on some movement in the air.

Some of that swing reappeared at the start of India's chase; off the very first ball, Rohit wristily whipped an inswinger from the debutant paceman Jason Behrendorff late through midwicket. He followed it up with a nonchalantly flicked six over long leg off Nathan CoulterNile, but the bowler swung one past a flick next ball and clattered his stumps. Virat Kohli and Shikhar Dhawan then ran down the remainder of the target with the help of timely boundaries.

Adam Zampa bounced back

excellently from a first-ball four in the penultimate over to concede just six and leave India with as many to get off the last over, and Kohli sealed it with a lofted four over extra-cover off Daniel Christian.

Just how low the surface played was seen in the fact that six of the eight wickets Australia lost were bowled; two of them chopping on.

It was far from what David Warner, Australia's stand-in captain, had pictured when he was asked to bat and expressed his inclination to do the same. The miscalcu-

lations of length began early enough, Warner setting the template when, having flayed two wide deliveries for four, he again swooped his bat down at an angle to a good-length ball and chopped on in the first over.

Not long after emerged the signs that Australia were in for a long, hard grind as they played out 13 dots in the first five overs.

The effects of those dots were somewhat neutralised by Aaron Finch's counter-charge. The only Australia batsman to display any kind of fluency,

SCOREBOARD Australia Innings (18.4 overs maximum) DA Warner* b Kumar 8 AJ Finch b Kuldeep Yadav 42 GJ Maxwell c Bumrah b Chahal 17 TM Head b Pandya 9 MC Henriques b Kuldeep Yadav 8 DT Christian run out (Kohli) 9 TD Paine† b Bumrah 17 NM Coulter-Nile b Bumrah 1 AJ Tye not out 0 A Zampa not out 4 Extras (lb-1, w-2) 3 Total (For 8 wickets, 18.4 Overs) 118 Did not bat: JP Behrendorff Fall of wickets: 1-8, 2-55, 3-76, 4-87, 5-89, 6-111, 7-113, 8-114 Bowling: Kumar 3.4-0-28-1,

Bumrah 3-0-17-2 (w-1), Pandya 4-0-33-1, Chahal 4-0-23-1 (w1), Kuldeep Yadav 4-0-16-2 India Innings (target: 48 runs from 6 overs) RG Sharma b Coulter-Nile 11 S Dhawan not out 15 V Kohli* not out 22 Extras (lb-1) 1 Total (For 1 wicket, 5.3 Overs) 49 Yet to bat: MK Pandey, KM Jadhav, MS Dhoni †, HH Pandya, B Kumar, YS Chahal, Kuldeep Yadav, JJ Bumrah Fall of wickets: 1-11 Bowling: JP Behrendorff 1-0-5-0, Coulter-Nile 2-0-201, Tye 1-0-10-0, Zampa 1-06-0, Christian 0.3-0-7-0

Ninvalle appointed AIBA executive P

resident of the Guyana Boxing Association (GBA) Steve Ninvalle continues to improve his portfolio on the international scene as he was recently appointed to the Association Internationale de Boxe Amateur (AIBA) EC Bureau.

His appointment is a significant one since the Executive Committee is seated by four persons out of 202-member associations.

In his brief comments, Ninvalle expressed his elation over the elevation and noted that his presence

…reckons benefits will soon trickle locally and regionally on the committed will correspond with great benefits for the Caribbean and Guyana.

Meanwhile, the GBA president disclosed that a meeting which is expected among more than 10 regional boxing boards’ officials will be held on Saturday.

Representation will be seen from AIBA as well as the American Boxing Confederation.

The meeting which was initially slated for September 9 was postponed due to the passage of destructive Hurricane, Irma.

Though the full details of the objective of the meeting have not been fully disclosed, it is understood that Ninvalle is chartering a course that could very well determine the way forward for the sport of boxing following the recent events at AIBA’s embattled president Wu Ching-Kuo, who sits at the helm of the sport, since 2006, has found himself in a power-struggle with the majority of his executive committee members who have joined forces to establish a temporary administration.

India bowlers utilised the conditions superbly before the rain came

Finch built up steam with smart clips, gentle dabs, the occasional chip, and when the bowlers erred in length, brutal cuts and forceful drives.

Hardik Pandya was es-

pecially culpable of those errors in length. He hardly found pace off the surface, and his first spell was strewn with fuller deliveries and length balls that often came with the added in-

centive of width. In all, his first two overs contained just three dot balls and four fours.

The dismissal of Glenn Maxwell, who added 47 with Finch, halted Australia's alltoo-brief charge. It arrived off a short ball that Maxwell pulled straight into the hands of short midwicket.

Perhaps the only passage of play that India wouldn't look back on too fondly was the 15th over, sent down

by Chahal, which saw two shelled catches and a rare stumping chance fluffed by MS Dhoni. That Tim Paine, the batsman reprieved on each occasion, still ended up with an unflattering 17 off 16 summed up Australia's day. (ESPN Cricinfo)

20

guyanatimesGY.com

sunDAY, october 8, 2017

Search is on for quality batsmen & express fast bowlers T

he six regional franchises have started preparations for

the upcoming #D4Day season, and Cricket West Indies Chairman of selec-

tors Courtney Browne has identified batting and fast bowling, as two key areas

for which the selection panel will be keeping a keen eye.

“Finding a few consistent batsmen is important, but what is also key for us is to unearth some young fast bowlers, so that we can add to the pool that we currently have, especially players that can clock in the high 80 to 90 mph range.

He added “So this upcoming regional season is key for players. There is an upcoming tour to the Caribbean by the England Lions early next year and such a high-profile “A” Team tour has not happened in a number of years.

This will be the fourth year that #D4Day in its current form will be contested over 10 matches. It followed the inauguration of the Professional Cricket League by CWI and features the six territorial franchises of Barbados Pride, Guyana Jaguars, Jamaica Scorpions, Leeward Islands Hurricanes, Trinidad & Tobago Red Force and Windward Islands Volcanoes playing home and away matches, and a system that promotes player movement.

“As selectors, we are happy with the length of the season,” said Browne. “We believe 10 matches in the #D4Day is a good yardstick for the players and for us. It helps us to see a player over a period of time and puts us in a better position to analyse if he has what it takes to be considered for the higher level.

“We would also like to urge players to work on their fitness and aim at achieving the fitness levels expected as our international teams have ramped up their fitness and conditioning work.

Browne urged players to show a higher level of consistency in performance, since this is one of the ways that

the selectors use to measure a player’s quality.

“When you look at the regional tournaments, it is a pathway into our representative teams as well,” he said. “It is a breeding ground for us and it is very important when we sit as selectors to look at players that have done well in the regional tournaments to identify those players that can go into our “A” Team programme.

“CWI now has a full “A” Team programme which helps to develop a better player and also helps to shorten their learning curve in international cricket.”

He said “There are cases where players do perform and may not make it into the senior team as quickly as persons expect.”

The #D4Day concludes on J a n u a r y 21, and all matches are now regularly scheduled to start on a Thursday, r a t h er than Friday, in a break from the long-standing tradition in the modern history (1966 onwards) of the West Indies first-class championship.

The schedule has also been

tightened up, due to the heavy amount of international matches that CWI will be staging in the coming months, and it would also allow the regional governing body to complete the #D4Day ahead of the Regional Super50 Tournament.

A Thursday start has also been introduced to give fans the option of coming out to see the end of the matches over the weekend, rather than having to take Mondays off.

Reigning three-time champions Guyana Jaguars will open their #D4Day title defence against Jamaica Scorpions on home soil at the Guyana National Stadium.

