Overall the many speakers praised Ferreira’s journey from childhood poverty to dock worker and labour activist to Butlerite to People’s National Movement (PNM) stalwart to Organsiation for National Reconstruction (ONR) stalwart and then back to the PNM.

Rowley said he first met Ferreira in 1986 when he (Rowley) became PNM deputy leader.

“I realised he was someone special, telling me about ‘being there and having done that.’ I attached myself to that intellect and that experience.” Rowley recalled working with Ferreira post-1986 to rebuild the PNM. “He brought to the PNM that experience of the ONR. I was the beneficiary of that experience and goodness.”

“Opening ourselves to others also requires us to be attentive to the needs of the new call because of the downturn in the economy, many persons lost their jobs and are undergoing severe financial difficulties. Similarly, because of the way our pension schemes are structured, many persons who have given their time and energy for the good of the nation now in their later years find themselves unable to cope with the financial demands.” He continued, “We have to invest in our older generations in who so much wisdom resides, and we have to invest in our youth which is our future, that which we will become depends on the emphasis that we put on preparing the younger generation for future responsibility.” Yesterday, in commemoration of Corpus Christi celebrations, thousands of devout Catholics walked from the Queen’s Park Savannah, Port-of-Spain in a solemn procession to Independence Square. Later they attended the mass at the Grand Stand, which was filled to capacity.

Archbishop Harris told the congregation, they must be open to all others who celebrate with them regardless of ethnicity, social capacity, or financial possibilities, because hospitality is one of the foundation virtues of Christianity.

He said only when they are open to others, one can say that hospitality is truly relived among Christians.

“Loving communities, my dear friends must not deceive simply as churches … there must be communities in the Trinitarian home, communities open to embracing others, communities in which the love that is within us does not stay enclosed within the confines of the community, but spills over to embrace others.” He continued, “It is only when our parishes and clusters become transformed into communities of love and when we can celebrate with other communities of love will we begin to see a change in this land of ours. The embracing of others which is hospitality must have an institutional dimension as church and with other Ecclesiastes communities.”

Amanda Joseph, the wife of Wakeel who has openly confessed to being linked to the Unruly Isis gang complained of chest pains at her Crown Trace, Enterprise, Chaguanas home, around 8.45 pm on Monday .

She was rushed to the Chaguanas Health Centre by her husband where Dr Khatri made several attempts to resuscitate the woman but she died around 9.45 pm .

The news of Joseph’s death shook the entire Crown Trace area and yesterday Wakeel was preparing to bury his wife .

However, he will have to wait until today for an autopsy to be carried out at the Forensic Sciences Centre in Port-of-Spain before the body is released for burial .

Yesterday senior police officers met in an emergency meeting and activated a security blanket over the Crown Trace area where the woman lived and where the wake is being held after receiving reports that rival gang members were planning to disrupt the mourning at the Crown Trace home .

Police and soldiers were assigned to ensure law and order prevail in Enterprise and were given new instructions to maintain a presence in the Crown Trace area and to ensure that no criminal activities take place .

Police sources said yesterday that they are taking no chances and have even offered to provide a presence at the home of Wakeel and to offer counselling to him and members of his family .

Yesterday Crown Trace residents began converging at the home of Wakeel shortly after news of his wife’s death spread and brought snacks for the wake. However because this is the month of Ramadan and Wakeel has been fasting the residents were told to return later with the food .

According to the Islamic faith if one dies during the month of Ramadan that person goes straight to Allah and all their sins are forgiven .

Police sources say due to the circumstances surrounding the young woman’s death, they are requesting that an autopsy be done to ensure no foul play .

Meanwhile Head of the Islamic Front, Umar Abdullah offered condolences to Wakeel and his relatives on the passing of his wife .

He described her as an inspiration and a tower of strength .

On March 31, during a walkabout in Enterprise following four killings in the area, National Security Minister, Edmund Dillon confronted Wakeel about whether he, (Wakeel ) was responsible for a spate of videos posted online, which according to Dillon, had the entire country uneasy.” Wakeel later admitted to the Minister that he was in the videos .

At the time he also told the Minister that he would be willing to tell the authorities who the crooked police officers are and where the illegal guns are hidden .

Berkeley was speaking Wednesday at the launch of ScoutsTT Investment in Character Campaign at the TT Scouts Headquarters, St Ann’s.

He said it did not matter how much infrastructure was put in place, if citizens were not grounded in the right values and characteristics, the country would go nowhere.

Berkely said the investment in the campaign was rallying TT in going beyond material things, beyond investing in jobs and buildings, but in creating the right kind of citizen the country needs now, and in the future.

