DIRECTOR of Public Prosecutions Geoffrey Henderson yesterday gave instructions to police to charge a 46-year-old man for the murder of 41-year-old Reena Dalchan, who was stabbed to death on Monday and who was buried yesterday. However, investigators are stumped since they cannot charge the fisherman until doctors at San Fernando General Hospital give the go-ahead to release him from the medical institution where up to late yesterday he remained warded in critical condition. After killing the woman, the suspect, of Crissy Street, Enterprise, tried to end his life by jumping off the gallery banister of the house, where the murder took place. He suffered spinal injuries and is now paralysed from the waist down. Police sources said they are not sure when the suspect will be charged since they don’t know when he would be released from hospital, where he is being kept under police guard at Ward Seven. Dalchan, a mother of four, was stabbed to death with an 11-inch fishing knife, last Monday at her parents’ home, Korea Village, Carapichaima.
AN autopsy carried out yesterday on the body of 28-year-old Debbie-Ann Ramnath, who was found dead at the entrance to her school on Monday, revealed that death was due to strangulation. The autopsy, done by Dr Hughvon Des Vignes at Forensic Sciences Centre, also revealed that the student of the Corinth Teacher’s Training College, also suffered cerebral cranial trauma (a blow to the head). A 25-year-old man, who was detained the day after Ramnath’s body was discovered, was up to late yesterday still assisting police in their inquires. Ramnath’s body was found around 6 am on Monday. She was identified by her husband, Ryan Sagar, a fire fighter at the Chagunas Fire Service, on Tuesday after he saw a photo of her in Newsday.
The Trinidad and Tobago Institute of Architects is backing Government’s controversial plan to relocate the Parliament. Prime Minister Patrick Manning said yesterday that he received a letter from the organisation supporting his plan, which has run into a barrage of criticism from other quarters. Responding to a question at yesterday’s post-Cabinet news briefing at Whitehall on the issue, Manning released a letter dated June 3 and signed by the President of the Institute, Mark Raymond, which gave a rationale for a new Parliament building. The letter stated that the Institute “unanimously and strongly considers that the architectural and historical integrity of the Parliament Chamber, in particular, must not be added or altered in any form.” The Institute added: “We are of the view that even if the renovated Chamber were still to be used by Parliament without any constitutional change in the number of members (of Parliament), the additional services necessary for state of the art multi-media communication, recording and graphic equipment cannot be achieved without considerable modification of the Chamber’s essential architectonic features and ambiance. A point of sufficient importance to reinforce the need for a new Parliament Building.
The Institute stated that given the national and architectural significance of the proposal to relocate Parliament as well as the interest expressed by the general public on the issue, the organisation decided to convene a meeting to solicit the views of its membership. It said that all its members shared the view that the Red House represented a critical component of the urban, political and historical structure of the city of Port of Spain, and the history of Trinidad and Tobago. The Institute said that it felt “strongly” that if the Parliament were to be relocated, the future and welfare of the Red House must be carefully considered. It said that the building must be fully and effectively restored. It added that the completion of the Red House restoration and the construction of a new Parliament building — particularly as the design is to be selected by competition — was a process which was likely to take four or five years to complete. It should not be done in haste, it stressed. The Institute said that once the Red House was restored it should be put to use as an open and public building that can be assessed by all, and which maintains the urban civic equilibrium represented by the relationship between the Red House, Woodford Square, the Cathedral, the National Library Complex, the Halls of Justice and Frederick Street. The Institute did not comment on the second part of Government’s plan — that is, to remove the Prime Minister’s office from Whitehall to the Red House.
BATTLE LINES for the Local Government Elec-tion have been drawn with the Opposition United National Congress (UNC) marshalling its forces to fight the ruling People’s National Movement (PNM) in the seven local government bodies it currently controls and in the PNM-controlled San Fernando City and Point Fortin Borough Corpora-tions. Meanwhile, the National Alliance for Reconstruc-tion (NAR) will lead the opposition’s charge in the country’s remaining five local government bodies. NAR Political Leader Lennox Sankersingh told Newsday the party will be contesting most of the seats in the PNM-controlled Port-of-Spain City, Diego Martin Regional, San Juan/Laventille Re-gional, Tunapuna/Piarco Regional and Arima Borough Corporations. The NAR leader hinted that the UNC would concentrate the majority of its efforts in Central, South and East Trinidad. He said the party is now in the final stages of screening and expects to have its full slate of candidates ready by weekend.