CWI Chief Selector Courtney Browne

Injured Smith returns home, Warner takes over A

ustralia's captain Steven Smith is flying home early from India, leaving David Warner to lead the side in the Twenty20 internationals, after failing to shrug off a shoulder problem he picked up during the fifth ODI in Nagpur.

Smith has been unable to bat or throw without discomfort since landing on his right shoulder during that match, forcing the selectors to call in Marcus Stoinis as his replacement for the three T20 fixtures.

"Smith landed awkwardly on his right shoulder whilst diving in the field during the fifth ODI against India last Sunday," team doctor Richard Saw said. "Following the match he complained of shoulder soreness, which has not set-

tled and is restricting his ability to bat and throw.

"Subsequently he has had an MRI scan which has excluded serious injury, but we believe the best course of action is for him to not continue to aggravate his shoulder and allow it to recover. He will have further investigation upon his return to Australia but we remain confident he will be available for the start of the Sheffield Shield season."

Since a dominant Test tour of India earlier this year, Smith's return of runs has reduced significantly, and he has not made a century since that series. After the ODI series concluded, Smith noted that he had not always been as comfortable at the batting crease as he is used to, searching for his best grip on the bat, among

other things.

"To be honest, I wasn't feeling great at the start of the series, I wasn't holding the bat the way I liked to and I was having a few issues there that I was working on," Smith said in Nagpur after India completed a 4-1 series win. "But I think I've slowly found a nice tempo which I'm after.

I would have loved to score a lot more runs.

"I've got myself in on a few occasions and not gone on to get the big runs that I previously have been. From that aspect, as the leader of the team, it's been disappointing. But I guess sometimes that's cricket. You have those periods where you're not playing or getting the scores you really like." (ESPN Cricinfo)

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Selman, Connell

return for SL ODIs …Munroe misses out

F

ast bowlers Shakera Selman and Shamilia Connell have returned to the West Indies women squad for the threematch ODI series against Sri Lanka that begins on October 11 in Trinidad. Both

Lanka series, alongside sister Kyshona Knight, while Munroe misses out. Shanel Daley, Qiana Joseph and Felicia Walters have also been left out of the 13-member squad.

Commenting on the

the team, along with a few young players and we must now allow the coaching staff to drive performance.”

Browne said “We expect to see more of an overall team approach to the different facets of the game and to

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21

West Indies Women get into action on Thursday at the Brian Lara Cricket Academy

suffered injuries during the Women's World Cup in England in July.

Selman was struck on the helmet while fielding at short leg during the team's opening match against Australia, while Connell injured her hip during the match against India. Kycia Knight and Guyanese Subrina Munroe replaced the pair for the rest of the tournament.

Kycia keeps her place in the squad for the Sri

squad, Courtney Browne, chairman of the CWI selection panel, said “The final squad as we mentioned previously, would have been based on a strong work ethic during the training camp that was held over the last couple of weeks.

“Focus was also placed on selecting a balanced squad, noting that some of our key players are all-rounders. We have maintained a core group of players that have performed before for

see more players taking responsibility for team performance, thus realising more of a team effort in winning matches.”

The three ODIs will form part of the new round of matches in the ICC Women’s Championship which will be contested between the leading eight women’s teams in the World – the Windies and the Sri Lankans, along with Australia, India, New Zealand, Pakistan, South Africa and recently-crowned

World champions England from now until March 2020.

Following the conclusion of the ICC Women’s Championship, the top three ranked teams plus the hosts (New Zealand) automatically qualify for the ICC Women’s World Cup 2021.

The remaining four teams will have a second chance to qualify through the ICC Women’s World Cup 2021 qualifier.

The three ODIs will be played at the Brian Lara Cricket Academy, on October 11, 13 and 15. The results of all three will count towards the ICC Women's Championship, which is being contested by the top eight ODI teams in the world. The top three finishers in the Women's Championship will qualify automatically for the 2021 World Cup. West Indies women squad; Stafanie Taylor (captain), Anisa Mohammed (vice-captain), Merissa Aguilleira, Reniece Boyce, Shamilia Connell, Deandra Dottin, Afy Fletcher, Kycia Knight, Kyshona Knight, Hayley Matthews, Chedean Nation, Akeira Peters, Shakera Selman. Hendy Springer (Head Coach), Eugena Gregg (Team Operations Manager), Gus Logie (Assistant Coach), Ariane Mangar (Physiotherapist), Shayne Cooper (Fitness Trainer),

South American Youth Games 2017, Santiago Chile…

Jeffrey & Ramdhani eliminated T

he Guyanese Badminton players Priyanna Ramdhani and Tyrese Jeffery have now come to the end of their part at the 2nd South American Youth Games at Centro de Entrenamiento Olimpico Santiago Chile.

Priyanna Ramdhani after a good run through-out the Tournament to reach the Quarter Finals lost to PowerHouse Brazilian Sania Passos on Friday.

Leading up to this, Ramdhani had played in the Group Round Robin Singles winning 2 matches against Suriname & Chile but lost one Match to Peru.

She also teamed up with Tyrese Jeffrey in Mix Doubles winning against Panama one Match bust lost the other two Matches to Brazil and Chile.

Tyrese Jeffrey played well also but needs more international exposure which will happen as he attends more tournaments.

The Guyana Badminton Association (GBA) is extremely happy with the performances of these two players who played their all especially in this cold condition and high altitude.

The GBA would also like the thank the Guyana Olympic Association for giving us this opportunity to be at this Games and know that the experiences the players gained will benefit the future of Badminton in Guyana.

Olivia Rose Esperance (Performance Advisor), Gary Belle (Video Data Analyst).

Subrina Munroe last played ODI cricket in November 2014

All Youth Sport host 7-aside cricket tourney

A

ll Youth Sports Club of West Bank Demerara will on Saturday October 28 host their 7-aside 4 overs tape ball cricket competition with proceeds going to the restoration of the La Grange Primary School ground.

The one-day event will be contested on the School’s ground and teams hopeful of participating are required to pay an entrance fee of $7,000 while teams are allowed only up to seven players per side. Winners will receive spoils in the forms of cash and prizes and fans can also help themselves to BBQ which will be on sale at the event.

22

guyanatimesgy.com

sunDAY, october 8, 2017

Williams celebrates return with sweet victory

G

eron Williams marked his return from injury with a superb victory in the 13th annual Hand in Hand Insurance Companies Cycle meet at the inner circuit of the National Park on Saturday.

Returning to the local cycling scene after a month long layoff due to injury, Williams rode well and executed his game plan to perfection. He conserved energy in the early stages of the race despite being in the chasing pack.

In the early laps, Shaquel Agard and Paul DeNobrega led for quite a few laps with some distance between them and

the chasers; however Williams along with Raynauth “Obeah Man” Jeffrey, Kemuel Moses and Christopher “Chicken Legs” Griffith kept pace and eventually overtook them.

In the final laps, Williams kept his composure and held off Griffith in the sprint to claim the 35-lap Invitational race in a time of one hour 16 minutes 16 second while Jeffrey was third, Moses fourth, DeNobrega fifth and GDF’s Alanzo Ambrose sixth.

Speaking after the race, Williams said that the race was a test and was much faster than

GCB/Jaguars 3-Day Franchise League Round 6…

West Berbice thrash Georgetown inside 2 days

G

eorgetown suffered an 8-wicket defeat inside two days at the hands of West Berbice when round six of the ongoing GCB/ Jaguars 3-Day League continued on Saturday with matches across the country.

Georgetown vs.

West Berbice at Bush Lot Resuming on 226-8, West Berbice were knocked over for a 1st innings 231 thanks mainly to Shimron Hetmyer’s

Gudakesh Motie

131 as Georgetown off-spinner Gajanan Suknanan captured 5-75. Georgetown who were knocked over for a paltry 155 in the first innings, faced a deficit of 75 runs and failed to reach their target but were halted by leading-wicket taker this year Gudakesh Motie 5-35 and Andre Dutchin 3-55, who kept them to 151-10, handing West Berbice an 8 wicket win.

