Attish Kanhai Research officer, Institute of Marine Affairs (Trinidad ,Express ) As the tiny boat streaked across the Gulf of Paria during the early hours of a Monday morning, the sky seemed to melt into the ocean. The horizon disappeared as sea and sky faded into one never-ending blue curtain. Not surprising, I thought, as I dreaded the day ahead. The weather forecast had predicted extreme plumes of Saharan dust over the next few days and warned allergy sufferers to take the appropriate measures. As I entered into the mangrove forest, the waterworks started: runny nose, itchy eyes and sore…
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MEXICO CITY, Mexico (AFP) — Mexico has surpassed 25,000 COVID-19 deaths and 200,000 cases, the government said on Thursday. Jose Luis Alomia, head of epidemiology at the health secretariat, said the country of 127 million had reached 25,060 deaths and 202,951 cases since reporting its first infection almost four months ago. The first three cases were detected in the country on February 28 but it wasn’t until the final week of March that the government suspended all but non-essential economic activity. President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador’s reluctance to take tougher measures earlier to halt the spread of the virus —…
The Brighton Playing Field, for which the St Vincent and the Grenadines Football Federation (SVGFF) has a 25-year lease, will from next Monday, June 29, enter another phase of its development. A Special Project, undertaken by the SVGFF and funded by Football’s world governing body- FIFA, will see resurfacing of the playing surface and the fencing of the entire facility. Estimated to cost a total of EC$900,000, the fencing is slated to take 80 working days, while the resurfacing of the field has been projected over a three-month duration. Franco Construction was awarded the contract to erect the perimeter fence,…
Construction of the Rainforest Seafood facility at Calliaqua has resumed. So said Minister of Finance Camillo Gonsalves in Parliament on Monday. The resumption of work on the Jamaican company’s project had been suspended in March on the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Gonsalves explained then that the project had to be temporarily halted because the company’s overall income had been affected by COVID-19 related measures in other territories where the company had investments. The project here had also been grounded when technical experts out of China, who were expected to be here to supervise the next phase of construction, could…
Superintendent Clauston Francis, Head of the Criminal Investigation Department (CID), is the only witness to have testified so far in the Preliminary Inquiry (PI) into the attempted murder of Auxiliary Police Officer Curtland Jack, and the wounding with intent of two others, November 2019 at Heritage Square, Kingstown. The P.I started at the Serious Offences Court last week Thursday and is expected to continue on July 7 when the Prosecution will call other witnesses. Tyson Spencer, 30, of Green Hill, has been charged with the attempted murder of the Auxillary Police Officer, as well as wounding with intent, Deron Quashie…
Leader of the Opposition Dr Godwin Friday maintains that the Unity Labour Party (ULP) did all in its power to prevent the debate on the Private Members’ Motion, brought by the New Democratic Party at the June 22 meeting of Parliament. The Motion, captioned ‘Covid-19 Pandemic and the Management and Social Consequences of the Pandemic’, called, inter alia, for the establishment of a broad-based task-force comprising persons from various sectors of the economy and civil society, “who would bring insight, experiences and expertise that would help government to fashion meaningful and effective policies and measures to aid and achieve economic…
Senator Israel Bruce, the New Democratic Party (NDP) candidate for the South Central Windward constituency in the next general election, has slammed the recently rolled out government Promoting Youth Micro Enterprises Programme (PRYME). Addressing a recent event held at Lauders to mark the official opening of the New Democratic Party’s South Central Windward constituency office, Bruce likened the PRYME – a grant programme – to a situation where a parent gives his offspring a vehicle, without allowing that child to manage all of the responsibilities that go with vehicle ownership. Bruce was careful however in having his comment used as…
On Monday 22nd June, 2020, the Unity Labour Party (ULP) regime denied members of the opposition their rights to debate a Private Member’s Motion in parliament. The Motion was on the COVID-19 Pandemic and the Management of the Economic and Social Consequences of the Pandemic. It was proposed by Leader of the Opposition, Dr. Godwin Friday. This behaviour in parliament by the members of the ULP government is unacceptable and can be described as the tyranny of the majority. From 2001, the New Democratic Party (NDP) has brought several Private Member’s Motions to parliament. For example, the Spiritual Social and…
On June 17, 2020, the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) convened a global roundtable discussion via the zoom platform in recognition of Desertification and Drought Day, under the theme “Is it time for a new social contract for nature”. The panelists for this conference included Ministers of Environment from India, United Arab Emirates, Mauritania and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, who were all asked to share experiences and lessons learned during this global pandemic that has crippled many economies around the world. This is not the first time the United Nations has reached out to this country to…
St. Vincent and the Grenadines has no known active COVID-19 cases following the recovery of the last two cases. These recoveries were indicated by the negative results of RT-PCR tests conducted at the Molecular PCR Laboratory Unit of the Ministry of Health Wellness and the Environment and confirmed by the Caribbean Public Health Agency (CARPHA) Public Health Laboratory in Trinidad today. The two (2) second negative results required to clear the positive cases were among a batch for 23 samples, 18 of which belonged to the Vincentians repatriated from Cuba on Monday June 22. All of the samples were negative…