Andreas, who manages Evolution Timing and Event Management Ltd, has vast experience in the managing of Multi-Sport events which was the main part of his portfolio at the TTT F, and he was also the man behind the Federation’s School Series.

The new five-event Multi- Sport Series will comprise of two Duathlons on the Diego Martin Highway (when it is closed for the ‘Keep Fit Program’ on Sunday mornings), two Aquathlons at Las Cuevas Beach and a triathlon at a location yet to be disclosed.

“We are looking at different venues, with the main feature of having a super-fast course that would allow drafting for a thrillingly memorable race,” Andreas said.

The Series will have an overall prize purse of close to $60,000 with the male and female winners each receiving $8,000.

Each race also has prize money for the top five finishers in each gender. There are two races in each event including a Sprint Distance race for athletes 16 and over, and a Super Sprint Distance race for athletes 12-15.

Sponsors have already committed to this exciting venture with Petroleum Sales and Services, SignWave and AS Brydens procuring Bronze Status. G4S along with Pluming Solutions have signed on as preferred suppliers while Blue Waters is also on board hydrating the athletes.

The first Duathlon will take place on July 2 at 6.15 am on the Diego Martin Highway, with the second race, an Aquathlon, following on August 6 at 7am in Las Cuevas.

The other races are carded for October 2017 and January 2018 with the Triathlon and Grand Finale prize-giving to be held on February 25, the second Sunday after Carnival.

Registration is already open for the first Race at www.evolutiontiming.

net and information can be obtained from Andreas or Derrick or via email at multisportseries@ evolutiontiming.net

our closest neighbour, is suffering political traumas because of its different mode of governance. We care deeply but its brand of politics is its brand of politics. We are not going to proffer who is right and who is wrong. Venezuelans have to fight it out for themselves. I am not taking sides. All we can do is commiserate. We cannot send them troops. We cannot send them money. But we can supply as much food, water.

clothing and essential toiletries to the best of our abilities. What we cannot do is allow too many of them to flood TT . There are several more millions of Venezuelans than us. At what point do we say no more Venezuelan refugees? Three quarter of a million? One million? The leader of the Movement for Social Justice is always expressing deep sympathy for President Nicolas Maduro. Does David Abdulah care that some Venezuelan citizens are allegedly being murdered so that Maduro can hold on to power? Abdulah asks that Caricom helps Venezuela. To what end? To send our regiment to injure Venezuelans? Once whichever power controls Venezuela sticks with any energy agreement signed between Venezuela and TT , we are not expected to interfere in its politics. Perhaps Abdulah can ask the government to turn the Queen’s Park Savannah into a giant refugee camp to shelter the Maduro protesters. And how are we going to handle more refugees than we can chew?

LYNETTE JOSEPH Diego Martin

With a Police Service that is overworked and underpaid and an uncooperative public, how can we expect the criminals to be defeated once and for all? We watch television show like CSI Miami and wonder why TT doesn’t have the things we see them. Yet when it’s time for gas subsidies to be removed and taxes to be implemented we more upset than anything else. We can’t expect to put all the blame on the Government and everyone else but ourselves for the shortcomings of the country. We are the nation, we are the government, the responsibility is ours to pay our taxes and report crime.

We need to take a deep breath and begin to think differently.

Changing the way we have been conditioned to think by society is not easy to do from our limited perspective.

We are who we are, and thinking positive and about solutions to difficult problems is not part of our nature. It’s difficult to imagine, let alone do. It is so much easier to shift the blame unto someone else.

The point is when our nation looks to be in chaos, seems to be hopeless, there appears to be no end to the downward spiral, we must take a deep breath and take an inward look at ourselves before we continue with the blame game, a game where there are absolutely no winners, where all of us end up on the losing side.

SIMON WRIGHT Chaguanas

McAlpin was addressing yesterday’s weekly police press briefing at the Police Administration Building in Port of Spain.

He said over the periods from January to June 2016 and 2017, the police had had notable successes in the collective effort not only to deal with illegal arms and ammunition, but also to focus on narcotics offences.

“The effort in drug-supply reduction by local agencies such as Customs and Excise, TT Coast Guard, security agencies at all ports of entry should not go unnoticed, and for this, the TTPS commends them for their efforts,” he said. “These supply- reduction efforts, which represent illegal narcotic seizures and eradications, are only one aspect, as the OCNFB and other external stakeholders continued to engage in the demand- reduction exercises such as lectures, displays, and interaction with youth.” Mc Alpin said the demand-reduction exercises were geared toward diminishing the appetite and interest in illegal narcotics, and catered for people of all ages.