Upper Corentyne vs. East Bank at Port Mourant Ground Batting first, Upper Corentyne made 262 all out in 62 overs, after Clinton Pestano (82) and Eon Hooper (50), were he top-scorers. Spinner Totaram Bishun led the bowling for East Bank with 4-50 who were then bowled out for 240 in 87.5 overs with Sachin Singh (60) and Captain Ronaldo AliMohammed (55), staging a fight-back. Batting a

he had initially anticipated but nevertheless pointed out that he felt “good” after being out of action for a month.

He also highlighted that the competition level was right up there, Williams now sets his sights on the upcoming Kadir Mohamed Road race slated for next Sunday (October 15) where cyclists will compete for an ounce of gold.

Earlier in the day, Warren McKay claimed top spot in the Veterans’ U-50 five lap event

beating second placed Junior Niles and third placed Leer Nunes in a time of 11 minutes 48.49 seconds.

In the Juveniles 10-lap race, Nigel Duiguid held off Briton John and Marcus Keiler to win the race in 23:26.42s while Shane Bourne was the first to cross the finish line for the mountain bikers.

John Niles triumphed in the

BMX Boys’ 9-12 years-old 3-lap race while Michael McKay and Mariel McKay were second and third respectively. In the same event but in the 12-14 yearsold category, Taram Gobordan took top honours while Marvin Knights and Ezekiel McKay were second and third respectively. (Michelangelo Jacobus)

GCA/Noble House Seafood 2-day cricket

TSC leave DCC on the ropes

– Mohamed falls short of ton for Everest

Akshaya Persaud

second time, Upper Corentyne surged to 201-0 from 49 overs, leading by 223 run compliments of opener Kandasammy Surujnarine who cracked 109* and his partner Balchand Baldeo 75*. Lower Corentyne vs. West Demerara at Young Warriors Ground Tevin Imlach stroked 119, while skipper Akshaya Persaud (61) and Richie Looknauth (45*) helped West Demerara pile on 331 all out in 126.1 overs against Lower Corentyne who ended day two on 146-8 form 74 overs.

Batsman Alex Algoo was 61 not out heading into the final day with their team 185 runs behind. Lower Corentyne’s bowling was spurred by Karan Arjpaul who snapped up 4-56, Kassim Khan 3-81 and fast-bowler Raun Johnson 2-101. Essequibo vs. East Coast at Tuschen Ground East coast Demerara batted first and made 289 with Rajendra Chandrika stroking an attractive 68 and got support from Joshua Persaud with 56 and Brian Sattaur 51.

Anthony Adams was the pick of the bowlers for the hosts with 6 for 81 while Neland Cadogan grabbed 2 for 55 and Akanni Adams 2 for 73. When stumps were drawn, Essequibo were 5 without loss still trailing by 284 runs.

A

n eventful opening burst from Transport Cricket Club (TSC) right-arm pacer Mark Baptiste has restricted hosts Demerara Cricket Club (DCC) to 25 for 4 in pursuit of 151 for first innings honours when the Georgetown Cricket Association (GCA) Noble House Seafood Second Division twoday cricket resumed on Saturday.

The spritely Baptiste removed Brandon Jaikaran (00), Alphius Bookie (01) and Nkoise Beaton (01) to end the day with figures of 3 for 6 from six overs. Off-spinner Joel Spooner removed Premsham Gansham for 16 (2x4s) who looked the most assured of the batsmen.

Dexter George (03*) and Reaz Ally (01*) will resume the fight today.

Earlier, the early morning showers delayed the start of play. When action got going around mid-day, DCC’s new-ball pair of Carlton Jacques (2-14) and George (4-32) exploited the conditions and stunted any progress attempted by the visitors. Off-spinner Xavi Smith also supported with 2 for 38. TSC’s 150 was achieved from Spooner with a gutsy 51 and Anthony Antonio (30).

Over at Georgetown Cricket Club (GCC), the action got underway at 15:30h and at stumps University of Guyana reached 101 for 6 at stumps against Malteenoes Sports Club.

After losing their first wicket at 35, irresponsible batting was the fail grade of the day. Keron Sewrignarine 21 (4x4s) and Devon George unbeat-

Dexter George (left) and Reaz Ally leave the field after a difficult afternoon for DCC

en on 26 (2x4s) played a counter-attacking partnership after their team slipped to 60 for 5. Captain Melry Stephenson made 19 at the top of the order.

Seamer Carlie Collins and spinner Marcus Watkins each took two wickets a piece.

At Camp Road, home side Everest Cricket Club were bowled out for 213 against Georgetown Cricket

Club (GCC) as Saheed Mohamed fell agonisingly short of a much deserved century. Mohamed’s 97 included five sixes and eight fours.

Dwayne Adams supported with 33 (3x4s; 2x4s). For GCC, left-arm spinner Stephon Wilson was the chief wrecker with 4 for 25 while Marlon Persaud took 3 for 64.

Action in all three matches continue today.

guyanatimesgy.com

sunDAY, october 8, 2017

23

EBFA/Ralph Green U-11 League Fate of Berbice cricket Mocha Champs oust Diamond to be

decided today W

ho will be the new head of Berbice Cricket? The answer will be known today as the Board hosts it elections at the Classic Hotel and Suite in Corriverton from 10:30h.

Based on reports coming from the ancient county, former vice-president Dhieranidranauth Somwaru is the only confirmed candidate. Speculation still surrounds whether Hilbert Foster, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Rose Hall Town Youth & Sports Club (RHTY&SC) will place his hat in the race.

However, it is understood that prospective candidates can still confirm their interest this morning.

More so, the returning officer will be elected today at a by-election by member clubs. Member clubs will need to show documents to verify their legitimacy as they seek to enter the venue.

In all, 11 Clubs and three Associations should be voting. The following clubs after consultation with their membership has elected the following delegates to represent them at the meeting; For Canjie Hospital Club: Jevaughn Stephens and Desmond Conway; Rose Hall Community Centre Cricket Club: Cecil Beharry and Ameer Rahaman; Guymine Sports Club: Albert Smith and Malcolm Peters; Chesney Cricket Club: Imran Khan and Narine Deonarine; Kildonan Cricket Club: Qualis Winter and Colin Bynoe JR; Blairmont Cricket Club: Shabeer Baksh and Vijay Farhad; Berbice Police Sports Club: Kewis Gravesande and Philbert Wilburgh; Mount Sinai Cricket Club: Jaipersaud Hardeo & Neil Rudder; Upper Corentyne Cricket Association: Dennis De Andread, Sydney Jackman, Chatterpaul Lionel & Lakram Lachman; Whim: Arnold Deosarran & Tameshwar Harinarine.; Berbice River Cricket Association: Jason Den Hart, Irving Lyte, Sheldon Bovell, Winston Lyte.

Each sub-association is entitled to four voting delegates while the clubs have two voting delegates each.

The October 8 elections will be the first since 2014.

D

ay five of the 2nd annual East Bank Football Association / Ralph Green sponsored Under-11 League at eth Grove Playfield, East Bank Demerara, produced some exciting results with one walk over being awarded to Samatta Point/Kaneville whose opponent, Agricola did not show up.

In the three matches played, Mocha Champs trounced Diamond Upsetters 3-0, Diamond United beat Friendship All Stars 2-0 while Herstelling Raiders halted the unbeaten run of Grove Hi Tech with a 2-0 triumph.

Mocha got their goals from Daniel Bradford in the 13th minute; Jamal Harry netted his four minutes later while the lone female player competing with the team, Kerry Boyce added her name to the score sheet in the 29th minute.