“What we are doing is saying to the public and corporate TT that it is time for us to actually start investing in our young people, and developing the right kinds of character tools and trades that we want in our society.

“We are asking people to join with us, invest in our programmes, invest time, money, energy, resources, in building TT. We have what we consider a proven alternative to all of the negative alternatives that afflict our society today,” Berkeley said.

“We can create a better infrastructure, but if we do not have citizens who are grounded in values, proper work ethics and those kinds of things that we consider to be the characteristics of scouting, then we are not going to get anywhere.

“The late Dr Eric Williams (TT’s first prime minister) said ‘the future of the country was in our children’s school bags’, but it was also in what our children did. Dr Williams also said that money is not the problem, it is a problem.

“What he meant was that the issues that affect us as a society in terms of nature building are not related to money, but to the values that we have and how we go about building the society. Our level of patriotism and understanding as citizens, as individuals in humanity and mankind, we have a responsibility to leave this world better than we met it,” Berkeley said.

He said it was not just what we got out of life, community or the government, it was also what we gave back to society.

“This is asking all those who have benefitted from youth activities and co-curricular activities in school to start giving back. Let us not say we do not have time to do things, let us make the time to invest in creating a better world and a better TT,” he said.

Berkely said the crime situation in TT was a result of individuals and a level of lack of hope, and felt scouting was a way forward.

He said currently there were 6,400 scouts in TT with hopes of bringing that figure to 10,000 in the next three years.

The World Organisation of the Scout Movement (WOSM) is 40 million with the vision to increase that figure to 100 million by 2023.

“It is about getting young people involved, about getting them to make the right decisions and choices and that is what scouting is all about.

“When people think about scouts they think about camping and hiking and tying knots. That is really the method.

The objective of the programme is really character development and instilling in young people the values that allow them to make the right choices, the good choices in life, and to contribute to their society,” Berkeley said.

He added that over the past five years, over $12 billion was spent on trying to find the cure for crime in the country. He said if we invested more of that money in programmes that focussed on prevention, it would be money better spent.

Questioned on the outcome of the audit, Trade and Industry Minister Paua Gopee- Scoon on Wednesday told the House of Representatives that the exercise revealed that of a total of 385 dealers surveyed, 335 or 87 percent were in full compliance with the foreign used car dealership system.

The audit also found that 16 dealers had outstanding documents to be submitted and 25 were not in compliance due to various pending matters.

Nine were removed from the list of registered dealers, she said.

In January the ministry undertook to review and audit the industry.

The overall objective, Gopee-Scoon said, was to determine if registered foreign used car dealers met all the conditions of the dealership and whether they were operating legitimately.

Asked when the school, which has been plagued with a number of infrastructural problems will reopen, Minister of Education Anthony Garcia told the Parliament on Wednesday that the school had experienced sewer problems in May but the problem had been resolved.

“However, it seems as though the stench has returned,” he said.

The school had been closed in May and then more recently this month due to sewer problems.

Asked by UNC MP Dr Bhoe Tewarie if the completion of the new school building adjacent to the current school building, which was under construction during the previous administration and which was “60 percent complete” could alleviate the problem, Garcia said that the new building was not budgeted for completion this year.

“As I indicated some time ago,” he said, “the Ministry of Education identified ten schools that required urgent attention.

The Preysal Government Primary was not among those ten simply because that school (building) was 40 percent complete.” The school buildings identified for completion, he said, were between 90 percent to 95 percent completed.

“We are going to look at Preysal Government Primary in the next fiscal year,” he said.

In a release to the media, Mason said “Atlantic’s offer of VSE P to some of its employees is a matter of deep concern to me personally, and to all the burgesses of Point Fortin.” Mason said while he understands the challenges facing the energy sector, “the loss of one job in Point Fortin is one too many.” Nevertheless, the mayor praised Atlantic for its history in being a good corporate citizen and contributor to the development of Point Fortin.

“Accordingly,” the Mayor wrote, “I would expect that the company would deal fairly with any of our burgesses who accept the VSE P package.” “On a wider social level, the people of Point Fortin are very resilient. Over the past few decades, they have survived the shutdown of both the Dunlop Tyre factory and the Point Fortin oil refinery. So I am confident that the community will be able to deal with any fallout from the Atlantic VSE P offer.” Mason empathised with the workers and promised his commitment to assist them in their transition out of Atlantic into a new life “beyond VSE P.”

There are enough reasons to decriminalise these offences.

According to Attorney General Faris Al Rawi, the State will reduce a backlog, estimated at about 100,000. The system already has between 126,000 to 140,000 cases a year passing through the magistracy.

At the same time, the magistracy has very limited pool of resources at its disposal.

