Guyana forward Sheldon Holder scored a brilliant, though slightly deflected, goal to lift Morvant Caledonia to a 2-1 win over Club Sando before San Juan Jabloteh held Central to a goalless draw to complete a double- header at the Ato Boldon Stadium in Couva.

Keron Cornwall had given Sando the lead on 13 minutes, pouncing on a spill by Morvant Caledonia’s Ghanaian defender Maestro Mensah at the goalmouth to beat goalkeeper Glenroy Samuel.

But Kerry Daniel, who like Samuel has made a return to Morvant this season, levelled the Stallions with a fine strike after latching onto a short Kareem Joseph free-kick to find the far top corner of Stefan Berkeley’s net.

Berkeley was beaten again from outside the box on the hour mark. Holder, slipped through by a quickly taken Joseph freekick, sent a shot sailing beyond the Sando custodian and into the back of the net with a slight deflection.

Stephon Seepersad, Morvant Caledonia’s substitute goalie of last season, later kept a clean sheet for his new employers, Central FC, on debut.

Central also handed Pro League debuts to former Trinidad and Tobago Under-17 attacker Jesse Joseph, Haitian defender Fresnel Simil, and 30-year-old former TT youth defender Sean Bateau, who had stints in the United States, Thailand, Maldives and Philippines.

But it was seasoned Pro League campaigner Jason Marcano that had the best chances for the Couva Sharks. However goalkeeper Javon Sample, who made the switch to Jabloteh last season, stood in the way of his former employers with brilliant stops on either side of the half.

Central, attempting a fourth straight Pro League crown, were lucky not to concede a late defeat thanks to the heroics of Seepersad.

Seepersad’s outstretched leg in stoppage time denied Jabloteh substitute Aaquil Campbell’s close range effort, adding to his brilliant stop just over the hour mark to blank Jamaican attacker Keithy Simpson, who had earlier drilled an excellent scoring chance inches wide before the break.

Today, the Arima Velodrome will welcome Pro League football for the first time in the current era when North East Stars, headed by coach Derek King, host point Fortin Civic from 7pm.

And on Monday, action returns to the Ato Boldon Stadium with a double-header when Defence Force tackle Police FC from 6pm and W Connection take on MIC-IT St. Ann’s Rangers from 8pm.

After their victories, both took time to praise the overall winners for their tremendous efforts in what has become one of the region’s top triathlon events on the calendar.

Ross defended her national title in the Olympic distance in two hours, 32 minutes and 49 seconds (2:32:49) after finishing fourth overall among the women.

Venezuela’s Genesis Ruiz won the category.

The Olympic distance requires athletes to swim 1.5km, ride 40km and run 10km.

Costelloe, competing in the same distance, won the national men’s title after finishing sixth overall in 2:21:13. Barbados’ Jason Wilson placed first.

On retaining the national title, Ross said, “(I feel) ecstatic. I believe last year was a bit of a jewel in the rough that I won Rainbow Cup (overall women’s title), so this year I am happy to just claim back the (national) championship.” Ross congratulated Ruiz for winning the overall title, saying she was unbeatable on the day.

“She was on fire, wow, I saw her and she was just in her zone, and when you get a person in a zone there is no stopping them. Congratulations to her.” Ross said the conditions were fair but it was somewhat challenging.

“The race conditions were actually pretty good.

The water was a bit bumpy, but not too bad. The bike is always a rolling hilly course which is always tough on any of the athletes.

By the time you get on that run, it is either scorching or extremely scorching.” Costelloe commended Wilson for his achievement and described him as a phenomenal athlete.

“He is the first triathlete I believe from the Caribbean to qualify for the Olympics in the sport of triathlon. He is a professional athlete and that just goes to show the difference between an amateur like myself and a professional athlete.

It clearly showed today, he was well in front of me. Congratulations to Jason on winning the triathlon.” Despite not winning the overall and men’s title, Costelloe was satisfied on taking the local crown.