He said it was evident from the number of first-time offenders being held with large quantities of narcotics that offenders are not limited to unemployed people seeking financial gain, but also included professionals who were otherwise employed in high-paying jobs.

Mc Alpin said in respect of cocaine from January to June 2016, 78.7 kilogrammes were seized, but in 2107 32.86 kilogrammes were seized, a decrease of 58.48 per cent.

“In respect to marijuana seizures, we had 511.72 kilogrammes in 2016 [and] 663.68 kilogrammes in 2017, an increase of 29.7 per cent.

Arrests for cocaine: in 2016, 316 males were arrested and in 2017 we had 290 – 8.23 percent decrease.

Mc Alpin said the police and by extension the OCNFB had recognised a continued interest in possessing illegal firearms and narcotics by small groups in society, and had issued a clarion call to all civic-minded citizens to join the fight against crime.

“Those willing to assist the law enforcement community in making Trinidad and Tobago a safe place, we call upon you to help us to make the difference.”

The Minister of Local Government went on TV and openly admitted that the respective agencies did not act on time. Who should take responsibility for this? The chairman of the Penal-Debe Regional Corporation, did not ensure that emergency shelters were made available to families and individuals who were in dire need of shelter and basic amenities. Who should take responsibilty for this? Kamla Persad Bissessar must be commended for taking time out to meet with those citizens to highlight their plight.

Where were the great men of the PNM? Where was Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley? Where was the eloquent Faris Al-Rawi? Where was the brilliant Colm Imbert? Where was the so-called knowledgeable Stuart Young? Did these men take an emergency vacation when they got wind of the approaching storm? What were the contingency measures that the great PNM would have put in place to replace all of the working mechanisms of the past administration? Are we seeing good governance or failed governance? Failed is the Government and it has prevailed.

JAMES MILLER via email

I believe these statements are deliberately deceptive and take the opportunity to bring the clarity and truth that these issues so rightfully deserve.

The data from the Ministry of Labour and Small Enterprise Development’s National Unemployment Register indicates that for the period September 2015 to June there has been 2,630 reported cases of people who have been retrenched. This is a far cry from Indarsingh’s outrageous and unsubstantiated figure of 25,000. In this regard, I call upon Indarsingh to cite the source of his fabricated figures.

It is disingenuous, to say the least, for Indarsingh to make a call “… for Government to lay in Parliament amendments to the Retrenchment and Severance Benefits Act” when he is aware that to date there are four draft policy position papers before Cabinet for its consideration. These documents include the Amendment of the Industrial Relations Act Chapter 88:01; the Retrenchment and Severance Benefit Act Chapter 88:13; the Cipriani College of Labour and Co-operative Studies Act Chapter 39:51, and the National Cooperative Policy.

I feel compelled to point out that over the last 50 years, there has not been a concentrated effort to address our antiquated and archaic labour laws and certainly not during the period 2010-2015 when Indarsingh was a minister in the Ministry of Labour and Small and Micro Enterprise Development.

However, this administration, in keeping with the Memorandum of Understanding with the labour movement, decided to address the updating of our antiquated labour laws and there is now an aggressive thrust to do so.

The process of amending legislation can often be long and arduous but to date we have achieved far more than any effort in the recent past and we are far from finished.

I also take this opportunity to remind the Opposition MP that there was a time in my career when I fought diligently and steadfastly for those under my charge as the head of one of the larger trade unions in this country. Today, I fight with the same conviction to represent the interest of all with equal fervour. I hold no sectoral interests, I represent the citizens of TT , employer and worker alike and there cannot be a partisan approach to genuine representation.

I invite Indarsingh and any member of the public to contact the ministry’s National Employment Services offices to enquire about our Adversity to Opportunity (A2O) Plan, also called “The Ten-Point Plan.” Through this plan, members of the public who have been retrenched and are experiencing the psycho-social effects of retrenchment can receive the support they need.

In closing, permit me to state that the media have a herculean task to find the balance in any issue as they seek to fulfil part of their mandate to inform and sensitise the public. I have always indicated my availability to your esteemed media house and remain available to bring clarity to any matter on which I have the authority to speak.

JENNIFER BAPTISTEPRIMUS Minister of Labour and Small Enterprise Development

The minister toured the school yesterday and said a fence which had been torn down by the storm would be immediately rebuilt, because the principal had told him the school was in a high-risk area.

Garcia said he intended to treat the matter as an emergency and would contact the Education Facilities Company to deal with it as soon as he returned to his office.

