NEWS

Kids play their mas

Vibrant and prompt are words that could aptly describe the 14th annual Junior Carnival Parade held yesterday at St Anthony’s College in Westmoorings. The parade was off to an energetic start as spectators and supporters came out in their numbers to view children vying for the top spot in the 17 categories. Costumes paid tribute to Calypso Rose (MacArthur Lewis) and veteran masquerader Curtis Eustace while other costumes focused on environmental safety and the importance of recycling. Read more here

20 held in raid at La Romaine

Po­lice blocked off streets in La Ro­maine, south Trinidad, for more than six hours yes­ter­day dur­ing a raid at a known drug traf­fick­ing zone. They ar­rest­ed 20 peo­ple, in­clud­ing sus­pect­ed gang­sters and drug deal­ers and seized an Uzi sub­ma­chine gun, three pis­tols, 74 rounds of 9mm am­mu­ni­tion, three kilo­grammes of mar­i­jua­na, eight grammes of co­caine and a blue po­lice op­er­a­tions jack­et. The raid was con­duct­ed by the Spe­cial Op­er­a­tions Re­sponse Unit (SORT) with aer­i­al sup­port pro­vid­ed by drones de­ployed by the Air Sup­port Unit. Of­fi­cers from the South­ern and Cen­tral Di­vi­sion Task Forces and Ca­nine branch en­tered homes, seized ve­hi­cles and or­der­ing sus­pects to lie on the ground. They blocked off sev­er­al streets, in­clud­ing Charles, Ethel, Claude and By­ron Streets. Read more here

POLITICS

Young worries about natural disasters

National Security Minister Stuart Young says among the issues that keep him awake at night are natural disasters and TT’s ability to mitigate risk and help in times of crisis. At the closing ceremony of the Humanitarian Aid and Disaster Relief Training workshop at the Trinidad Hilton last week, Young recalled challenges of coordinating the efforts of different agencies and maintaining communication with areas affected by flooding in Oropune last year. Read more here

Moonilal: Gov’t negligent in dealing with gangs

Op­po­si­tion MP Dr Roodal Mooni­lal has com­mend­ed Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Gary Grif­fith for his all-out war against gang­sters but said the lu­cra­tive con­tracts giv­en to gang lead­ers un­der the Row­ley ad­min­is­tra­tion is un­der­min­ing ef­forts to stop the gang war. In a state­ment yes­ter­day, Mooni­lal called on Row­ley to ter­mi­nate con­tracts with gang lead­ers and to take ac­tion against any min­is­ter who gave con­tracts to gang­sters. Iron­i­cal­ly, un­der Mooni­lal’s tenure as Hous­ing Min­is­ter in 2013, con­tracts were giv­en to known gang lead­ers, some of whom were ar­rest­ed by po­lice last week. Yes­ter­day, he main­tained: “Row­ley’s regime has been gross­ly neg­li­gent in deal­ing with the scourge of gang war­fare.” Read more here

BUSINESS

Massy outlook improves

This week, we at Bourse review the financial performance of Massy Holdings Ltd (Massy) for the first quarter of its fiscal 2019 year. We examine the company’s performance and give a brief outlook, considering some developments on the horizon. Read more here

REGIONAL

Time Come! - South Coast Highway Project Goes To Tender This Week

Five subcontracts valued at more than US$22 million are to go to tender this week for roadworks in St Thomas and Portland, according to government minister Daryl Vaz. This follows the allocation of more than J$8.4 billion in the 2019-2020 Budget. The Government made the allocation to fund its ambitious plan to rehabilitate more than 100 kilometres of roadways across the eastern end of the island. This represents the South Coast Highway Improvement Project (SCHIP), which has been in the pipeline for some time now. A subcontractor is to be selected by mid-March. Read more here

INTERNATIONAL

UK lawmakers: Facebook 'intentionally and knowingly' violated data privacy laws

UK lawmakers have accused Facebook of violating data privacy and competition laws in a report on social media disinformation that also says CEO Mark Zuckerberg showed "contempt" toward parliament by not appearing before them. The UK Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee said in a report published Monday that a trove of internal Facebook emails it reviewed demonstrated that the social media platform had "intentionally and knowingly" violated both data privacy and competition laws. Read more here

Pulwama attack: Four Indian soldiers killed in Kashmir gun battle

Four soldiers have been killed in Indian-administered Kashmir in a gun battle with militants, police say. The clash occurred in Pulwama district, where more than 40 Indian paramilitary police were killed in a suicide attack on Thursday, raising tensions between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan. A civilian and two alleged militants were also killed as Indian troops searched for suspects. Meanwhile Pakistan recalled its ambassador for consultations. Read more here

18th February 2019

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