“It feels great once again. Last year I came second, so this year I got back first place so it is a great feeling once again,” he said

Be that as it may, Maraj is not the only person who thinks I am biased because recently, a judge in one of our nation’s courts personally expressed to me his opinion that I seem to favour the UNC in my columns.

Now, notwithstanding the fact that I view Maraj’s recklessly public statement as maligning my character, I see both comments as confirmation that I am doing the right thing with my columns.

There honestly is no better feeling than knowing that I am an equal opportunity offender engendering animosity from both sides merely because of my innate ability to view situations without an ounce of bias; I call a spade a spade.

I cannot change the way a person interprets my words, but if my columns are read in isolation, it is quite easy to assume that I come down on one side of the fence, when in reality I don’t.

I have said it before, and I will say it again, the only party card I have is my Trinidad and Tobago identification card, which means I owe loyalty only to my God, my country and my family.

Trinidad and Tobago really needs more people who are willing to objectively process the news and give unbiased views on any political situation; otherwise we will never be able to see past the nonsense that is being passed off as policy by our governments.

In 1901, Albert Einstein said that “blind obedience to authority is the greatest enemy of the truth” and it is a quote that continues to guide my thought process.

Without any intention of sounding narcissistic or conceited, we need more people like me who are fearless independent thinkers that reject all notion of party before country.

I have given up on most of the older generation ever being independent thinkers because religious extremism, racism and blind party loyalty has been so entrenched in them by folks like Dr Eric Williams and Basdeo Panday that it appears near impossible to change their minds on any issue.

To this day, despite my best attempts, I cannot get party loyalists from either side to understand that their lives have hardly improved under the PNM, while it got far worse as a result of the UNC.

Consider this a clarion call for the youths to pick up the mantle to take our country forward.

Many of us have studied away, so we have had more exposure to the differences that exist in the world; we should be more open minded to individual choices and more willing to challenge the status quo and so-called conventional “wisdom”.

Of course, I am not trying to imply that all young people are independent liberals because that would be a lie.

When I first returned home, I experimented with the youth organisations of the PP who were in government at the time, the PNM and the MSJ, and it shocked me to see so many young — supposedly educated and intelligent — sycophants.

It did not take me long to realise that none of the sheeplings in these groups were interested in anything beyond what benefits the alignment would bring them.

It sickened me then and it sickens me now to recollect that experience.

There are way too many Trinbagonians who believe everything they hear from politicians; trust must always be a gift that has to be earned. If more of us would attempt to think independently and challenge everything we hear from politicians, it would open up a wealth of potential knowledge that will allow for more informed decision-making.

And those better informed decisions would eventually lead to the dismantling of the current corrupt two-party system.

As we’re on this topic, I have to thank the Newsday for the opportunity, support and guidance over the past years as I developed (hopefully) as a columnist. The editors have never attempted to stifle my opinions, nor have they attempted to impose whatever v i e w s t h e y m a y have on me.

T r u e i n d e – p e n – dence – I could n o t ask for more.

Government should never be a burden to its citizens.

No government should impose a traffic fine that is more than the fine for possession of arms and ammunition. No citizen should be so burdened by taxes that it stifles one’s ability to support one’s family.

Almost every political party in governance over the years seems to lose touch with the population shortly after being elected to serve. Ministers of government believe they no longer have to account to the people and blatantly refuse to answer pertinent questions with arrogance. Rather than showing empathy for citizens, they bold-facedly make excuses for incompetence and indifference to human suffering.

Projects to improve our infrastructure, reduce traffic congestion, enhance agriculture, increase tourism, restructure our healthcare and education are shelved for short-term projects geared towards repaying party supporters.

No longer are politicians concerned about simple things like improving our water distribution system, local government restructuring, structured police patrols, regulating squatting on public and private lands or ensuring that our justice system is elevated to a place where citizens can once again trust our courts to effectively and efficiently deal with conflict resolution.

Perhaps governance blinds those in office to the realities on the ground. The people are saying: We are willing to pay property tax but not the complex structure that is being proposed.

