NEWS
Rowley: Budget date close
Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley says the country is now awakened to the economic realities it faces. He made this comment yesterday before hinting that Finance Minister Colm Imbert could announce the date for the 2017/2018 Budget today in the House of Representatives. The House sits at Tower D of the Port of Spain International Waterfront Centre. With Imbert looking on as he addressed the post-Cabinet news conference at the Diplomatic Centre in St Ann’s, Rowley said there was an established practice whereby finance ministers announce budget dates. Read more here
Family seeks relative missing on island
Relatives of a Trinidadian woman who was living in St Maarten are now panicking and worried over their missing relative, who has now not been seen since Hurricane Irma ravaged the island last week. The family’s last form of communication with Aliyah Gill was via a Whats App message, when she chatted with one of her aunts, Jaliy Lah Lum Wai, 63, of Port-of-Spain, just one week before the disastrous hurricane made its landfall. Read more here
Irma survivor: Don’t take hurricane warning for granted
Hurricane Irma survivor Terrence Weeks returned to Trinidad on Wednesday night with a message for his fellow citizens—do not take a hurricane warning for granted, and God cannot help you. Weeks, along with his nephew, police officer Ricky Nicholas, returned from Tortola, British Virgin Islands, which was devastated by the Category five system. Read more here
POLITICS
Rudy: Floodgates will open in 2018
An Opposition MP is predicting that the retrenchment floodgates will be opened after the moratorium on retrenchment in the public sector ends on December 31. Member of Parliament for Couva South Rudy Indarsingh yesterday accused Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley of speaking with a “forked tongue” when he met with the Joint Trade Union Movement (JTUM) for several hours at his St Clair office in Port of Spain, on Wednesday. The announcement was made by JTUM’s president Ancel Roget and comes weeks before Government announces its budget for fiscal 2017/2018. Read more here
Khan gets ‘fake oil’ report from board
The final report of Petrotrin’s internal audit probe into the “volume discrepancy” allegedly involving the company and A&V Oil and Gas was finalised and being forwarded to Energy Minister Franklin Khan yesterday. Khan revealed this in the Senate in reply to Opposition queries on the Petrotrin audit report controversy revealed by Opposition leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar last weekend. Khan yesterday described it as a “volume discrepancy” issue. It has brought the Dr Keith Rowley administration into sharp focus particularly because of alleged players involved. Read more here
Jamette Talk
In a scathing attack, Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley yesterday accused Opposition Leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar of “jamettry”. Rowley slammed Persad-Bissessar for her treatment of the “fake oil” issue, coining the new term in the political lexicon to describe her behaviour. But in response to questions, the Prime Minister also admitted he knew “Mr Baksh very well”. Nazim Baksh is the owner of A&V Oil and Gas Ltd, the company at the centre of the Petrotrin fake oil fraud allegations. Read more here
BUSINESS
Digicel Foundation aids Development Centre
Digicel Foundation invested $1.2 million in the construction of Rio Claro Learning Development Centre for Special Children and urged the students not only to enjoy the school but also to take care of the facility. Delivering the feature address at the official launch of the Centre on Wednesday, Foundation CEO Penny Gomez noted that her company is purported to be the corporate champion for persons with special needs. “With a proactive principal and dedicated staff, we have been able to provide support to the school in varying areas. Three of our key programmes are the Therapy-based Education Programme, Aquaponics Programme and Preparing you as well as our inclusion activities - Carnival Kiddi Pump and our Play Unified fun day,” Gomez said. Read more here
JMMB Group CEO: T&T must diversify economy
JMMB Group chief executive officer Keith Duncan warned of the risks for T&T associated with having a non-diversified economy and called for an inclusive economic reform plan that would transcend political parties and governments. Duncan delivered the feature address an event jointly hosted by the JMMB Group and the T&T Chamber of Industry and Commerce titled, “A Look at Economic Development in T&T and the region.” held at the Hyatt hotel in Port-Of-Spain. Addressing members of the business community and other industry leaders, Duncan suggested that T&T could achieve economic transformaton by: establishing non-partisan oversight committees, making definitive decisions around foreign exchange policy and strategies, creating a more business friendly environment as well as leveraging the Heritage and Stabilisation Fund. Read more here
Scotiabank issues 'Phishing' warning to customers
Scotiabank is warning customers to be careful as unauthorised text messages are being circulated in the public domain requesting confidential information. The bank said such messages are fraudulent and are considered “phishing” Phishing, the explained is “a type of identity theft where criminals use emails to try to bait you into fake websites. Once there, you are asked to disclose confidential financial and personal information, like passwords, credit card numbers, access codes or social insurance numbers. The most familiar type of phishing scam is an email threatening consequences if you do not log in and take action immediately”, it stated. Read more here
REGIONAL
World's Oldest Woman Snatched
The world's oldest person, 117-year-old Violet Moss Brown, is caught in the middle of a tug of war between members of her family as one group that claimed that she was not getting the best of care has snatched her from her Duanvale, Trelawny home and refuse to say where she is. The family members with whom she had been living are now in a panic as they are unaware of her whereabouts. They said that she was taken by a relative to keep a medical appointment on Saturday, but she has not been returned to her Trelawny home. Read more here
INTERNATIONAL
Report: At WH dinner, Pelosi asked, 'Do the women get to talk around here?'
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi asked "Do the women get to talk around here?" during the White House dinner on Wednesday night over the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, according to a report in The Washington Post. The Post reported that during the dinner, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross asked the 11 people at the table -- including Pelosi, the only woman present -- what President Donald Trump got out of the deal made with Democrats on border security and DACA. As Pelosi tried to make her point that Trump would get support from Democrats on a variety of issues, the men at the table started talking over each other. Read more here
Parsons Green: Underground blast a terror incident, say police
15th September 2017