Diamond United were gifted two own goals in their win over Friendship while Herstelling Raiders’ goals were scored by Solomon Austin in the 7th and 20th minute.

WIFBSC AGM set for Guyana on Friday – Council to look 6 years ahead

T

he 2017 West Indies Full-bore Shooting Council (WIFBSC) will be hosting its Annual General Meeting (AGM) on Friday in Guyana, following the end of the 150th anniversary shoot which gets underway from October 9 at the Timehri Rifle Ranges.

Speaking with Guyana Times Sport on Saturday, WIFBSC Secretary Ryan Sampson confirmed that while the council will be having their AGM to plan ahead for the next six years, they will not be having elections of office bearers this year.

However, Sampson said the AMG which features affiliate members from; Antigua & Barbuda, Guyana, Trinidad & Tobago, Barbados, Jamaica and Bermuda; will discuss matters ranging from the 2019 Palmers tournament held in New Zealand to the hosting of future tournaments by its affiliates.

He also said the council will be placing heavy emphasis on the status of ammunition in the countries

as to better help maintain safety guidelines for the future while executives expected to be present at the AGM include; current WIFBSC President John Nelson from Jamaica, Treasurer Captain Bill King and Sampson who is the Secretary of the council.

Each of the six affiliate country members has a Vice-President along with members who will attend the AGM, with Guyana’s Paul Slowe representing as the Vice-President. Also, International Confederation of Full-bore Rifle Associations (ICFRA) Secretary General Phil Harrison is currently in Guyana and will be a part of the meeting to further update members on a number of topics regarding the fraternity. Meanwhile, shooters from across the globe have already begun to assemble in Guyana ahead of Monday’s start to the 150th anniversary championships and Sampson confirmed that while preparations have been challenging, the final result is something the GNRA members should

WIFBCS Secretary Ryan Sampson

be very proud of.

“We have put everything in place; we are about 90% confident we have the things the way we wanted them to be. Jamaica who were expected to arrive will not be a part of the shoot due to documentation issues,” said Sampson He also added that a few of the shooters from Canada and the Falkland Islands have commended the local body for their works done to ensure the ranges at timehri mirrored that of international standards, adding that the GNRA executives should be proud. “We did a good job preparation-wise and we pushed to ensure we do good job in showcasing Guyana,” he ended.

The tournament gets underway from 9:00h on Monday October 9.

Sports is no longer our game, it’s our business

SUNDAY, OCTOBER 8, 2017

guyanatimesgy.com

Williams celebrates return with sweet victory Pg 22

Comeback King! Geron Williams crosses the finish line ahead of Chistopher “Chicken Legs” Griffith

Fate of Berbice cricket to be Pg 23

decided today

Dhieranidranauth Somwaru

Hilbert Foster

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2 Sunday Times Magazine

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OCTOBER 8, 2017

Feature

A volunteer gives back to the elderly in providing love and companionship

By Ashraf Dabie

R

ecognising the need for special care by the elderly in Guyana, young entrepreneur Abbigale Loncke has created a service to fulfil these needs adequately.

However, for Abbigale, it is not just providing a service; it is about supplying love and companionship.

Abbigale began her career as a Care Officer in London, at the Orchard Lodge Resource Centre (secure prison for boys), while pursuing her degree back in 2006.

In 2011, she returned home (Guyana) and subsequently became the first counsellor at the Sophia Care Centre, mentoring an ex-

cess of 100 children who were attached to the institution.

During her time at the Centre, the passionate young woman managed to re-integrate over 40 of the young residents back into their respective communities.

However, after spending three years working with the children at the Sophia Care Centre, Abbigale was forced to make a difficult decision: leaving due to the deteriorating health of her grandfather, who was at the time living in her care.

Desperate for assistance in caring for her grandfather, Abbigale went on a search to find a facility that offered comprehensive care and support to the elderly, especially those requiring additional attention and even medical assistance.

It took two years of scouring the country for her to realise what she was looking is nonexistent.

Her unsuccessful search prompted her to establish a home care agency that aids families in providing care for the sick and elderly - the Community Health Care Agency, located in Georgetown.

In an interview with Sunday Times Magazine, Abbigale recounted the source of inspiration behind her passion in caring for the elderly. “After my grandfather fell sick and needed extra care at home, I decided to start an agency to help families, like mine, who were in need of care and support at home. From 2013 to now, we have rebranded into Community Health Care, which for us means taking care of the health of entire communities - physically, mentally, socially.”

Abbigale listed a few services that set her establishment apart in caring for the elderly: companionship care, dementia and Alzheimer care and support, personal/ grooming care, nursing care, live-in care and

assisted living care, where individuals can live in a facility with their peers and still maintain their independence.

“We also provide a ‘Meal on Wheels’ service, which delivers healthy meals daily to the homes of individuals in Georgetown, Berbice and Essequibo. All meals are pre-planned and we work with any health or medical restrictions,” she pointed out.

Abbigale noted that thus far the highlight of her career was participating in former U.S. President Barrack Obama’s Young Leaders of the America’s Initiative (YLAI).

This initiative provided the opportunity for the entrepreneur to be mentored by several well-established companies in the U.S. for a period of six weeks. It also exAbbigale Loncke posed the young activist to different business platforms and business models, which resulted in the restructuring her company and its objectives.

Stemming from her participation in the YLAI programme, the Agency has managed to pair its mission, which is to take care of Guyana’s most vulnerable individuals, with a strong social responsibility to give back to those who are in need of support. The company has grown to the extent where it is now able to offer employment to a number of women, and for this Abbigale is extremely proud.

Besides being a timely business initiative, the Community Health Care Agency has created a volunteer drive which welcomes members of the public to give of their time to elderly individuals who are alone and need assistance, but are unable to afford such services.

“We aim to be the leading agency for elderly care in Guyana. This means our programmes would continue to expand and our staff would continue to better the care we provide. Our next goal is to finalise the opening of our Day Care Centre for the Elderly. This would be a stateof-the-art facility fostering healthy daily lifestyles among Guyana's senior citizens.

We would continue to expand the reach of our services throughout Guyana to not only provide care, but also provide employment for women. By supporting Community Health Care Agency, you will be giving back in so many different beneficial ways,” Abbigale declared.

For more information, call 659-0239 or 617-9415 in Georgetown; 771-4529/6484302 in Essequibo; and 680-9307 in Berbice.

Also, visit Community Health Care Agency on Facebook.

In commemoration of the Month of the Elderly, observed internationally in October, Abbigale said her Agency is offering a special 15% discount on all services that cater for the needs of the elderly.

Sharing a light moment at the Agency

guyanatimesgy.com

OCTOBER 8, 2017

Sunday Times Magazine

3

Times Focus

Y

akarinta and Kwaimatta are two scenic villages in the North Rupununi where the indigenous villagers hold true to their traditions.

Yakarinta is closer to Annai, and Kwaimatta to Karanambu Lodge – all in the North Rupununi region.

Yakarinta The area that is now Yakarinta was known as “Konowaije” by the Makushi people; named after a bush in the area. The Carib people called that same bush “yakarmiti”, which is the name the village originally came from.

The first Makushi person who came to the area was Charley Brown. He came from north of Yakarinta. Later Sidney Benjiman, a fellow Makushi, ended up joining him in the area during a trip to Georgetown. Later other settlers from Pikiriikire came and joined the area. At this point, the community was largely controlled by the Anglican Church.

The community has now grown into a village in the

Rupununi, Region Nine, and mostly speak Wapichan.

In Yakarinta, there is a nursery and primary school, health post, church, women’s sewing centre, village office, teachers’ quarter, guest house and a community centre.