Simply increasing the old taxes by a percentage in keeping with changes in the economy, like a 1,000 percent increase on the old taxes, is a better and less costly structure that is proposed. The proposed new traffic fines are punitive rather than fair.

Local government reform is long overdue. Legislation to reduce the case load in courts, introduce plea bargaining, reform the prison system and set up special courts to deal with violence and gun-related offences are long overdue.

The Ministry of Works and Infrastructure’s failure to deliver, the Tobago ferry service, the state of our roads, the lack of attention to buildings like the Red House, Whitehall and President’s House all point to incompetence. Mass transit is a serious requirement to reduce traffic congestion, not a political football.

WASA must be able to deliver a better water supply and restore roads with immediate effect or be restructured in partnership with the private sector. Tourism, agriculture and sports are areas where the Government can earn foreign exchange and provide employment for the many graduates that continue to join our workforce. It’s time to reduce the reliance on Government for sustenance and replace the initiatives with creating avenues for self-development and business growth. This requires partnership with the business community.

It’s time to listen to the people again. The nation cannot wait for election after election to change government and hope that in office someone will hear the cries of the people.

STEVE ALVAREZ via email

In advertisements, the division apologised to the public for any inconvenience caused when the data collection exercise was suspended.

Legal challenges by the Opposition halted the exercise until the Appeal Court last week overturned Justice Frank Seepersad’s orders on the process, advising Government to properly inform the public that the procedure is voluntary and that there are no penalties.

The division complied yesterday assuring submission was voluntary.

It also said, “Failure to submit the valuation return forms and or supporting documents and the choice not to supply all the information requested during the period of this data collection exercise will not attract any sanctions.” The division said forms can be collected at any of its offices, head office at the Ministry of Finance or downloaded from the website www.finance.gov.tt/propertytax. And also listed the documents which may be handed in

The hand behind those creations is Natasha Stoute-Burnley and she provided Sunday Newsday with a tour of her designs at her Arouca home last week. Her clay designs, including snakes, frogs, turtles and beetles, decorated her garden area, turning it into a verdant wonderland. Inside her home there are a number of shelves with more items: cars, worms and even cute mice in baby strollers.

“Its a lot of random stuff,” she said.

Stoute-Burnley works in liquid clay, terra cotta and white clay.

During the interview she demonstrated pouring the liquid clay into a mould. The mould is then kept tight with rubber bands. After a few hours the mould is removed and cleaned it. It has to dry out well and is then carried to be “fired” and then painted, both actions multiple times depending upon the item. One piece could take weeks.

Stoute-Burnley, 43, from Arouca and mother of two, was born to a father who was government painter and a mother who did a lot of jobs including tiling and caring for children.

Both her parents have passed.

Stoute-Burnley recalled that growing up she was always creative and would do things like basket weaving, knitting and sewing or make snacks like paw paw balls and tamarind balls. Her passion was always hair, though, and she care for the hair of her two sisters. She did cosmetology at Arima Senior Comprehensive and her profession is hair technician. In a recommendation letter from a teacher dated May 1991 she was described as “industrious and businesslike with a personality that (enamoured) her to everybody who knew her.”

The road to Random Creations began with her long time love of cacti of which she had amassed a small collection.

She recalled that she would go plant shopping with a friend but found it difficult to find pieces to put in the small cactus pots or to decorate the garden area. She would find a few plastic frogs, some mushrooms and fairies but she wanted to have her own pieces for her miniature gardens.

She was inspired four years ago when her sons’ father purchased a worm decoration for her garde. She purchased a piece of clay and brought it home.

After having it on a shelf for a month she began making decorative worms out of it. She made the error, however, of making the pieces solid instead of hollow but learned to improve her craft since then.

She started to craft more things and her friends and co-workers began expressing interest in the items and how they were created.

“It was different from anything anybody else was doing.” She said that she focused on a garden theme and all the work was done by hand even when it is poured from a mould it is still painted and details added. She is self-taught and through the internet, her “best friend”, she was able to learn how to paint.
On the name of the business she said a friend called from the United States commented on the variety of her items and came up with the name Random Creations. She used the worm as the logo because this was the first piece that inspired her.

