In a release on Tuesday, BATT announced that it has collaborated with United Way to establish the United Way TT-Hurricane Relief 2017 fund to assist with relief efforts “for our Caribbean counterparts that have been severely affected”.

BATT offered “its deepest sympathy to everyone affected by Hurricane Irma, which has had devastating impacts on several Caribbean islands.” BATT said that the member banks have each opened an account under the same name and invited the public to contribute with the recovery process.

“All funds raised will be donated to the United Way Trinidad and Tobago, who will ensure the funds are used for the purpose of helping those in need in the Caribbean. The banks where donations can be made are as follows: Scotia Bank Trinidad and Tobago Limited, Republic Bank Limited, First Citizens Bank Limited, RBC Royal Bank of Trinidad and Tobago, JMMB Bank and First Caribbean International Bank (Trinidad and Tobago)

Emrit, who left Trinidad last weekend to compete for the Boost Defenders in the Shpageeza Cricket League (SCL) in Afghanistan, was in the field in the second match of a doubleheader against MIS Ainak Knights when the blast occurred.

The all-rounder, speaking to Newsday yesterday evening, recounted the terrifying incident which has left him and his family back home shaken.

“It had a suicide attack outside or close to the stadium. We don’t know how close it was. It sounded like it was right outside the stadium. They said it was three kilometres but it felt right there.

We were fielding and heard a loud explosion and the whole ground started to shake. When I looked up I saw the building shaking and glass shattered and smoke in the air. We just went off the field. They told us it was a glass cylinder explode, then they said it was a grenade. Inside the stadium was safer but after now we hearing it was a suicide bomber,” Emrit said.

The 36 year old said he is not taking any chances with his life and will be returning home as soon possible.

“My family uneasy home so most likely I’ll leave Friday as long as I get a flight. Trust me it’s the scariest thing I’ve experienced,” he added.

Emrit, recently competed for the Guyana Amazon Warriors in the Caribbean Premier League and has plied his trade in numerous cricket leagues around the world including in Bangladesh, Pakistan and Hong Kong.

According to an ESPNcricinfo story Shafiqullah Stanikzai, Afghanistan Cricket Board’s chief executive officer, the blast occurred during the fourth over of Knights chase of 202.

The other overseas players at the ground were Emrit’s teammates Cameron Delport (South Africa) and Morne van Wyk (South Africa). Delport was a member of the Trinidad and Tobago Red Steel in the CPL in the past. The Zimbabwean trio of Vusi Sibanda, Sikandar Raza and Ryan Burl were representing Knights. The match was stopped briefly, but once the Afghanistan government-appointed security gave the clearance, it resumed.

Afghanistan was recently inducted as the 12th full member by the International Cricket Council in June. The security situation has not permitted any international cricket to be played in the war-torn country. But for the T20 league, Stanikzai said the Afghanistan government itself was involved in security.

“For this tournament, a special decree has been issued by His Excellency, the president of the country, to look after the security,” he explained. “We heard a sound, but we were not sure exactly what happened.

The match was stopped for short time but resumed once the security heads told us we can carry on. The president’s special advisor was also present at the ground to assure the security.

They told us there is no threat to the players.”

Daniel said that while 60 body cameras were issued to officers in Northern Division, several are in need of servicing.

He also revealed that of the 12 police stations in Northern Division, only three – St Joseph, Tunapuna and Pinto Road – were selected to participate in the pilot body cam project.

“At the moment we have assigned a camera to one senior officer on active patrol. We were not given enough cameras to supply more and there are several issues we had with them…but our technical team is working on that aspect,” Daniel said.

In other policing news, Daniel drew a correlation between an increase in the number of illegal firearms seized this year to an improved detection rate and reduction in murders.

He said that between January 1 to September 13, 123 firearms were seized within Northern Division, a 48% increase for the same period last year.

This improvement, he said, was accompanied by a decrease in the number of murders by 17% and an increase in the detection rate by 21% within his Division. He credited the improvement in crime-fighting to a more innovative and community-based approach to policing which seeks greater dialogue between police and the public.

Launched at the Activity Centre, Caura Valley on September 6, the Tank Farm consisting of ten 1,000 gallon water tanks came to fruition through the collaborative effort of the community group, WASA , the MP’s office, the regional corporation, CEPEP and the Digicel Foundation. In congratulating members of the council, foundation CEO Penny Gomez stated, “The proposal of a tank farm really blew us out of the water. We were impressed by the originality and by the fact that a project of this nature really addressed a basic need for the community. What made it even more special for us, was the element of sustainability by having WASA as a strategic partner.”

Driving the village council to continue its good work in developing Caura, Sen Clarence Rambharat, Minister of Agriculture, Land and Fisheries in his address encouraged the group to “build Caura around good leadership,” a media release stated. Also addressing the crowd was Deputy Speaker of the House and MP for Tunapuna Esmonde Forde who thanked the foundation for the private sector partnership noting that Digicel is in the business of “linking communities.”