Kwaimatta Kwaimatta means “the place”.

Kwaimatta started out as an outstation of Kwaimatta Ranch. A few vaqueros (cowboy) families had resides near Kwaimatta and so it eventually grew large enough to become a satellite of Massara.

The people in the village speak Makushi.

In Kwaimatta, there is a health post, primary school, village office, teachers’ quarters and a hot meal kitchen.

Villagers in Kwaimatta engage in farming, fishing and hunting activities, while in Yakarinta villagers engage in farming, fishing, hunting, making bricks and crafts. (Info on villages from Ministry of Indigenous Peoples’ Affairs. Photos by Neketa Forde)

Tractor heading to Yakarinta

Yakarinta Primary

Tractor crossing river in Yakarinta

Houses in Kwaimatta

Kwaimatta Primary School

Scenic landscape in Yakarinta

4

Sunday Times Magazine

guyanatimesgy.com

OCTOBER 8, 2017

Feature

C

assava is a primary food source for most indigenous peoples of Guyana. Many indigenous groups eat cassava in the form of cassava bread and farine, as well as regularly manufacture fermented cassava beverages.

According to Terry W. Henkel in his study “Parakari, an indigenous fermented beverage using amylolytic Rhizopus in Guyana”, most indigenous cassava fermentations involve prolonged cooking and exposure to salivary enzymes as the method of initially breaking down the starch to sugars (amylolysis), which subsequently are fermented to ethanol.

Parakari is a more complex cassava fermentation using an amylolytic mold in place of salivary amylolysis. In other words, instead of chewing, indigenous peoples utilise fungus to break down starch to sugars.

While fermented beverage production is nearly universal among

B

efore the fishing rod of today, the indigenous people created ingenious fishing traps to sustain their daily lives. Some of these traps are extremely complex with one-way valves, bait chambers and floats, while others were primitively basic.

Nevertheless, all fishing traps had one common trait - all evidently adapted to specific functions and ultimately different species of fish.

According to the late Denis Williams in his book “Prehistoric Guyana”, “the second great petroglyph tradition of the Northern Amazonia is represented by the Fish Trap Series…” which show the frequency and importance of fishing in indigenous communities.

Fishing was good in those early times. As early as 2000BC, small bands of “hunter-gatherers”, as Williams described them, would fish in pools, rivers and streams in the “productive rainforest” to trap their next meal.

The stratification of food refuse at the Pedra Pintada rock shelter on the Parima River in Region Nine shows occupation there to have lasted between 2,000 BC and1, 000 BC. This ‘refuse’ was said to indicate the heavy reliance on fish, fresh water snails and various small reptiles and mammals. This is further exemplified by the exploitation of the Kassikaityu River (Upper Takutu-Upper Essequibo), as illustrated by the Kassikaityu petroglyphs, which indicated “four kinds of

indigenous Amazonians, parakari is unique among New World beverages because it involves the use of an amylolytic mold (Rhizopus sp., Mucoraceae, Zygomycota) followed by ethanol fermentation, he states.

Among the Wapishana of Aishalton village in the Rupununi whose fermentation process he studied, thirty steps were involved in parakari manufacture, and these he notes exhibited a high degree of sophistication, including the use of specific cassava varieties, control of culture temperature and boosting of Rhizopus inoculum potential with purified starch additives.

During the fermentation process, changes in glucose content, pH, flavour, odour and culture characteristics were associated with a desirable finished product. Parakari is the only known example of an indigenous New World fermentation that uses an amylolytic mold, likely resulting from domestication of a wild Rhizopus species in the distant

fish traps: the Maswah, Box Trap, Cylindrical Fall Trap and the Spring Basket Trap”.

Aside from selective harvesting, the different types of traps indicated location, design, and baiting procedure utilised by the indigenous community.

Fish trap locations also differed in accordance with various habitats. Certain traps were anchored on the river bed,

past.

Henkel states that only three of the tribes currently manufacture parakari: the Wapishana, Macushi and Patamona. Production of parakari among the Wai Wai, who live to the south of the Wapishana in extreme southern Guyana, was noted early in the 20th century but now has ceased due to suppression by missionaries.

In his study Henkel finds that the origins of parakari fermentations are lost in antiquity. The overwhelming prevalence of fermented beverages throughout Meso- and South American indigenous cultures indicates a long-term, pre-Columbian practice.

Parakari production, with its exceptional degree of microbial manipulation, certainly has a long history.

The Wapishana noted that the beverage has been around since the “beginning of time”; they have no cultural memory of a time without it.

Early stages in the preparation of parakari (Terry W. Henkel)

baiting procedure “evidenced by petrographic data” implies a “wide knowledge of the habits and haunts of various fish species and of their respective food preferences”.

Notably, the indigenous community was monitored in their fishing exhibitions to limit exploitation. According to Williams, “selective extraction was guaranteed by the imposition on a nearby rock exposure

A Spring Basket Fish Trap, a trap that pops out the water when a fish is caught

while others were supported on the platform of the water current or just below the surface, and sometimes barriers across waterfalls.

Fish trap locations and designs were specific to particular water bodies, depending on the geographic area, surface shapes and features. Not to mention, the indigenous fish traps and

of a range of fish traps known to be effective in taking particular species of a given pool”.

Hence, choosing a fish trap for fishing was crucial to the hunt, the species caught and the amount taken home at the end of a given fishing trip. (Information taken from “Prehistoric Guiana” by Denis Williams)

The Maswah, a trap that is usually placed where there is flowing water such as the bottom of a waterfall

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6 Sunday Times Magazine

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Sunday Times Magazine 7

Feature

I

n the eighteenth century, the authorities ordered each plantation owner to build and maintain a public road and bridges to connect to the two adjacent neighbouring plantations.

The original width of the roadway was 16 feet, but this was later increased to 36 feet, and rough red bricks, made from burnt clay, were used to surface it. This road was deemed a public right of way, and if the plantation owner refused to build or maintain it, the government authorities would carry out the task and then demand payment from him.

If he could not meet the payment, his land could be sold by the West India Company or the Berbice Association to recover the cost.

When the British took control in Guyana in the early nineteenth century, a Commissioner of Roads and Bridges was given the task of supervising

carry out the task.

The plantations which were purchased by exslaves after 1838 experienced early problems in raising money to maintain the public road and bridges, with the result that they were, at first, in a state of disrepair.

However, when these "proprietary villages" established forms of local government and levied their own local taxes, they were able to obtain funds to carry out maintenance.

Relatively swift movement along the coastal roadway was hampered by the rivers flowing to the Atlantic Ocean. Privately operated ferries, which included boats, barges and large rafts, moved people and good across until later in the nineteenth century when wooden bridges were built across the Boerasiri, Mahaica, Mahaicony, Abary, and Canje Rivers as well as the Anamoromise Creek flowing through No. 66 Village to the Corentyne

Since almost all the plantations were located on the coast or the lower river banks, the interior forest and savannah areas

Postcard shows roads in Georgetown in the 1890s

of goods arose. In March 1837, only twelve years after the first iron railway was built in England, the British colonial authorities commenced plans to build and operate a railway between Georgetown and the Mahaica River.

Early that month, government officials met with all the proprietors and representatives of the estates on the East Coast of Demerara to discuss the proposal of constructing the railway. This proposal received unanimous support since the estate owners felt that the railway service would drastically cut the expenses for trans-

Eventually, a joint stock company, the Demerara Railway Company, was formed to organise financing to run the entire operation.

The company, soon after, hired Frederick Catherwood, a British civil engineer with experience in the construction and operation of railways in England, to carry out the project. On his arrival in Guyana, he surveyed the East Coast route, and later he also mapped out the proposed line to be taken for a railway on the coastal area between the Demerara and Essequibo Rivers.

raise the required capital, two-thirds of the shares were acquired by investors in Great Britain and Holland.

