TTMA In The News
Over to the manufacturers
Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley’s address at the Trinidad and Tobago Manufacturers’ Association dinner and awards function last week was a clarion call to the country’s manufacturers. He appealed to this important sector of the national economy to expand its productive capacity and especially to boost its exports, hence its foreign exchange earnings. In a wide ranging speech titled “Manufacturing: the proven option for diversification” that cited buoyant economies like Singapore’s that used manufacturing as a base for diversification, he challenged local manufacturers to be innovative, to seize opportunities to market their products in Latin American countries with which successive governments have signed trade agreements over the past 15 years. “How many of our firms are producing and exporting the same items today as they were ten and twenty years ago?” he asked, making a case for innovation. Read more…
NEWS
$M Blaze in Central
Sixty workers of the Food Basket mega-supermarket store off the Uriah Butler Highway in Chaguanas are today without jobs after the sprawling business was gutted by fire of unknown origin yesterday afternoon. Although firemen using appliances from several fire stations were able to contain the blaze after a two-hour long battle, the supermarket was completely gutted even as the building itself remains standing. While no official word was forthcoming last night from the owners of the supermarket, firemen said that losses are estimated in the millions. According to a police report the fire started at about 3.15 pm at the warehouse on the upper level of the building. As plumes of thick, black smoke spread rapidly throughout the building, panic ensued and screaming workers scrambled out of the burning building. No injuries were reported. “It happened so fast. I was cashing downstairs then I heard someone shout out ‘fire fire, fire!’ I really did not know what was going on, but I saw everyone running out of the building,” said a 35-year-old employee. Read more…
New Arima Hospital downsized
Cuts were made to the cost of the construction of the Arima Hospital and the number of beds to be made available for patients, according to Arima MP Anthony Garcia. Speaking to members of the media after touring the hospital yesterday at Queen Mary Avenue in Arima, Garcia said the cost, which was at $1.8 billion, is now $1.2 billion. Some 15 per cent of the cost of the hospital will be provided by the Government. He said that 110 beds instead of 150 will now be available when the new hospital is completed by June 2018. “In my capacity as MP of Arima, I made a promise to residents of Arima that I will do all to ensure that the hospital is built and provide the much needed health facilities for residents in Arima,” he said. Garica said there were rumours circulating that construction came to a halt but he was happy to see labourers actually working. Read more…
Tobago training saved us $.9m
The Judiciary of Trinidad and Tobago has defended its decision to host a two-day seminar at a premium resort in Tobago last weekend at a cost of $1.7 million. Read more…
POLITICS
Orlando massacre in TT Mark: Dying by the dozens
Opposition Senator Wade Mark yesterday declared that the murder rate in TT within recent years, including the “murderous start to 2016”, was on the same level as the massacre at a nightclub in Orlando last Sunday which left 49 people dead and 53 more wounded. In his contribution to debate in the Senate on a motion to approve the Privileges and Immunities [CARICOM Implementation Agency for Crime and Security (IMPACS)] Order 2016, Mark charged, “In fact, the massacre that took place in America recently... they say its the bloodiest in its history... we have now gone through a period in this country...where it is the worst experience that we have had in the last few years.” Declaring that citizens of this country have been “dying by the dozens,” Mark said over 210 persons have been murdered in this country within recent times. “The majority of them have gone through gunfire,” he quipped. After asking where were the illegal firearms coming from, Mark seemingly answered his own question when he said the guns were “coming from porous borders.” While the People’s Partnership (PP) coalition was in government over the last five years, the then Opposition (now ruling) People’s National Movement (PNM) regularly criticised the PP for leaving this country’s maritime borders unprotected when it scrapped the offshore patrol vessel (OPV) agreement reached between the former Patrick Manning administration and BAE Systems to provide three OPVs for the Coast Guard. Read more…
Real story will come to light
While the ruling People’s National Movement has expressed disappointment at the situation involving former senator Hafeez Ali — after news of a sex tape involving him was leaked online — Ali himself says he is disheartened by some of the information “out there” about it and public comments about him. But while expressing disappointment at the situation yesterday, PNM chairman Franklin Khan said personally, colleagues were in support of Ali and would help him to “get the counselling he needs.” The respective parties — and others connected to the matter — spoke yesterday after Ali was replaced in the Senate following his resignation as senator last Friday. The 43-year-old Ali resigned after a social media video of him displaying sexually explicit behaviour surfaced online last week. Read more…