The project was done through the foundation’s Extraordinary Projects Impacting Communities (Epic) programme, which funds indoor and outdoor community initiatives. Seeing the opportunity to further develop the community and its environs, the village council, and the MP’s office applied for an Epic grant to implement the project. “While our financial input in this project rang to a tune of $40,000, it is this public private sector partnership that is the real win for us at the foundation, because we know that with the additional support, the village of Tumbasson will continue to flourish. This project acts as a model for other community groups to emulate,” Gomez said.

“We are in perilous times but I know that we are a resilient people.

I have complete faith in the people of Trinidad and Tobago, every single citizen, that we will not just rise to this occasion, but we will successfully surmount the challenges currently before us,” Robinson-Regis said at a Pre-Budget public forum on “gender sensitive budgeting”, held by the St Augustine unit of the Institute for Gender and Development Studies.

The forum, held at the Learning Resource Centre at the St Augustine campus of The University of the West Indies was titled: “Budget for Gender Justice: Make households matter to the House.” Organisers said it was aimed at ensuring that women, men, boys and girls have equitable access to opportunities and outcomes needed to advance peace, empowerment, rights and gender justice.

In an interview following her speech, Robinson-Regis told journalists that the Public Sector Investment Programme (PSIP), the government’s overall development programme for the country, will remain at $5 billion – the same as last year. Questioned about allocations in the budget, she said, “the priorities will be maintained. We have said in our vision that there are certain priorities that we have to maintain in order to maintain a certain level of stability and we will maintain our priorities.”

THINGS LOOKING UP She appealed to those who were criticising government for not taking hard decisions, “to consider the impact of massive retrenchment in the public service, a return of the negative list and curtailment of foreign exchange injections into the economy by the Central Bank.

I ask them to imagine the extent of social dislocation that would flow naturally from that and what would be their suggestion to the government to mitigate that.

“I ask those who demand that they be paid all their outstanding monies today to consider the effect of that payment on the sustainability of the very positions they now occupy. I ask those who demand that diversification take place now to help the government to understand how to do that without first putting in place the necessary infrastructure.” She added that the people who insist that the sacrifices should begin with those in government should check when last a government minister got a salary increase.

Despite that she said that things are looking up although the challenges remain and those realities have to be taken in to account.

“And as a consequence of that we are not burying our heads in the sand – we are making sure that we address all of the challenges that befall us.”

NO UNION THREAT In response to questions about the government’s ability to maintain the stability in the face of demands by the trade union movement, the Minister said she believes unions understand the current economic circumstances and will do their part to ensure TT remains stable. “I don’t see any threat from the unions.” Robinson-Regis said forums like yesterday’s are held too late to have any real impact on the budgeting process because at this time the budget is almost complete and all that remains to be done is to put on the finishing touches. Indeed, one of the repeated complaints from speakers at the forum was the lack of consultation on the shape of the budget, but Robinson-Regis said the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Planning and Development as early as April invited groups to make suggestions for inclusion in the budget and to meet with the ministries for consultations.

However, she said that many of the invitees do not respond and if they do respond their responses are late.

HOLD BUDGET EARLIER Hazel Brown, of the Network for NGOs of Trinidad and Tobago for the Advancement of women, an umbrella body for about 100 non-profit organizations advocating women’s and family issues, suggested that the budget should be presented in April or May, giving the country a chance to discuss it and make suggestions for the inclusion of matters that the nation considers vitally important.

Robinson-Regis said that idea did not make sense because there is a mid-year review of the budget which is essentially an amendment.

“Which is normal and which is what happens so that would not make any change.” However, Brown said the current budgeting process has to change because it is a very flawed and inefficient process and NGOs such as hers had been advocating that idea for the last ten years, adding that their idea “provides a very effective participatory way of determining what the budget expenditures and income approaches should be, for example, you get an opportunity to talk about this business about land and property tax and all of that so that those things could be incorporated into what the final budget is.” She said after listening to the comments from the public it would still be up to the government to make the final decision but they would be better informed by the public discussion. Reminded that the budget is subjected to very rigorous examination during the debate in both houses of Parliament, Brown countered that “all of that is political debate. What we are getting in the Parliament is not necessarily objective evaluation of the proposals, what you get is the politics, that is what you get in the debate.”

Maharaj in a statement titled, ‘Students suffer administrative incompetence at law school’, alleged that repeater students were asked to pay the full economic cost of their tuition just hours before registration.

Hitherto, all students paid just $13,000, while the Government subsidised $81,000. But now some must pay the full sum of $94,000.

Maharaj said a delegation of students had asked him to represent them.

Al-Rawi yesterday told Newsday that Cabinet had not taken this decision (to force students to pay the full cost) but rather it was the former People’s Partnership (PP) government – according to details given to him yesterday by the school’s principal Miriam Samaroo.

“It was a decision of the Kamla Persad-Bissessar Government of which Devant Maharaj was a member,” Al-Rawi said adding that 40 students will be affected by the removal of the subsidy.