UNC Local Govern-ment coordinator, Fyza-bad MP Chandresh Sharma said the party has screened 350 nominees for next month’s election, and included in that number are several sitting councillors and heads of local government bodies. He said the UNC was trying to select the best possible slate of candidates for the July 14 polls and incumbent UNC local government representatives would not be guaranteed automatic se-lection. UNC chairman Wade Mark said yesterday finishing touches were being made to the party’s list of candidates. The PNM is due to launch its Local Govern-ment Election campaign on Saturday at Woodford Square while the UNC launches its campaign 24 hours later. Sankersingh said the possibility of a joint NAR-UNC presentation of candidates at that launch has not been discussed.
Government has introduced a new mechanism for paying the $1000 book grant. And it has also cut down on the number of children receiving this grant, as it moves to phase out the system and introduce the textbook rental scheme. Education Minister Hazel Manning announced yesterday that the book grant would be confined to Forms 3, 4 and Lower 6 students. Furthermore, their parents would receive a plastic credit card valued at $1000 which could be used only for the purchase of schoolbooks. This measure would cost Government $100 million. Meanwhile, she said, primary school children and students of Forms 1 and 2 would receive free school books. The Education Minister said that in the primary schools the textbook loan programme would include the lending of one book in each of the four major subject areas (Reading, Language Arts, Mathematics and Science). These textbooks would have to be returned at the end of the year and re-used again for two years, she said. Among Forms 1 and 2 students a textbook rental/loan book scheme would be started for books in four subject areas (maths, language, spanish, science), she stated. She added that the programme would be expanded to all the Forms by 2005, replacing completely the book grant.
Manning said Cabinet agreed to the report of the Textbook Evaluation Committee, which looked at all textbooks designed for the new curriculum. She said the Committee found many of the textbooks submitted for both primary and secondary education failed to meet the standards required. She said in language arts, for instance, no book was found to be suitable. She said the Committee addressed this problem by grading the textbooks on the basis of their overall scores and recommended those textbooks where the overall scores were not far removed from the minimum scores. She added that the Cabinet agreed to the establishment of an Inter-sectoral Textbook Committee as part of the move to facilitate the production of textbooks of a higher quality.
The same cabinet, which last year decided to divest state-owned NBN, yesterday had a change of heart, when the matter came back to it for final determination. Prime Minister Patrick Manning at a news conference at Whitehall told reporters that several ministers, himself included, have been having serious reservations about the original plan. Asked whether government was reluctant to surrender political control over a television station, Manning said that that question was raised, but not answered, Manning said, “We just felt we needed to re-examine that policy before we confirm it,” adding that “it was all up in the air.”
Manning said the cabinet comprised human beings “who could always change their mind and see a different point of view on the matter. After we took the decision on policy, we referred it to the Divestment Secretariat…in the interregnum you have time to think on these things again and reflect,” he said. A government source said that one of the considerations which factored into the change of heart was the fact that government would have to invest some $70 million into NBN before putting it on the market. Government had taken the decision to divest in December last year, citing among its reasons the fact that NBN was losing $1.5 million a month.
The Senate on Tuesday night passed the Kidnapping Bill 2003 with a tough mandatory minimum sentence which allows no judicial discretion to vary the sentence for the specific offence of kidnapping for ransom. There was much concern that the blanket mandatory 25 years sentence would inhibit persons who aid and abet kidnapping from pleading guilty in the expectation of a lesser sentence in return for turning State’s evidence. The Bill also overturns several traditional legal conventions. Clause 9 imposes a legal duty on anyone who knows about a kidnapping to report it to the police, although normally the law does not usually punish anyone for a failure to act if under no prior obligation to do so. Anyone failing to do so is liable to fine and imprisonment. A significant new clause added to the Bill on Tuesday punishes police officers who fail to duly investigate a reported kidnapping.
Clause 9(4) states that a police officer who receives information and who does not investigate in accordance with proper police procedure commits an offence and is liable on summary conviction to a fine of $100,000 and imprisonment of two years. Opposition Senator Wade Mark had urged a 10-year penalty, unsuccessfully. His colleague Arnim Smith claimed: “There are widespread rumours that the police are part of the problem…People are saying the police are involved…People are afraid to give information to the police who will give it to others.”
Due to the Opposition’s lack of support for a parliamentary special majority required for bills breaching the national constitution, the Bill did not seek to ban bail.
