I have sent several letters to permanent secretaries, human resource directors and the office of the Chief Personnel Officer requesting At first there was uncertainty as to where exactly my paperwork had found itself, and eventually I received correspondence from the ministry stating that everything had gone to the CPO.

According to them, “numerous reminders” and calls were made to inquire about the status of my situation. Apparently the CPO indicated they were working on the matter and they would forward “same upon completion.” Unfortunately, this is the last I heard from the ministry.

Since I left the ministry, a new government has taken over, the person who was keeping me updated from the HR Department has left, and the ministry is now a division of the Ministry of Education. I don’t think I can be faulted for being apprehensive that my matter will be forgotten.

I implore the Ministry of Education and the CPO to please expedite the process to ensure I receive my gratuity as soon as possible. All parties involved should have no problem contacting me. My phone number is in my file if it hasn’t gone missing once more.

DI XIE-ANN BELLE via email

However, Caribbean Airlines (CAL) was not on the list. To the best of my recollection I was told that CAL does fly into Orlando every week. I think that is something the airline should look into and have corrected.

GERARD DUVAL Petit Valley

Over the years we have had peaceable elections both general and local without any type of disturbances to involve police coming out to stop any electorate disputes.

In my opinion that is the spirit of true democracy. Everyone exercising their civil duty without fear or intimidation.

This has been our way, peaceful elections. Let us not give way to any behaviour carried out by external forces influencing us to think otherwise.

While we view elections in other countries around the world we must as Trinbagonians for ourselves determine what is wrong and what is right.

I must say in the past our demonstration on Election Day and even after elections is quite commendable.

If there is to be any “wars” let it be a war of ideas and resolutions to make TT a better place for us and future generations.

For at the end of the day when the election is all over and the sun sets we have now to get up and work and live with each other.

So election war, no Sir, not in TT .

Citizens will utilise their right to vote on November 28 in a peaceful manner which they have grown accustomed too over the years.

Arnold Gopeesingh San Juan

Dr Rowley said that 40 percent of government revenue was working for the benefit of the country and the rest was feeding upper echelons greed. Why’s the nation and the media not talking about this? Knowing this, the Rowley led PNM still went ahead and imposed additional taxes on citizens – property tax, online tax, increase of fuel prices, replacement of VAT on goods and services putting more of our tax dollars on the table for the merchant class to steal.

Government therefore, isn’t willing or able to seal leakages from the treasury and other places, amounting to the 60 percent of government revenue carted away by capitalist’s greed – party financiers, business blackmailers, white collar embezzlers.

At the town meaning on local government reform, Dr Rowley also called on the Opposition Leader to break the silence on her relationship with a businessman who imported marijuana in chicken parts. And Persad-Bissessar called on the PM to break his silence on his relationship with a businessman who imported US$2 million hidden between ply boards. They both know who Mr Big is, why don’t they as leaders, who claim they’re patriotic to country over self, use the information to get both Mr Bigs behind bars? If these two leaders are afraid to their lives, or to act on what they say they believe about ethics, integrity, honesty, law enforcement, to do the right thing, why are they our leaders? US President Woodrow Wilson said while in office in the early 1900s, “Since I entered politics, I have chiefly had men’s views confided to me privately.

Some of the biggest men in the United States, in the field of commerce and manufacture, are afraid of something.

They know that there is a power somewhere so organized, so subtle, so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive, that they better not speak above their breath when they speak in condemnation of it.” We in TT have had this problem throughout our lives under independence.

Our leaders are afraid on a rogue business class who rob our treasury with impunity.

As such, is it wise for the head of the national security council to be a politician? The conflict of interest between national interest and personal aspiration to win elections and make a government appear to have national security under control is obvious. That what aggrieves the head of the national security council most, is the price his opponent pays for roti to celebrate the Hindu festival of lights, brings us to wonder, what are the highest pressing concerns for the subordinate members of the national security council? The price they pay for clothes and shoes maybe.