“I am inspired by everything around me. It is never one thing on my mind to create.” People began asking to buy her items but she wanted everything to be professional before she started selling. She registered her company in November 2014 and also printed call cards and t-shirts designed by her graphic designer son Ezra.
She was also encouraged by friends to attend plant shows and his first appearance at a show three years ago, which was also hosted by Eastern Horticultural Club, “was a hit.”

“Everybody loved the beetles, worms and snakes.” She said after that appearance she received calls from people from South Trinidad and a woman from Guyana.
Her aunts from the United States ordered some items with patriotic colours for souvenirs.
She has taught at two vacation camps and showed the children how to make butterflies.
Stoute-Burnley said that she loves to teach children and introduce them to clay. She recalled that a married couple visited her at her home and she taught them to do some pieces.

She said her pieces are nice enhancement for gardens. They start from just $15 and Stoute-Burnley said she likes to make her things very affordable.

She said that people are in awe when they see her work and ask questions like “this was done here?” “In Trinidad?” “You did this?” “Locally done?’ They would also describe her pieces as “beautiful” and one person told her she “loves everything.” At one plant show a patron told her that she could not leave her booth because of all the great items. She said people are amazed that is not imported from Japan or china.

She said her pieces are not just ornamental but useful and one of her friends uses her clay shoes to hold stationery.

She added that they are a great gift for someone who really loves plants and they can get unique, inspired pieces which can be left outdoor and hold up to the weather.
She has made plant pots into shells, turtles, snails, owls, mushrooms and even Buddhas.
“You name it, Random Creations have it.

And it’s all hand done.” She teaches adults by appointment and expressed hope that she will be able to teach more children.

You can check out Random Creations on Facebook @randomcreations, call 778-0443 or email randomcreationstt@ gmail.com

At every turn, on every corner, and in all of our institutions, there is a palpable sense of failure .

And the real tragedy about this is that our foundations still surprisingly remain secure .

But as the top teeters into collapse, eventually our foundations will begin to fail too, as they become exposed to the ongoing rot and decay of neglect, mismanagement, corruption and the allencompassing lack of any sense of national responsibility in any area of governance or management .

What can be wrong with us? So blessed by location and a range of natural and human resources, most of which we have squandered more than once, we seem blissfully unaware of the current true state of our plight .

Somehow, twice in the past, the mechanisms of world oil prices have intervened to snatch us from bankruptcy and revolution, after we had wasted a heritage we were just lucky to have accessed. And we do not engage in this ongoing neglect just from indifference and laziness—although these two qualities are ever present in all of our pathetic endeavours—, we do it to facilitate a chronic flow of corruption. From petty corruption in face-to-face encounters with supposedly “free” government services, all the way up to multi-million dollar schemes of failed insurance companies where the principals enjoy poor peoples’ money to continue astonishing life styles. And all the way in between these are the massive, never- to-be-completed construction contracts within our petroleum sector, for our infrastructure development, and like icing on the side, the multi-million dollar attorneys’ fees as the two sides sue and counter sue each other as they circle in and out of government .

The ongoing physical deterioration of the whole of the refinery at Pointe-a-Pierre is an ongoing feature of our ownership and care of this “flagship” asset we took over .

Ruptured oil lines on the shipping pier caused an environmental disaster a couple of years ago, and while we tried to forget or dismiss that, a large tank at the refinery compound was leaking at its base for years, noted but ignored by highly paid operatives .

The “just a few barrels” from that tank, which conveniently had also lost its required earthen “bund wall”, has drifted on to beaches in Venezuela and to Venezuela’s offshore Caribbean islands, and now to Aruba. Do you really think it is only one tank in the refinery that is in a state of imminent failure? Or just the one pipeline which is at failure point? The total and apparently deliberately contrived failure of our shipping service to Tobago is no surprise to anyone. All efforts are being made to hide the facts from the public as to who and when and why decisions were taken not to ensure that a suitable cargo vessel was retained until replacements were in place. Or that the fast ferries did not undergo scheduled maintenance when required, by experienced and competent service providers .