The delay in raising capital forced the railway plan to be delayed until 1845, when legislation was finally enacted to regulate the constitution of joint stock companies for carrying on public works and to authorise the acquisition of land for such purposes. The passage of this legislation enabled the company to raise the required funds in London very quickly. A total of 100,000 British pounds was required, but the

Main street, New Amsterdam 1860

the maintenance of the public roads and bridges. Plantations that did not keep the public road in good condition faced the penalty of being sold to recover the cost if the government was forced to

River.

Governmentowned ferries continued to operate across the larger rivers (Essequibo, Demerara and Berbice) and large steamers were used to maintain this service.

had very few roadways, and the local Amerindian population used mainly tracks and pathways, or the rivers, to move from one settlement to another.

As the population grew, the need for the movement of an increased volume

View of roadway in Georgetown in 1900

porting sugar and other goods to Georgetown and, thus, reduce overall the cost of sugar production.

As a follow-up to this meeting, a committee was soon appointed to take responsibility for building the railway between Georgetown and Mahaica.

The main problem the company faced was that of raising the necessary finance in Guyana because many sugar planters claimed they were almost bankrupt as a result of the loss of their slave labour due to emancipation. Since they could not

company was able to acquire double that amount.

To be continued (Text from “The Guyana Story - From Earliest Times to Independence� by veteran retired Guyanese diplomat, Dr Odeen Ishmael)

8

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10 Sunday Times Magazine

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Home & Cooking

Recipe of the week

M&M’s

Popcorn Balls

Ingredients:

4 cups mini marshmallows 3 tbsp butter 12 cups popped popcorn, 8 oz bag colourful M&M’s lightly buttered is fine

U

se everyday objects you already have around your home to make creative storage and organising solutions for your bathroom.

Instructions: In a heavy bottom pot on low, melt butter.

Add marshmallow and cook until melted, stirring occasionally.

Add popcorn and stir to coat. Mix in M&M’s. To form the balls, grease hands with butter the form popcorn into balls.

Insert a paper straw in the middle and press around the straw.

Wrap in colourful wrappers and tie with decorative string or ribbon!

Note: M&M’s may melt a little from the heat, that’s a good thing! You can reserve some to add on the outside while forming the balls.

Makes 8 (Photo and recipe from www.jehancancook.com)

Repurpose a muffin pan in the bathroom as a handy tray for toiletries that you can bring by the tub for at-home pedicures, or place a few tea light candles inside to set a serene mood for a bath.

Greatest Cooking Tips

Store raisins in an airtight container in the refrigerator, they will stay fresh for much longer. Pour very hot water over them if they have hardened; after that drain them immediately, and spread on a paper towel to dry.

Potatoes soaked in salt water for 20 minutes will bake more rapidly.

Don't salt meat before you cook it. The salt forces the juices out and impedes browning. Instead, salt meat halfway through cooking, then taste when the meat is done and adjust the salt as needed.

Dry food well with paper towels before adding to the pot; it helps reduce splattering.

Whenever barbecuing, use tongs to turn the meat. A fork should never be used for it will punch holes in the flesh and allow the natural juices to escape and loose flavour, and become chewy.

A wine rack in the bathroom is a clever way to keep a few towels right at hand. Simply roll up towels and place bath towels on top and smaller hand towels and washcloths in the spaces below.

Home Help At the first sign of a tear in your pantyhose/tights, run the brush of your clear nail polish on top. This will prevent the run from getting bigger or longer.

Even though patent leather is a popular shoe material, it's prone to dark, distracting scuffs. All you have to do is rub a cotton swab with petroleum jelly on top to remove the mark.

To remove turmeric stains, wash the stained clothes or kitchen linen immediately in cool water and soap. Dry in the sun and the stain will fade to a very pale pink. Wash the article again and the stain will be gone.

Cut a lemon in half, squeeze juice into a small bowl of water, add both lemon halves and place in the microwave for five minutes. The fresh scent eliminates cooking odours, and condensation from the steam loosens random splatters that have hardened. Wipe away the loose stains with a damp cloth.

Fill a spray bottle with white vinegar to clean chrome and stainlesssteel fixtures, and to remove scum, grime and mildew from your bathtub, tile or shower curtain.

A small crate can be reused as stylish shelves in the bathroom. The wood crate will add a rustic style to your loo — and create an open shelving solution for bath salts, big bottles of shampoo or even a pretty vase of fresh flowers.

12 Sunday Times Magazine

OCTOBER 8, 2017

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Puzzles

Crossword

1

6 11

16 21

22

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25 26

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109 Links cry ACROSS

110 Wolfgang's thanks Misbehave (2 wds.)

111 Broadway production Poisonous snake 115 "Gross!"

Rainout-proof

116 Foreign visitors?

Fragrant shrub

117 Prudential competitor Glistened

118 Chinese takeout freebie (2 wds.)

-- incognita

119 Burger side Ally opposite

121 Midnight -Ring-shaped island

123 NW state Jane or Henry

125 Posh hotel lobbies Fundamental

126 Sell stolen goods DeGeneres sitcom

127 Support a church Myopic Mr.

128 Put the finger on Kind of rug

129 Coal strata Lingerie buy

130 Lost a lap Stellar review 131 Risk a ticket Belly dance instrument

132 Kind of cab Boot camp arrival

133 Platitude Predatory whales Knight's counterpart DOWN Boundaries

1 In re (2 wds.)

RR terminal 2 Odd job Alexander sobriquet

3 Popular mixer Dieter's unit

4 Beneath the waves Monica of tennis 5 Goobers Storybook elephant 6 Ready to swing? (2 wds.)

Big stack of firewood

7 Good buy Compelling 8 Rx givers Merry sound (hyph.)

9 Citizen of Asmara Fairylike

10 Indy participant Do pull-ups

11 Legal papers Sirius (2 wds.)

12 Nothing but Turkish title 13 "Alice" diner owner Strong brown paper

14 May birthstone Kublai - 15 Ball of fire Stoic founder

16 Flimsy, as an excuse 1040 pro

17 Give -- -- try Comeback

18 Sign in (2 wds.)

Duffel filler 19 Spoken Slight indication

20 Lumps of clay Every now and - 30 -- Maria Treeless region

32 Not "dis," in Brooklyn Bireme movers 74 Recognized

34 Border state Pleads humbly

75 From Basra

37 Electron's course Secret rendezvous 76 Ship's officer 38 "Rats!"

Mark of Zorro

77 Mukluk wearer

39 Cartoon shrieks Lens openings 78 Gap between mountains

41 Faux pas RV haven

80 Troublesome joints

42 Invent a word Balearic resort isle

81 French Legion caps

43 "Othello" heavy Pocket bread 82 Burro alternative

44 Mentally acute Of a historic time

83 Organic compound

45 Willing, plus Part of a fist

85 Angers (2 wds.)

46 Dalai Lama's city Gossipy Barrett 86 Hertz competitor

47 Like one who's seen it all 87 Berets Boxcars, in dice

48 Blacken a steak Mrs. Shakespeare

89 Conductance units 50 Scratchy Skin diving devices

90 Shrill barks

51 Ponytail sites Tempe inst.

91 Market worth

52 Research funds Jam or pickle

94 Cheat sheet 54 Els or Kovacs Jacques -- Cousteau

95 -- or less

55 Called on the carpet 96 Ordinary Looks at 56 Lairs Apply makeup 97 Varied

58 Where Hawkeye served Brunch orders

99 Root vegetable

59 Deborah of old films Hotel staffer 100 In operation

60 Changes direction Paraffin-based 101 Tapioca source 63 It's often delivered Impromptu screwdriver 103 Gives a leg up

64 Earth, personified Lead-ins 104 Mobster's piece

65 Sock part Fizzy drinks

105 Very, in Veracruz 66 Pursue Cameos, maybe 106 Snits

68 Decides on Franck or Chavez

107 Wading bird

69 Hillside, to Angus Weather map lines 108 Zoo heavyweight 70 Barnstorms Meditation guides

110 Faked out the goalie

72 Objectives Dallas cager

111 Apt to sulk

73 Coffee brewers Medicinal plant

112 Pope's council

KATHLEEN SAXE

WORD GAME TODAY'S WORD -- RELIGIOUS (RELIGIOUS: rih-LIJ-us: Having or showing belief in God or another deity.)

