NEWS
DPP to decide today on Shannon murder case
Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) Roger Gaspard SC, yesterday spent close to four hours with detectives from the Homicide Investigations Bureau perusing the case file in the murder of Republic Bank employee Shannon Banfield. Gaspard, Newsday understands, gave certain instructions to the officers who are to return to his office today where a decision is expected to be made on how the investigation should proceed. Newsday was told photgraphs, a flash drive containing video images taken from CCTV video footage and statements formed the nucleus of the case file submitted to DPP Gaspard. The DPP has been in constant communication with investigators since Banfield’s body was discovered last week Thursday in a storeroom on the third floor of the IAM & Co. Ltd store off Charlotte Street in Port-of-Spain. She was last seen alive shopping at Pennywise and then IAM & Co two Mondays ago. Read more here
'Missing woman': I was having a time.
Heather Barriteau, the woman at the centre of a fake abduction has confessed that she lied. "I was not abducted, I went on my free will and had a time for the weekend and that is it," she said in an interview from her husband's cellular phone. Asked to comment on his wife's admission, Devon Paul, said he did not want to comment. "That went way out of proportion," he said. Read more here
IAM worker said to be in low spirits
Port of Spain store worker Dale Seecharan, who remained in police custody yesterday, is said to be in a despondent and frustrated state. Seecharan, 38, was one of two employees of IAM and Company along Charlotte Street, Port of Spain, who were detained last Thursday as persons of interest into the death of 20-year-old bank worker Shannon Banfield. Around 10.10 p.m. on Sunday, after spending four days in custody, he was released from the Riverside Plaza office of the Homicide Bureau of Investigations. The St Helena man then went to his home, where he was greeted by family. His freedom was short-lived. Read more here
POLITICS
Build up, don’t kill and destroy
Reacting to the murders of WASA employee Nejie Jaja, 27, and Republic Bank Ltd employee Shannon Banfield, 20, Public Utilities Minister Fitzgerald Hinds yesterday urged young men to build up and create, rather than kill and destroy. Speaking after a press conference to announce the implementation of a 25 percent rebate on electricity bills $300 and under at the Ministry’s office in St Clair, Hinds noted that women now feel unsafe while walking the street, which should not be the case. On December 5, Banfield left her workplace at Independence Square to shop at Pennywise and IAM & Co Ltd but never made it back to her Santa Cruz home. On December 8, her body was found on a shelf in a storeroom on the third floor of IAM & Co Ltd’s Charlotte Street outlet, covered with cardboard boxes. Read more here
No National Test in 2017
There will be no National Test in 2017. Hundreds of parents and pupils yesterday breathed a sigh of relief as chief education officer in the Ministry of Education, Harrilal Seecharan, said, “We have taken the decision in the ministry to not go ahead with the National Test in 2017.” Announcing the decision during a press conference at the Ministry of Education, Port-of-Spain yesterday, Seecharan said the decision was based on concerns from a number of stakeholders. The decision arose during the national education consultations which took place in February, following which the recommendations were presented to and later accepted by the Cabinet. Read more here
Concern over herbal drug safety
Herbal medicines promising to “make you a harder man”, to cure diabetes and to make you lose weight “overnight”, which are being sold in the country, are not being tested by the Food and Drug (F&D) Division of the Ministry of Health. This disclosure caused concern at yesterday's meeting of the Joint Select Committee on Foreign Affairs, at the Parliament building, Tower D, International Waterfront Centre, Port of Spain. Read more here
BUSINESS
ECLAC: TT to grow by under one percent
The Trinidad and Tobago economy is expected to grow by 0.5 percent this fiscal year, an improvement from the minus 4.5 percent contraction in fiscal 2016, said a table accompanying a report launched yesterday by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC). “The Preliminary Overview of the Economies of Latin America and the Caribbean” was yesterday launched locally at ECLAC’s Portof- Spain office. The table also forecast top 2017 Caribbean growth in St Kitts/Nevis (5.3 percent) and Guyana (3.8 percent), while top Latin American growth could be in Dominican Republic (6.2 percent), Panama (5.9 percent) and Nicaragua (4.7 percent). Read more here
PoS stores suffer drop in sales