“We have 48 sitting magistrates, 38 of whom sit in the criminal courts, nine judges sitting in the criminal High Court and a total of 30 judges at the level of the High Court, and 11 justices of appeal,” he said in Parliament as the legislation moved to the House of Representatives.

Only six per cent of the people who are charged on a yearly basis are in fact given a verdict by the court. The other 94 per cent, the Attorney General said, are the subject of charges that go into the backlog.

The administering of traffic offences including the use of attorneys, issuing of warrants and hearing of cases, Al-Rawi said, takes up hundreds of thousands of man hours that could be better used elsewhere. Fines for traffic offences collected between 2010 to 2015 were $250 million. But the overall expenditure on the system for the past seven years has been about $7 billion.

It is true, however, that the law has a symbolic function. And it can be said that the State is sending the wrong signal. Instead of seeming to dilute the gravity of road offences, it should be doing the opposite. And every offence, no matter how seemingly trivial or procedural, adds up.

But this is not the case if the system of law and order is so overburdened as to be paralyzed. If these cases end up getting stuck for years, if they delay other more grave cases and divert resources from them, then the effect is an undermining of the system of law and order generally. That is not good for anyone.

Further, as stated by Al Rawi, the most serious of road offences will remain criminal. This means, there will be adequate protections in place to defer the worst kind of conduct.

What’s more, having a better streamlined system, involving the use of points, which can be administered by a wider pool of personnel will result in more efficient policing of wrong-doing.

It may well be that the system of violations will actually be more effective than a system of offences in the long-run as the State’s capacity to handle these could increase over time.

Of course, all of this is contingent on adequate resources being given to police officers to manage traffic. The Attorney General noted this country is still using the breathalyser while other countries have long moved on to devices that can also read levels of drug intoxication beyond booze.

Disconcertingly, while the State has figures for traffic offences across the country there were two notable omissions in the Attorney General’s presentation in Parliament.

It is not clear why figures for San Fernando and Tobago were not available, but we feel these figures are very important and should be included in any debate on national road safety initiatives.

For now, we welcome this new legislation and urge citizens to remember that once implemented, it will not be a licence to misbehave.

In fact, it may well be the opposite.

In a nation that is almost under the full control of crime and corruption due to a government that is unable to deal with the rising crime rate and an uncooperative and fearful public, it is important for citizens to do everything in our power to protect ourselves.

I am appealing to motorists to keep their vehicle locked at all times, even while driving.

They must install an anti-theft system in their vehicle if it doesn’t have one. Thieves are unwilling to steal vehicles if they know the vehicles can be recovered quickly.

It is essential drivers are aware of their surroundings, especially in parking lots and gas stations.

If confronted by a car thief, do not resist.

Cars can be replaced; you can’t.

CHELSEA BEDASE El Dorado

Justice Frank Seepersad, in an oral ruling given after evidence from Kevin John and his former superior officer, said John’s alleged use of recreational marijuana was at his own risk. The judge said the Chief of Defence Staff at the time was entitled to discharge John for “service no longer required” after he tested positive for marijuana use in one of three drug tests administered to him in December 2010.

Seepersad also noted that John was lucky he was not dishonourably discharged, as there would be no taint on his character which would prejudice his future employment prospects. John was a private in the Army with eight years’ service.

John tested positive for marijuana use on December 20, 2010, when a reactive test was done by an army doctor at its Camp Cumuto barracks. Two tests done days earlier came back negative, but John’s superior decided the third test was needed, as the first two were not done in a controlled or supervised environment, and a strange “crackling” sound had been heard on one of the previous occasions when John provided a urine sample.

He was also charged with possession of marijuana after police searched his girlfriend’s home at Knightsbridge, Cascade. He and his girlfriend are still before the magistrates court on the possession charge. In his civil lawsuit, John claimed his rights to procedural fairness were breached, as the TTDF did not give him an opportunity to challenge the finding against him, but took the oppressive approach of discharging him.

In his ruling, Seepersad said the use of illegal narcotics should always be viewed as a circumstance of no tolerance, especially in the protective service.

He said so long as the use of illicit drugs remained a criminal offence, it was the public’s expectation that an officer who provides an invaluable service to the country should operate under strict compliance with the law. Seepersad said of even greater concern was the use of illegal substances by those who were entrusted with lethal weapons, such as soldiers. He said John’s superior officers were correct not to adopt a flexible approach when he tested positive for drug use.

The judge did suggest, however, that the TTDF should provide a list of offences and the nature of offences for which a no-tolerance approach would be adopted.

Although John lost his case, he was not ordered to pay the State’s costs, as he said he was unemployed.