NEWS
Interns must work in primary hospital setting to specialise
The TT Medical Association (TTMA) has expressed concern about the lack of employment for qualified medical professionals, and in particular house officers in the public sector. The TTMA estimates there are close to 200 house doctors who continue to seek permanent employment. In a statement on Friday, the association said job security was no longer guaranteed to medical graduands. There were concerns by Health Minister Terrence Deyalsingh that specialist doctors were not easily sourced. To this end, the ministry has decided to send a team to Cuba to source specialist doctors to fill the need of doctors here. Read more here
Special training to benefit hearing impaired
As part of its effort to improve services for differently-abled students, the Ministry of Education recently completed a two-week sign-language exercise for 22 members of the Student Support Services Division. Officials said it was part of a wider initiative aimed at increasing the sign language proficiency of officers and coincided with the ministry’s thrust to cater specifically for students with special needs. Ten special education teachers recently participated in the Certificate in Teacher Orientation and Professional Development for Education of Deaf and Hard of Hearing Learners offered by the University of the West Indies in collaboration with Gallaudet University. Read more here
Maracas vendors protest: Newcomers getting keys to booths
Maracas Bay vendors, some of whom have been selling there for more than 40 years, are calling on the intervention of the State to ensure that they, too, are provided with new vending booths. Read more here
POLITICS
PM: I coming with my own slate
Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley has announced that he would not only be seeking re-election as the PNM's political leader but will be fielding his own slate of candidates in the party’s internal elections scheduled for September 30. “On the 30th of September, this party will be called upon under the one man one vote system to vote for who you want, not just to lead the party but to be the executive to run this party. I am putting you on notice that I intend to put my name forward to lead the PNM into the next term,” Rowley said yesterday. Addressing the PNM sports and family day at the Edinburgh 500 recreation ground in Chaguanas, Rowley told the crowd that while they had a right to vote for their candidate of choice, he also has a right to prevent “imps” whose only purpose is to destroy the party, from being elected. Read more here
PM invited to international ganja conference
Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley and members of his Cabinet have been invited to attend an international cannabis conference to be held in Jamaica next month, to help in their ongoing discussions on decriminalisation and possible legalisation of marijuana. Douglas Gordon, founder of CanEx Jamaica Business Conference and Expo, extended the open invitation to T&T’s policy makers during a telephone conversation with Guardian Media. The third annual CanEx conferences takes place in Montego Bay, Jamaica, September 27 to 29. Read more here
Don’t’ Threaten Me
“Don’t threaten me.” This was the warning issued yesterday by Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley to Oilfields Workers’ Trade Union (OWTU) president general Ancel Roget, who is set to kneel and pray in front the PM’s official residence in St Ann’s on August 26. Read more here
BUSINESS
Unions warned about looming job crisis
Labour leaders must be like politicians, seeking members’ interests only when they need them. That was the advice from Dr Andre Vincent Henry, director, Cipriani College of Labour and Co-operative Studies, at a forum on Social Protection hosted at the school’s Valsayn campus. “It cannot just be about every three years you do a collective labour agreement. I will submit to you that some trade unionists are like that, every three years they come to mobilise you to protest for a collective labour agreement,” he said. Read more here
C&W reports mobile decline
Regional telecommunications provider Cable & Wireless Communications (CWC), which operates in T&T as Flow, last week reported a decline in its mobile subscribers, but increases in its fixed-line and broadband Revenue Generating Units (RGUs). Read more here
REGIONAL
'We Want More' - Byles Rails Against Untapped Opportunities In Economy
Chairman of the Sagicor Group Richard Byles is questioning why Jamaicans are not being targeted for better paying positions in jobs that are being created in several sectors of the economy. Delivering the keynote address at Saturday night's St Ann Homecoming and Heritage Foundation's 13th Annual Awards Banquet at Jewel Dunn's River in St Ann, Byles acknowledged that over the past five years, economic progress has been made but stressed that much more needs to be done to set the country on firm economic footing. Part of that requires that Jamaicans are considered for more than just unskilled and semi-skilled positions in developments taking place locally. This in turn requires a massive training initiative, he suggested. Read more here
INTERNATIONAL
The utter collapse of Donald Trump's 'best people' boast
As a candidate, Donald Trump would famously boast that if elected, he'd "surround myself only with the best and most serious people" -- adding: "We want top-of-the-line professionals." The first 18 months of his presidency have repeatedly revealed the fallacy of that pledge, as myriad members of Trump's Cabinet and senior staff have departed -- often under suspicious circumstances -- even as the President himself has railed against the ineptitude of people who still work for him. Just this weekend, Trump dealt with two major staff problems -- both of which, in different ways -- he created. Read more here
Turkey takes action in bid to curb currency crisis
13th August 2018