Average mark 45 words Time limit 60 minutes Can you find 75 or more words in RELIGIOUS? rile rise rogue roil role rose roue rouge rouse rugose rule

ruse egis ergo euro lieu liger ligure lire loge logier lore

lories loris lose loser lour louse lousier lues luge lure iris

isle girl glories glue goes gore gorse grilse grouse gruel guile

guise ogle ogler ogre oiler oilier orgies oriel osier ours uglier

urge user sego sigil silo sire slier sloe slog slue slug

slur soil sole sore soul sour suer sure surge

RULES OF THE GAME: 1. Words must be of four or more letters. 2. Words that acquire four letters by the addition of "s," such as "bats" or "dies," are not allowed. 3. Additional words made by adding a "d" or an "s" may not be used. For example, if "bake" is used, "baked" or "bakes" are not allowed, but "bake" and "baking" are admissible. 4. Proper nouns, slang words, or vulgar or sexually explicit words are not allowed.

113 Breezing through

114 New-car option

116 Not wasted 117 Throb

118 "-- Come Undone"

120 Environmental prefix 122 Devoured

124 Rock-band need Solution on Pg 13

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Sunday Times Magazine 13

Tech

Tech news

Your smartphone is making you cranky

Apple iPhone X camera, Face ID ‘years ahead of Android competitors’

B

ritish scientists claim to have pinpointed at least one of the causes of your bad moods: your smartphone.

Nearly a third of notifications from your smartphone trigger negative emotions, making you feel more hostile, upset, nervous, afraid and ashamed than you were before picking up your phone, according to a newly released study from Nottingham Trent University.

According to the researchers, the main culprits were notifications related to work, as well as those related to phone updates and Wi-Fi availability.

“It is clear that social notifications make people happy, but when they receive lots of work-related and or non-human notifications, the opposite effect occurs,” Dr Eiman Kanjo told UK newspaper The Telegraph.

Indeed, notifications from friends buoyed participants’ moods, and helped foster feelings of belonging to a group.

To gather the data, the scientists invited participants to download an app that would collect information about their phone’s notifications over a five-week span.

In all, the scientists observed 50 participants as they received over half a million notifications over a five-week span, self-reporting their reactions in a questionnaire three times a day.

Tech news

T

T

Phil Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of worldwide marketing, announces features of the new iPhone X, including Face ID

HE Apple iPhone X, set for release on Nov. 3, is “years” ahead of its Android competitors, it has been claimed.

A celebrated Apple expert called Ming-Chi Kuo said that the gadget’s advanced facial recognition system would not be matched on Android phones for up to two and a half years.

The X features a system called Face ID which

Netflix is raising its prices

he company is raising the prices on its standard and premium streaming subscription services.

The standard service, which allows customers to stream shows and movies in HD on up to two screens at once, is now priced at US$10.99 monthly, up from US$9.99. The premium service, which provides viewing on up to four screens (plus ultra HD content access), is US$13.99, up from US$11.99.

The basic service, which enables Netflix streaming on once screen and doesn't allow

for HD or ultra HD viewing, will remain at US$7.99.

But the price change, first reported by Mashable, won't impact existing members yet.

According to a Netflix spokesperson, users will be notified of the new prices based on their billing cycle and will a get 30-day notice before the changes take effect. Netflix will begin notifying members of the change on October 19.

"From time to time, Netflix plans and pricing are adjusted as we add more exclusive TV shows and movies, introduce new product features and improve the overall Netflix experience to help members find something great to watch even faster," the company said in a statement.

The increases come as the company pours more money into developing original programming. The company has committed US$15.7 billion to streaming content deals -with US$6 billion earmarked for 2017 alone. (CNN)

order the gadget will have to wait weeks or even months to get their hands on one.

But according to the reliable Apple website, 9to5Mac, Kuo said the “outlook for 2018-2019 iPhone growth is still positive”.

It wrote: “He adds an estimate that Android devices are now likely 1.52.5 years behind Apple when it comes to matching its TrueDepth camera experience.

“If this pans out, this could put Apple in a better position to continue its iPhone growth by giving users more reason to switch from Android.”

unlocks the device by scanning its owner’s face.

It is particularly clever because it uses Apple’s TrueDepth camera to scan the face in three dimensions, making it significantly more secure than competing models which only use 2D images and can be fooled by showing the

Tech news

A

Crossword Solution

phone a picture of its owner’s lovely mug.

Kuo is quoted as saying that this system is so far ahead of the competition that it could prompt Android lovers to become iPhone users.

He also reportedly claimed that the production process required to build the X was very tricky, meaning that Apple may not be able to build enough smartphones to match sky-high demand.

This could mean that people who don’t pre-

Hundreds of new emojis are coming to your iPhone soon

pple's iOS 11.1 update, coming soon, will include hundreds of new emojis.

Apple teased the emojis back in July, only noting at the time that they would be available later this year.

Highlights include a new "love-you" gesture that's based on the American sign language symbol, new smiley faces, gender-neutral emojis, a trench coat and mythical creatures, Apple said.

The new symbols are part of a standard called Unicode 10, so users on other platforms such as Android should eventually

Tech TIP

expect to see them in some form, too.

Apple said beta testers will see the new emojis next week in developer and pub-

lic beta versions of iOS 11.1.

In addition to iOS, they will be available on watchOS for the Apple Watch and macOS. (CNBC)

How to Delete Your Google History

I

f you are a little nervous about just how much information Google's services have on you, follow this quick guide to deleting data and history.

First, head to the main page (https://myactivity. google.com) to find your Google history and data.

Then, pick what data you want to look at. To access this, click on the three lines at the top left corner of the page.

You have the options of looking at: web and app activity, voice and audio activity, device information, location history, YouTube watch history,

and YouTube search history.

After you pick one, peruse what information the service has about you. You need to decide whether or not you want that information gone.

If you do want that information and data deleted, click the three dots on the top right corner of the page. Select the

"Delete" option.

You can decide how much of your information you want gone. You can choose from "today," "yesterday," and "advanced," where you can pick from "4 weeks" or "all time."

Select your choice and, voila, your history and data should be gone.

14 Sunday Times Magazine Bollywood/Hollywood

A

mid growing incidents of selfierelated deaths, Bollywood megastar Amitabh Bachchan advised people to be cautious while clicking selfies.

“While taking selfies many people met with an accident and therefore, we should remain cautious whenever clicking selfies,” he said.

He added: “Wherever we go, we normally click 10-12 photos, but still we say that one selfie is must...” (PTI)

Karan Johar announces new film

F

ilmmaker Karan Johar has announced a new film under his banner, Dharma Productions. The film will be titled “Good Friday” and be co-produced by Fox Star Hindi.

Abhishek Varman, who directed “2 States” - the Bollywood adaptation of Chetan Bhagat’s book by the same name, will direct “Good Friday”.

Karan Johar tweeted the announcement Friday afternoon. “DHARMA collaborates with FOX STAR STUDIOS and SAJID NADIADWALA directed by ABHISHEK VARMAN ...APRIL 19th,2019 #GoodFriday,” he wrote.