Does government really want money? Who do they want if from, productive people and processes or from the middle and subsistence classes? Why are government’s finance collection processes inordinately trained on the incomes and assets of the middle class and subsistence class? Does it make sense to target meagre middle and low income wages (that government already has an income tap on) to generate billions of dollars to run the country? Does that make sense? If money was oil and gas or water production would it make sense to bore more tap holes in low production wells to get increased raw fuel or water production? Or wouldn’t it make sense to drill new wells to tap new virgin sources of income? Which one makes sense? And wouldn’t it make sense to seal leakages in pipelines to existing high producing sources of income? And to cap off leakages in high producing sources of money? Why isn’t government doing that? Why are they bent on frustrating the public with nuisance taxes? Aren’t they doing that to distress the nation so it focuses on making ends meet, instead of focusing on monitoring on what government does with its tax dollars and national resources, so citizens can resist government transferring their taxes to party financiers and friends?

B JOSEPH via email

The proposed ideas exhibit a base thorough in approach and knowledge, agreeing with most accepted views.

This vision is broad and encompasses all, it will foster unique regional identity as well as accountability, presenting a practical method to elevate the esteem of local bodies to provide development and involvement in every part of the country.

The genuine extended hand by the government only lends to a progressive initiative, alas as inevitable in our country with the birth of a creative idea comes the afterbirth of a critic.

COLIN FORTUNE Arima

This, as only yesterday, Opposition Senator, Gerald Ramdeen, accused an HDC official of bid rigging in the State’s house building programme.

Speaking at a JCC seminar on the construction sector’s contribution to the economy, Dr Rowley said the PPP arrangement was an idea whose time had come, especially in a time of economic hardship where government could no longer afford to fund the housing programme by itself. “The Government’s policy is to continue to expand the housing stock and the government does not have the cash reserves that it had before.

Up to 2009, the ministry of finance was funding up to $2 billion a year in construction.” The Prime Minister, a former housing minister, said that the cost of the programme had “run away” from Government, with the result being a gradual rise in the prices of the units, many of which were now out of the range of the people they were intended for.

Given the importance of the private sectors participation in the arrangement, the Prime Minister said it was sad that the very first award of a contract under the arrangement was “already generating a level of negativity, suspicion, accusations and allegations, which seem to be the order of the day in Trinidad and Tobago.” Dr Rowley expressed hopes that the country could get to the point where it commended those who entered partnerships with the Government and showed that the model could work.

However, the Prime Minister did not entertain questions on the issue, leaving the event without speaking to media.

In a phone interview with Newsday, Singh said her mother spent over nine hours at the hospital last Wednesday without being seen by a doctor after complaining of severe chest pains.

Her mother, the Tunapuna resident said, has been awaiting a coronary angiogram for months. Singh said it was only after her mother returned home from the hospital that morning that a doctor called and asked how she was doing.

Singh said she is a constant visitor to the health institution as she makes frequent visits with her family members. She added that medications such as Plavix and Ramipril had to be purchased even when her relatives were there because they were unavailable in the hospital.

“I don’t know what is happening. All they keep telling me is write your complaint. I am totally fed up,” she said.

She added that purchasing the medication made it very difficult for her. Her husband’s disability cheques are not enough to cover the cost of the medications.

Singh also complained that there were not enough doctors at the hospital to attend to the patients, with constant cancellations occurring on clinic days.

She fears if her husband, who suffers from congestive heart failure, has to go to the hospital again that he may not make it out again.

“I don’t know what is happening with the health system. Where is the Minister of Health?” she asked.

When contacted, the Ministry of Health’s Corporate Communications Department said that they were investigating the matter.

The department said they had to verify the facts with the National Insurance Property Development Company- which runs a pharmaceutical division.

Addressing a function earlier this week at the Port-of-Spain City Hall auditorium to launch the Shouter Prohibition Ordinance 1917 Commemorative Year 2016 – 2017, Reverend Dr Hazel-Ann Gibbs De Peiza said the street preaching, for which Spiritual Shouter Baptists were known, had lapsed because baptists had become “sophisticated” and were now wearing “high heels and stockings.” She said that because of their absence from the street corners things had gone bad in the country, adding that when they used to be on the street corners, things never got out of hand and because of the deteriorating situation in the country people were asking, “Where are the Spiritual Baptists?” Dr De Peiza, Chairman of the Spiritual Baptist Shouter Prohibition Ordinance Centenary Commemoration Committee which is planning the year of remembrance, said there were two organisations to which Spiritual Baptists were affiliated with more than three hundred and fifty churches locally and internationally and all these churches and congregations had come together to celebrate the commemorative year.