He also praised the Electricity Commission (T&TEC) for doing a tremendous job in replacing a pole which had fallen during the storm and had left the school without electricity as well as internet connectivity.

He said the T&TEC crew had worked through the night to replace the pole and was still there at the time of his visit yesterday morning.

He said as soon as the T&TEC crew was finished, a crew from FLOW would begin work to restore internet service, and he had been assured the electricity supply would be restored by the end of the day.

He said a number of other schools were also affected by the storm: Todds Road RC; Brazil RC; Mundo Nuevo RC; and the San Rafael RC primary schools.

In a statement, the ministry said other schools affected were Mayo RC Primary and Rousillac Hindu Primary School, where some of the galvanised sheets on the roof were blown off.

The statement added that the Kanhai Presbyterian Primary School and St Helena’s SDMS Hindu School were cut off by flooded access roads, although the school buildings themselves were not affected. However, the minister hoped that all the flood-affected schools would be re-opened by today.

The ministry also said the Valencia South Government Primary School and Manzanilla Government Secondary School were being used as shelters for displaced families and would remain closed today.

Scotiabank St James, like banks across the country, was closed for the weekend and remained closed until Tuesday, while Tropical Storm Bret rained down on the country. Yesterday, when employees re-opened the bank, they realised that the bank had been broken into, and called the police.

From as early as 7 am, police could be seen processing the scene at Scotiabank St James, located on the St James Main Road and Bengal Street. Investigators told Newsday yesterday that the would-be bandits broke in from the roof of the building, and attempted to access the ATM and the vault of the bank, but were unsuccessful.

Police are still trying to ascertain what exact day the break-in occurred but are working on the theory that the culprits used the storm to cover their entry into the building.

The bank, ATM and its insurance office, also located at the bank, remained closed for another day, as police and security forces conducted investigations.

Cuffie made the comments yesterday at the National Library and Information Service (NALIS) Public Service Day, commending workers for their commitment to TT and citing the preparedness and organisation on the part of the public servants as a crucial factor in minimising Bret’s impact.

“The country depends to a large extent on the work of the public servants,” he said.

“On Monday, I was at the meeting where the public servants met and prepared for what was going to take place on Monday night going into Tuesday, and there was extensive preparation by public servants and as part of that extensive preparation, I think there was a marked decrease in the kind of damage we could have had.

“I think that they responded well in a reduction in the extent of damage that could have occurred, and I want to praise the public servants who worked assiduously to ensure that T&T was protected from the damage that could have unfolded even with a relatively small tropical storm like Bret.” Cuffie said while he did not have the exact figure available, he was pleased with the overall turnout of public servants on Tuesday and yesterday, adding that all the relevant ministries would remain open throughout the week.

He also said there would be no different procedure to treat with the absence of workers on Tuesday than on any other day, adding that it was the responsibility of employees to apply for their days off.

“Neither the absence of workers nor the flooding are new to us. There is a procedure to govern absence from work and that is the same procedure that is applied to every occasion. That is, people will apply for their days, the relevant accounting officers will conduct the checks and balances. This is a normal part of the public service.” The event ,which was held at the National Library, Port of Spain, featured several different government public service agencies aimed to provide information on these arms as well as the opportunities available for those seeking employment.

Best was drafted by the Tridents in March and will appear in his second stint in the league after previously playing for the St.

Lucia Stars.

“Playing for Barbados is what I always wanted from the inception of the CPL,” Best said.

“To have the opportunity to play for the Tridents finally; I will go out bowl fast, get wickets and bring fans to the Kensington Oval.” Captain Kieron Pollard leads the Tridents into the 2017 season with international signees Wahab Riaz of Pakistan and Kane Williamson of New Zealand.

Tridents have also retained the services of batsman Dwayne Smith, who was integral in the team’s sole championship in 2014.

“We have a good squad with a blend of talent and youth,” Best said. “Pollard is a very good leader with his experience at the top level playing around the world in various leagues. Adding guys like Wahab Riaz and Kane Willamson gives us a very good blend of youth and experience, I think we will compete and do well.” A fiery fast bowler capable of delivering at speeds over 95 mph, Best is known for his boundless energy on and off the pitch.

In his mid-thirties Best maintains an impressive dedication to fitness and bowling quickly. He has focused heavily on fitness in an effort to prolong an almost two-decade long international career.

“My pace has always been a weapon for me. I haven’t really lost any pace, I have maintained my pace for the last 17 years playing professionally by the way that I train and the desire I have for bowling and bowling quickly.” He is currently using a stint at English club side, Lashings, to prepare for this summer’s campaign and expects to join the Tridents ready and raring to go.