He also put to rest all rumours about the star cast of the film: “The FINAL cast of this collaboration will be put out soon along with the title All rumours of story and other details circulating are FALSE!” (Hindustan Times)

Deepika Padukone: ‘I’m not over depression completely’

A

ctress Deepika Padukone said her battle with depression in the past has been "such a bad experience" that she always carries a fear of relapse. The 31-year-old actor was interacting on the stigma surrounding mental illness at the India Economic Summit held recently.

"I don't think I can say that I'm completely over it (depression). There is always a fear at the back of my mind that I might have a relapse because it has been such a bad experience for me," Padukone said.

When asked whether opening up about depression had cost her movie roles, Deepika said she was unsure but there might have been some producers who did not approach her.

"Maybe there are peo-

Iggy Azalea sued for unpaid credit card bills

I

t seems like Iggy Azalea has been living her life way too fancy. American Express filed a lawsuit against the rapper for failing to pay off her credit card balance that exceeds US$300,000.

According to documents obtained

by TMZ, the credit card company also states that the total amount is US$250,000 more than her preset limit, which was issued to Azalea two years ago. Unfortunately for her, American Express expects the 27-year-old rapper to pay the full amount as well as its legal fees.

It's been a tough year for Azalea, who voiced her frustrations over her upcoming album "Digital Distortion".

After Def Jam CEO Steve Bartels said that he wanted to hold off releasing new singles for the album, now the release date of "Digital Distortion"

has been stuck in the purgatorial state called "coming soon." On July 8, Azalea opened up about the status of

ple who haven't offered me films because they think I was depressed and I can't act. Maybe, I don't know.

I'm in a good space because I can choose the movies that I want to act in, but I don't think everyone has that luxury of where they want to work or when they want to work," she said.

Batting for the introduction of mental health as a part of the curriculum in schools across the country, she said the idea will help do away with the stigma attached to it.

"A large part of the stigma comes from the fact that we (just) talk about physical education in schools. I had physical education in my school, but we didn't have anything to talk about mental health. It's not a part of the curriculum. If we in-

C

about him and dragged his former film release, “Baywatch”, in the process.

According to Variety, the ninth installment of the franchise was initially scheduled to debut in theaters on April 19, 2019, but Universal Pictures has decided to push it back a year. The stu-

cluded that in the curriculum and introduced the idea or the importance of mental health at school level, there will be no stigma," the actress said.

Deepika, who is also the founder of Live Love Laugh Foundation, said policymakers and people at workplaces need to recognise and normalise depression so that those suffering from such mental illnesses could come out and confide without the fear of losing their jobs.

Elaborating upon her decision of going public with her battle with depression, Deepika said, "I didn't think about the repercussions. The idea really was to change the way people in India and the world see mental illness". (PTI)

her upcoming album. "Steve Bartels says he doesn't want to release another single for my album unfortunately. So that's that," she wrote on her official Twitter account.

Also, her tour was cancelled due to the outline backlash over cultural misappropriation and disrespect. She also broke up with NBA guard Nick Young even though they were already engaged. Moreover, her debut full length album, "The New Classic", was pushed back several times after singles such as "Team" and "Mo' Bounce" failed to receive the same amount of success as "Fancy". She was also supposed to be releasing a music video for her collaboration with Brazilian singer Anitta. However, "Switch" music video was leaked and resulted in the cancellation of the release. (AceShowbiz)

T

yrese has made his gripe with Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson public information when he took to Instagram on multiple occasions to warn him not to go forward with filming a spin-off film based on his “Fast & Furious” character, Hobbs.

Now, after being ignored by the A-list actor and rejecting his email, Tyrese has returned to the keyboard and this time he's slamming Johnson for apparently causing the delay of the next installment in the franchise.

The singer/actor took to Instagram to reveal the news that the upcoming “Fast & Furious” film has been delayed by a year — now being released in April 2020.

In a now signature lengthy caption, Tyrese directly addressed Johnson, accusing him of making the franchise all

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OCTOBER 8, 2017

dio, however, did not disclose the exact reason for the delay.

This all comes on the heels of Tyrese's one-sided threats to Johnson, where he claims his agreement to film a Hobbs film, solo, is what caused the scheduling shift. (BET)

hris Hemsworth talked about his marriage to Elsa Pataky. In his cover story for the latest issue of GQ Australia, the “Thor” actor admitted that his skyrocketing career had taken a toll on their relationship and he admitted that his wife sacrificed more than he did.

"My wife and I fell in love, had kids, didn't really see each other for a few years, then fell back in love," he said.

"In terms of work, [Elsa has] certainly given up more than I have. She'd like me to step back and be at home with the kids more, and of course, I want that too. But I feel like I'm at this crucial point in my career - I've just got to set up for longevity or I'll slip off.”

"Once you have children, every instinct and every moment of your time is consumed by that. You've got nothing for each other," he revealed. "So, make sure you have date night even if it's once in a blue moon, because most of the time you're just too tired and you'd actually prefer to sleep."

Chris Hemsworth and Elsa Pataky got married in December 2010. They have a daughter born in 2012 and twin sons born in 2014.

The Aussie actor was last seen on the big screen in "The Huntsman: Winter's War" and "Ghostbusters" in 2016. He will next appear as the God of Thunder in "Thor: Ragnarok" and then reprise his superhero role in "Avengers: Infinity War". (AceShowbiz)

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Sunday Times Magazine 15

16 Sunday Times Magazine

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Fun Times

Archie

ARIES Look for new job opportu(March 21- nities. Update your resume to April 19) fit current trends in your industry. Apply for jobs, attend a networking conference and explore new possibilities.

Make positive changes to

TAURUS your appearance or demean(April 20- or. Participating in events or May 20) socializing with friends will improve your personal life.

Romance is highlighted.

GEMINI (May 28June 20)

Emotions will be difficult to control if you get into excessive situations. Make moderation your goal, regardless of what others decide to do. You don't have to overdo it to have fun.

Do something relaxing or

CANCER make plans to enjoy a quiet (June 21- day with a loved one. Romance, July 22) family fun and personal improvements are favored. Let your actions speak for you.

LEO (July 23Aug. 22)

Dilbert

Peanuts

Self-improvement will boost your confidence and help you get ahead personally and professionally. Update your resume or put together a proposal that will secure your position and future.

VIRGO (Aug. 23Sept. 22)

Socialize, travel or spend a romantic day with someone you love. You'll learn a lot about your family and friends if you discuss your beliefs, lifestyle and goals.

LIBRA (Sept. 23Oct. 23)

Work alongside people who have a plan and are reliable.

Who you associate with will make a difference to the outcome of a situation you face.

Don't be indulgent or overreact.

Taking a day trip or workSCORPIO ing toward a greater cause (Oct. 24- with a loved one will improve Nov. 22) your relationship and attitude. Use your imagination, and take in what life has to offer.

Revamp your resume.

SAGITTARIUS Someone will offer insight into (Nov. 23a way you can use your skills Dec. 21) that you hadn't thought of before. Do your research before you decide to change direction.

Commit from the heart.

CAPRICORN Personal contracts look prom(Dec. 22- ising. Concentrate on love and Jan. 19) improving your personal life.

Calvin and Hobbes

Walk away from unpredictable people or ventures. A romantic gesture will improve an important relationship.

AQUARIUS Work hard to make your (Jan. 20Feb. 19) relationships better. Be willing to negotiate and compromise. Personal gain will require cooperation.

PISCES Put your heart and soul (Feb. 20- into love, marriage and makMar. 20) ing the most of a partnership that means a lot to you.

Romance and personal improvements are highlighted.