Dillon: T&T can be affected, threat of terrorism rising
Sunday’s gun attack on a gay nightclub in Florida, USA, which so far appears to be the deadly work of a “lone wolf”-type killer, has been condemned by National Security Minister Edmund Dillon, who yesterday warned Trinidad and Tobago should also be concerned. Read more…
BUSINESS
CIBC First Caribbean launches new mobile banking app
CIBC FirstCaribbean recently launched its new user-friendly mobile banking app for smartphones which is yet another innovation by the regional bank to provide customers with banking solutions that fit their lives. “The new mobile app joins a series of innovations introduced to help the bank’s customers determine the banking experience they want – in essence control over how and when they bank is entirely in the hands of the client,” said Trevor Torzsas, Managing Director of Customer Relationship Management and Strategy. Managing Director of the Trinidad and Tobago bank, Anthony Seeraj, said the app “was something our customers have been asking for and the initial feedback since its launch has been excellent. We are giving our customers here in Trinidad additional options when banking with us.” Torzsas said the new app “proves that CIBC FirstCaribbean is the bank that fits seamlessly into our clients’ lives. All the enhancements that we have put in place over the past two or three years are part of our promise to deliver innovative products and services that truly meet our clients’ individual needs.” “Banking that fits your life - that is what we are ultimately aiming to provide to all our customers and our products were the obvious place to start and our mobile banking app is just one of those innovations,” the bank executive noted. Read more….
First Citizens awaits rate hike decision
While she declined to offer a prediction about the repo rate, First Citizens Group CEO Karen Darbasie said the banking group is eagerly waiting the United States Federal Reserve’s decision on a rate hike. Her comments came as the Federal Reserve began its two-day meeting yesterday. Officials are widely expected to leave short-term interest rates unchanged at their meeting, following a dismal May jobs report. A decision on whether there will ne a rate increase is expected this afternoon when the Fed releases its latest policy statement and projections at 2 pm. Darbasie, who commented on the matter following a special shareholders meeting at the Trinidad Hilton and Conference Centre, said the bleak job report had raised doubts about the market and increased speculation on whether the US had succumbed to prolonged slump or is just on a brief pause. Darbasie said two months ago the Federal Reserve had suggested that interest rates might increase at this month’s meeting. Read more…
Caricom bets on renewable energy
Renewable energy (RE) or sustainable energy (SE), as it is also called, is all the rage in Caribbean energy policy circles these days, even in Trinidad and Tobago, which has been the last to jump on the RE and SE bandwagon because we have a surplus of oil and gas in the country, much of it sold at controlled prices. So the desire to transition out of fossil fuels into what is expected to be less costly RE has understandably been less urgent. Read more…
REGIONAL
New St Lucia cabinet sworn in
Newly-elected Prime Minister, Allen Chastanet, on Tuesday announced the members of his Cabinet, at a swearing in ceremony in Vieux Fort, Saint Lucia. Along with some portfolios being renamed and reallocated, Chastanet himself has taken on three major functions as minister with responsibility for finance, foreign affairs and the civil service, together with economic growth and job creation. Read more…
Speed guns, breathalysers in the works for St Vincent drivers
Speed guns and breathalysers could soon be seen on the roads of St Vincent and the Grenadines. Members of the Royal St Vincent and the Grenadines police force are said to be eagerly awaiting the change in the law to make both devices legal. The amendments to the Motor Vehicle Act will allow for drivers caught speeding or driving under the influence of alcohol to be prosecuted. The draft amendments are expected to be put on the order paper soon, and could receive the first reading at the next sitting of the House of assembly. At least 25 persons died from road accidents in St Vincent and the Grenadines in 2015. This includes seven students from the northern community of Fancy, who perished in what has become known as the Rock Gutter tragedy on January 12 last year. Read more…
INTERNATIONAL
Orlando nightclub gunman visited gay chat rooms, officials say
Orlando nightclub gunman Omar Mateen visited online gay chat rooms despite expressing outrage at the sight of two men kissing and making inflammatory comments about gays, law enforcement officials said. Investigators don't know whether he visited the chat rooms for personal reasons or for surveillance before carrying out the brutal attack early Sunday at the Pulse gay nightclub in Orlando, killing 49 people and wounding more than 50 others. Days after the attack -- the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history -- sources revealed he not only visited gay chat rooms, he also frequented the same nightclub he would eventually terrorize. A former colleague has said Mateen constantly made homophobic, sexist and racist remarks. Read more…
EU referendum: Osborne warns of Brexit budget cuts
15th June 2016