Most people in the Caribbean, 84 percent, support a Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) which is due to be functioning in Port-of-Spain by year-end, revealed Barbados Attorney General and Deputy Prime Minister Mia Mottley. The CCJ will adjudicate disputes over the Caribbean Single Market and Economy (its “original” jurisdiction) and will replace the British Privy Council as our highest court of appeal (its “appellate” jurisdiction). Mottley was speaking as chairperson of the CCJ Preparatory Committee at a news conference yesterday at Crowne Plaza attended by several Caricom attorneys-general including TT Attorney General Glenda Morean. The law ministers yesterday discussed documents to establish the US$100 million Trust Fund whose annual interest would fund the running of the CCJ in perpetuity, guaranteeing its independence and sustainability. Mottley said Caribbean persons had urged a local regional appellate court since colonial days, and that support for the CCJ had recently leapt from 64.8 percent in 2000 to 84 percent in 2002. She said that while the CCJ was being set up, British Prime Minister Tony Blair had recently proposed to abolish the institution of the Law Lords and the Lord Chancellor, a move she said would have implications for the Privy Council. Rather than wait in dusty corridors for this outcome she said, Caribbean states had gone ahead with the CCJ to establish full political and legal sovereignty.
Mottley said: “The United Kingdom wants to establish its own Supreme Court…They have taken a decision to go where we have gone since Independence.” She was unperturbed by CCJ member states which domestically had not yet approved the court’s appellate jurisdiction, saying there would still be time in the future to do so. She said Barbados had passed enabling legislation, which she said would be proclaimed for the opening of the CCJ. Mottley said the CCJ would give justice to people who might not otherwise be able to financially afford to access the British Privy Council. While its headquarters are in Trinidad she added, the CCJ will be an itinerant court moving from country to country, and like the Privy Council it would be able to adjudicate on matters in different types of legal systems in the region. Mottley expressed full confidence that the CCJ would be served by capable judges, saying: “The Caribbean has a distinguished history of citizens serving at the highest levels on international tribunals.” She added that advertisements to recruit CCJ judges would be placed throughout the whole Commonwealth to avail the CCJ of the world’s best brains and to develop a judicial system relevant to the political, social and cultural needs of the people of the Caribbean.
THE Banker’s Association of Trinidad and Tobago (BATT) has reached an agreement with the utility companies regarding the policy of customers being charged transaction fees for the payment of their utility bills at local banks. As part of the agreement, which came into effect on June 1, customers will no longer be required to pay transaction fees to the banks when paying their utility bills. In a letter to Consumer Affairs Minister Camille Robinson-Regis, issued yesterday to the media, President of BATT Richard Young stated that the association has been meeting with the Water and Sewerage Authority, the Trinidad and Tobago Electricity Commission and the Telecommunications Services of Trinidad and Tobago over the last four months in an effort to arrive at a mutually agreeable solution to the situation.
Young said that he was happy to say that an agreement was reached, where each utility company will pay a bank fee of $3 plus VAT per transaction. “What this means is that individual customers will not be required to pay a service charge when they use the bank’s teller service to pay utility bills,” said Young. Based on complaints by consumers about the unfairness of the transaction fees, Robinson-Regis raised the concern with the banks. In January 2003, the minister in collaboration with the Central Bank of Trinidad and Tobago initiated a research programme to look at the issues of the transaction payments, and in February the fees were removed by one bank. The agreement between the BATT and the utility companies caters to all transactions conducted over the counter, through the ABM or the Telebanking service.
AFTER six years of waiting for the State to pay compensation for the death of their nine-year-old son from lead poisoning which also left the dead boy’s brother disabled, Albert and Cheryl Soodeen have been granted an interim payment of $250,000. The State yesterday awarded the sum pending a complete assessment of damages to ascertain the total sum of money which should be awarded. The Soodeens, of Demerara Road, Wallerfield, filed a lawsuit for negligence, claiming that deposits of lead materials in the vicinity of their home affected their children – Ronald, 9 and Mark, 7. Ronald died in 1996. Mark still undergoes medical treatment. In 1997, retired Justice Bissoodath Ramlogan ordered damages be assessed as a matter of urgency. The case came up for hearing on several occasions during which time submissions were made before a judge on the availability of medical records to ascertain Mark’s medical condition and his prognosis.
Last month, the assessment case was called before Justice Mira Dean Armorer. The law firm of Daltons, representing the Soodeens, filed a summons in the Sub-Registry, San Fernando, seeking an interim payment from the State of $250,000. The Soodeens stated in an affidavit they are entitled to substantial damages, but since judgement was handed down, the family has incurred expenses in assessing the medical condition of Mark. The boy’s condition needs to be continually assessed, it stated, to facilitate medical treatment locally or abroad. The summons sought an order of the Court for the State to make the interim payment. Yesterday, when the case came up before Justice Dean Armorer, attorneys Lynette Maharaj SC and Joan Samlalsingh of Daltons, represented the Soodeens. Attorney Krishna Narinesingh of the Solicitor General Department, appeared for the State. It was agreed by consent that the State will pay $250,000. The assessment will come up for hearing on July 18.