But that could never happen, not in a land where “maintenance” means paying money to the courts for where you left your sperm .

The utter fiasco of the Tobago ferry service could not have been planned to be more unbelievable if we tried. But of course, just as at Petrotrin, nobody is at fault about any of this, these things, as we now know “just happen” .

And please do not think that it is just our physical assets that we destroy through neglect and rapacious mismanagement .

Our Judiciary and our lawyers are working feverishly and acrimoniously to tear down this pillar of our Constitution. You mean that none of these “learned” people could even seek to establish some dialogue within their profession to resolve the dispute surrounding the appointment of an apparently overworked magistrate to the High Court? What egos are driving these people? And from where do we now seek reason and justice when we have disputes? Them? And wondering if things could get worse, we have the apparent dispute between two very senior army officers (one now retired) as to how the children of the Attorney General (whom the AG has apparently not acknowledged as his children?) were allowed into a secure military base and given high-powered guns to play with. What is the “real truth” with this situation? And finally for this week, we had the sordid and shameful episode of an elderly man dying on the lawn of the Port of Spain General Hospital, where he was literally dumped by hospital security .

According to “the rules” only an ambulance could pick him up and bring him back inside? The foundations of our independence are being sorely tested by our criminal neglect of all of our infrastruct u r e and our institut i o n s .

But no one is responsible!

So said Khafra Kambon, chairman of the Emancipation Support Committee at the Yoruba Village Drum Festival at the Yoruba Village in Port-of-Spain yesterday.

Speaking to Sunday Newsday, Kambon said the celebration was psychologically important to African descendants, and it had made an impact on their everyday lives.

“All those things in your environment – whether it’s your built environment, the things you hear, the things you see – all that has an affect on your mind and how you see yourself, which is critical to the development of any people. A lot of things can contribute to your sense of self so wherever you can make an input in the things that can affect the mindset of Africans, affect our sense of self, it is very important.” For example, he said when he was younger, Nigerians would wear their African clothes and they would be laughed at because if it. Now, thousands of people wear their African clothes proudly on Emancipation Day and special occasions. Also, he said black women began to be proud of their natural hair and dark complexions in the 1970s and “what has been sustained has been sustained a lot by the Emancipation festival.” Kambon said the Emancipation Support Committee also got involved in the formal education system by hosting and providing literature for an African history quiz in secondary schools and a spoken word competition in primary schools. He said when the children learned the contributions past and current people of African decent made to the world, they were surprised and encouraged to do more themselves.

Therefore, he said, such information needed to be part of the curriculum but did not expect that to be the case anytime soon.

“I would be pleasantly surprised if there is a radical change in how the curriculum addresses information that affects how we think about ourselves as a people so we have to do, in our small ways, what we can.” MP for Laventille East/Morvant Adrian Leonce said the Yoruba Village Drum Festival was a way to “promote a level of consciousness” for people of the area to develop themselves as he felt that consciousness was dwindling.

“I think the reasons people gravitate to things that may be negative and have a negative impact on the community is because they do not have a proper understanding of what the community is about and where it came from. I think that knowledge, and developing that strength inside, would not allow some of the weaknesses that make them gravitate to negativity.” Noting the Yoruba Village once encompassed parts of Port of Spain including Laventille and Belmont, Leonce said more people needed to support and contribute to the Yoruba Village Drum Festival. He said that contribution could include just listening to and understanding the history of the Yoruba Village, or through the giving of resources like time, experience or money.

For instance, if you pay $8 (instead of $6.80) for US$1 but it allows your business to close a lucrative deal, then that extra cost of doing business is well worth it. If you give an “incentive” to a doctor to prescribe your company’s drugs (instead of the competitors’), and he/she does, then that “incentive” is written off as the cost of doing business.

Pharmaceutical companies provide good examples. Many have paid hefty fines for various reasons.