Businesses in Port-of-Spain have seen a significant drop in sales following the discovery of Shannon Banfield’s decomposing body at IAM and Company last Thursday. President of the Downtown Owners and Merchants Association (Doma) Gregory Aboud told the T&T Guardian: “There has been an effect on the overall performance of businesses in the city. We have made a request for a visible presence of the police in the city and we have had some positive response to that request. “We have seen an improvement in the visible presence of the police service since the incident and we are confident that safety and normal conditions will return to Port-of-Spain for Christmas.” Stacy McPherson, a supervisor Miguel Moses and Sons on Frederick Street, said the popular fabric store has had fewer sales in the last few days. Read more here
JMMB opens at South Park
The Jamaica Money Market Brokers (JMMB) Group has opened a branch at South Park mall in Tarouba, San Fernando. The group, which consists of JMMB Bank, JMMB Investments and JMMB Securities, held an opening ceremony on Monday at the location. Read more here
REGIONAL
Turks and Caicos goes to the polls
Now that the campaign noise is over, the voters of the Turks and Caicos Islands (TCI) will go to the polls on Thursday and choose their new government. As seems to be the case with all elections, this one is being touted by all sides as the most important in the British territory’s history. The governing Progressive National Party (PNP) is satisfied that it has fulfilled its promises – and some – and is ready to take the territory to “the next level”; the opposition Peoples Democratic Movement (PDM) naturally disagrees, and feels that “Enough is Enough – and It’s time for a change”, with a newly formed third party, the Progressive Democratic Alliance (PDA), calling for “A new beginning … United for Change”. While there has in the past been some wild swings, with both the PDM and the PNP at different times garnering all but two of the 15 seats, the voters appear to be split more or less equally between the two main parties. In the most recent 2012 general elections, while the PNP won with a single seat majority, the PDM won the popular vote, by just under 1,000. However, this time many local observers consider the waters more muddied than ever. Read more here
Tested Patience ...Doctors Regret Strain On Health Service
With the Government's free health-care policy, which was intended to deliver equal treatment and service to all citizens, backfiring, placing a crippling strain on staff and resources, one doctor, echoing the sentiments of her colleagues, says it's a reality that they regret. The Kingston Public Hospital (KPH), celebrating 240 years of existence, like every public health institution in the country, battles daily with limited staff, dwindling medical supplies, and a swell in patients seeking treatment. Senior medical officer at the KPH Dr Natalie Whylie said as she reflected on the institution's 240th year anniversary that it is a reality with which they struggle, but one that was inevitable due to limited human resource. "In the last 10 to 15 years, we have had a doubling of patients who come to the emergency room alone, without an expansion of the physical infrastructure. It is a very challenging place to work, and so that translates sometimes into difficulties in recruiting and retaining staff. If you have an increased demand for services and you have not matched that with a proportional increase in infrastructural support and manpower, it's going to translate itself into waiting time," she told The Gleaner during an interview on Monday. Read more here
INTERNATIONAL
China installs weapons on contested South China Sea islands, report says
New satellite imagery indicates that China has installed weapon systems on all seven artificial islands it has built in the contested waters of the South China Sea. It's a move that's likely to alarm the country's neighbors and further unsettle ties with the United States, where President-elect Donald Trump has shown himself increasingly willing to confront and challenge Beijing. The images, released by the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative, show anti-aircraft guns plus other weapons systems that would guard against cruise missiles sitting in hexagonal structures on the islands. China has already built military-length airstrips on three of these artificial islands, previous analysis by the AMTI, part of the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), has shown. China's Defense Ministry said the military installations were proper and lawful, and mainly for self-defense. "If others are flexing their military muscles at your doorstep, are you not even supposed to have a slingshot in hand just in case?" a statement said. The organization's findings come despite a pledge from China's leadership that it has no intention of militarizing the islands. Read more here
Aleppo battle: Evacuation of rebel-held east 'under way'
15th December 2016