The year will feature public lectures all over the country and in schools; seminars and workshops for the membership; and cultural events including the staging of the play “The Wine of Astonishment” written by Earl Lovelace; a Youth Cultural Explosion; craft markets to show off the talents of church members; a function on January 2nd to honour all Centenarians in the faith and a Freedom March through the streets of Port of Spain next year on November 18th to mark the end of the year. She said that on November 28, baptists will unveil a special monument; open a special park and hold a special service on their lands just off the Churchill- Roosevelt highway at Maloney.

She said the Commemorative Year is expected to produce an awakening of consciousness among members of the faith, a stronger and more united Spiritual Baptist faith working with society and the government to demonstrate the rewards and value of faith in God; the youth of the movement becoming more conscious of the history of the faith and becoming more self-confident and committed to making positive contributions to society.

She hoped it would also result in the society treating the faith as partners in the society and serve to renew and unify the country, producing a people standing with greater pride.

She added that it might seem to many people that the faith is inactive but member churches had been doing a lot of things, among them opening Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) schools and building churches, proper edifices as she described them, which were no longer the small “mud and tapia buildings” that people have become accustomed to but major structures which were comfortable and located on main streets rather than on remote back streets.

Other speakers said the coming year will be a Year of Reflection and national conversations on the social perspectives of the faith and Bishop Earl Hypolite of the Holy Mt. Zion Spiritual Baptist Cathedral, said they were beginning a journey in remembrance of the discrimination against the Spiritual Baptist faith.

He said the repressive law banning Shouter Baptists from practising their faith was passed in 1917 and repealed in 1951 and during that period “our fore parents were disenfranchised; brutalised; and ostracised by those in authority.”

Making introductory remarks at the event, Victor Hart, chair of the Trinidad and Tobago Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative said successive government assisted in “emasculating” the sector, essentially crippling its ability to help the country in difficult times such as these .

“The process began in the late 1970’s when the government stopped producing 5 year plans that were used by companies then to plan for upcoming projects because they knew what projects were in the pipeline. Today, we can’t even be sure what projects we’ll be likely to plan for in 2017, let alone 2018 and beyond,” said Hart. He told the audience that government to government arrangements, as introduced by Dr .

Eric Williams in 1979, sidelined the local construction firms .

“That decision saw French designers and contractors being welcomed to TT.” Hart lamented that today, the situation was the same as he reeled off a list of foreign countries who have come and gone, benefittng from large government contracts .

“In welcoming those foreign companies to T&T, successive government’s have ignored the pleas of sector’s plea to one, ensure that there was transfer of technology to locals, two, to insist that they register with global organisations before being able to work in T&T and three, make those companies take out bonds so that they do not leave our shores owing money to local consultants, contractors and suppliers.” He also said the sector remained largely unregulated with foreigners continuing to be favoured at the expense of locals with regard to payment .

These are old complaints, a fact acknowledged both by representatives of the JCC and the Prime Minister, who told the contractors that there were two sides to the story and that it was reasonable for government to search outside, if they believed locals either could not deliver a project by a particular time, or did not have the skill to do so .

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For the past four months, a small group of parents and children have met twice a week to develop their life-skills, such as academics, cookery, drama and technology in a project that Edwards would like to see rolled out to other communities in TT.

“It is possible to reduce criminality by 90 percent over three years, but we (TT) only invest in crime suppression, but should instead invest in social programmes. I’m tired seeing good money spent behind bad ideas.” He said his group, Steven Edwards Productions, will gladly partner with other NGOs and the country’s police youth clubs.

“We are now developing a handbook.

The secret tour success is that we are very serious about what we do.” Edwards said the project has so far been run on just a quarter of its due allocation.

SE P’s Rebecca Mahabir said every session of the project had a component of motivation, explaining, “We must first think of ourselves as successful”.

She said an expected outcome of the project is the drafting of a storyline for a film, “Life in the ghetto”, to be entered in the TT Film Festival 2017.

A video of the project showed participants preparing food, utilising technology and performing dance and drama.

Barry Bristman of the Canadian High Commission hailed SE P for helping participants to rise above their limitations, so as to develop themselves personally and professionally.

Inspector Ian Charles of the Inter Agency Task Force (IATF) vowed to continue assisting the programme in any way possible, such as the provision of security and transport. “A lot of people here have talent but we need to get the talent out,” he encouraged.

“These little things can lead to bigger things. The University of the West Indies offers scholarships in drama. Kids, take your training further, and one day I hope to see you doing plays in the Little Carib Theatre