For instance, in 2012 GlaxoSmith- Kline paid US$3 billion for offences including off-label promotion (promoting a drug for unapproved uses), failure to disclose safety data, paying kickbacks to physicians and making false and misleading statements about the safety of Avandia (diabetes drug).

Other companies paying onetime billion dollar fines include Pfizer (2009, US$2.3B), Johnson & Johnson (2013, US$2.2B), Abbott (2012, US$1.5B), and Eli Lilly (2009, US$1.4B). All these companies and others, like Merck, Norvatis and AstraZeneca, are repeat offenders. Repeat offenders? Clearly, to them, these fines are merely “the cost of doing business,” a small price to pay for the massive profits they make.

So when the Permanent Secretary (PS) in the Ministry of Sport proffered to the Public Administration and Appropriations Committee of Parliament that the $92,000 spent by her ministry for the Tobago weekend jaunt was “the cost of doing business,” I expected her to tell us about the million-dollar benefits we could expect from the money spent. She didn’t say and no one on the committee bothered to ask.

So I’m asking the PS to tell us what “business” they were doing and what was our expected return on investment.

She could also provide some clarity on the following. We hear that $10,000 was spent on the rental of four vehicles for three days, for a one-day (actually, two hours) function. That works out to over $800 a vehicle per day. What kind of vehicles did they rent? I’ve never spent more than $300 on any car rental in Tobago, and the car carried five people and two golf bags. Then, again, I’m neither a minister nor an assistant nor an adviser and I pay the rental from my own pocket (I don’t have an expense account “without a ceiling,” like the PS), so I try to get value for money.

In her defence, though, the PS did say she believed they got value for money. (Yes, and I believe the West Indies would have won the ICC Champions Trophy easily if only the team had qualified.) Given that the stay at the Magdalena Grand included buffet breakfast and all-you-can-eat lunch and dinner, how much time did they have between meals to drive around in these expensive vehicles? When did the “series of meetings and site visits” take place? Apart from a visit to the Dwight Yorke Stadium which, from all reports, few members of the delegation attended, what business did the delegation conduct? More importantly, can the PS tell us how did these “costs” of doing business redound to the benefit of taxpayers?

NOEL KALICHARAN via email

The TT team remained in Denver, Colorado following Thursday’s 2-0 defeat by the United States to continue preparations.

Coach Dennis Lawrence was at the helm of three training sessions at the Colorado Rapids training pitch.

With the US match out of the away, Lawrence has emphasised that the focus now must be on Costa Rica.

“The US match is gone, it’s out of the way and now we’ve got to look ahead to the next one which is Costa Rica. We have got to pick up and go again,” Lawrence said.

Veteran Carlos Edwards said it was a situation now where “we’ve got to roll our sleeves up and move onto the next one.

“It’s no sense dwelling on the game with the US,” Edwards said.

He added: “We missed out on a chance to secure at least a point.

Obviously after a day we’ve reflected and the coach has gone over the clips for us, showing us the positive side of things and to be honest, we did have some very good moments in the game where we showed good shape and organisation.

“But the two goals came at crucial moments where we slipped up. What we’ll do now is try to react as best as possible, work on some of the areas and just focus on what is ahead which is Costa Rica on Tuesday,” Edwards ended Goalkeeper Jan Michael Williams, meanwhile signed a new one-year transfer to Honduras top flight club Juticalpa FC on Friday.

Williams, who made a recent switch to North East Stars from Central FC, is expected to fly out to Honduras later this month for pre-season training.

He produced several brilliant saves on Thursday night to keep TT in the game.

“I think the team has shown improvement since Dennis Lawrence and the rest of the staff came on board.

:We really need to buckle down and get some more points on the board,” Williams said.

“The camp is a bit quiet now because obviously we are very disappointed with the result against the US but we’ve had a couple training sessions since the match and the focus is coming back.” “We just have to go in and do exactly what the coaching staff is asking us to do.” Williams said.

Regarding the new deal, he added: “Finally I think I have been trying for some time to go back outside and play at a higher level.

“The call came from Honduras and I’ve already signed the contract so it’s just about getting out there and starting pre-season with the club.”