Both Maharaj and Al-Rawi speaking separately lamented that the change may hurt the legitimate expectations of the students.

Al-Rawi said, “I’ll make a diligent attempt to ensure fairness.”

He also denied reports that the meeting had to be called off because of the protests, adding that the meeting began at 6 pm and ended at 8.45 pm, with 62 percent of all bands registered with Pan Trinbago having a representative at the meeting. Gregory Lindsay, speaking on behalf of Concerned Individuals for Pan (CIP) challenged the legality of the Diaz’s meeting.

But contacted for comment yesterday, Diaz thundered: “According to the constitution I have a right as president to call a meeting at short notice. So I don’t know who is advising them or which lawyer is telling them things. The meeting was to brief members and they (CIP) were not there when I started it (the meeting). The circular was to deal with Panorama and no other business. It was very straightforward.” Diaz claimed that five people, “who never even played pan before” turned up and disrupted the meeting. “They are not panmen.

I don’t know which band they claim to represent. People bring them out to talk and say no Panorama, just to disrupt a meeting! Ninety percent of the members want Panorama.

“But three bands say they don’t want Panorama and they hired some fellas to hold placards and make noise,” Diaz claimed.

He reiterated that Pan Trinbago does not pay Panorama performance fees (remittances) to panmen but instead negotiates with the National Carnival Commission (NCC) and the Community Development, Culture and Arts Ministry.

Diaz said he told the members that they have to wait on the Budget to know what is the allocation for steelbands for 2018.

He indicated that Minister Nyan Gadsby-Dolly asked the NCC to ensure all interest groups find a new way forward for Carnival and as Pan Trinbago president he conveyed this to his members at the meeting on Tuesday.

Coming out of that meeting, was a plan to carry small bands semi-finals for Panorama to Chaguanas where each band will be required to play a Chutney song in addition to the usual Panorama tune while the medium and large band semis will be in Port of Spain as usual, but with a change of format.

Diaz indicated that Pan Trinbago is considering mixing the medium with large bands in that after each medium band plays, a large band will follow. That format will continue into final night for the medium and large bands in Port of Spain, while the small bands final will be held in San Fernando. All prelims will be held at various panyards starting January 4.

In a release, the ODPM reported that it has been in communication with the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA), who has been co-ordinating regional response and relief to participating states impacted by Hurricane Irma namely: Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, the British Virgin Islands, Haiti, Turks and Caicos Islands.

ODPM said that while cash donations are considered to best practice at this stage of relief efforts, a preliminary needs list has been generated from damage assessments conducted and the following items are being requested: water*; 20 x 24 tarpaulins; collapsible water containers (five gallons); bleach (one litre)*; mops with handles; push brooms with handles; disinfectant (one litre)*; mopping liquid (one litre)*; mosquito repellent; canned food items (sardine, tuna, corned beef, soup)*; packaged dry goods (cereal, crackers)*; disposable diapers; cloth diapers with pins; baby powder; vaseline; baby wipes; bottled baby food*; pacifiers; baby aspirin; Tylenol; matches (by the carton); buckets (five gallons); rubbing alcohol (one litre)*; Ziploc bags (boxes); and paper towels (by the carton).

The items marked * are requested preferably by the case, but all donations are welcomed.

ODPM also said that the Trinidad and Tobago Postal Corporation has volunteered to assist in relief efforts and has set up various collection points for items at a number of their corporate post shop locations.

ODPM said that citizens wishing to assist those affected by Hurricane Irma are welcome to drop off any amount of the specified items in labelled boxes, indicating the package is for Hurricane Irma Relief via the ODPM, the item and its quantity.

ODPM asked that citizens please ensure that all items carry a minimum shelf life of six (6) months.

“I figured they wanted to start to work on locating the body but we have not heard anything from them since then (up to news time),” Pasqual said. Pasqual said the family also learnt from a family friend that a local military extraction team was being sent to St Martin to assist with relief efforts.

“So, we are hoping that he would get some information to assist on the ground about what is happening with the body.” Salvary-Doyle, 64, and her grandson Oliver Robert-Gedio, three, drowned after being pulled into the sea during Irma’s onslaught on St Martin last week.

The woman who lived in San Fernando, was visiting her daughter Daphne (Oliver’s mother), at the time of the tragedy. Daphne lived at 32 A Rue Round The Pond French Quarters.

Daphne was not at home at the time of the incident.

Pasqual said the family was told that when the house that Salvary- Doyle was in began falling apart after Irma made landfall in St Martin, she and the rest of the family decided to leave for another house a short distance away. She said as Salvary-Doyle and her grandson were about to reach the house came in and the waves took them.

Tragically, the death toll now includes Trinidad and Tobago national Melan June Salvary-Doyle, 64, and her grandson Oliver Robert Doyle-Gedio, 3, whose bodies were discovered earlier this week.

Both were swept to their deaths in raging flood waters when Irma unleashed her deadly torrent on the tiny island of St Martin last Wednesday.

According to some accounts, Salvary-Doyle and the toddler were in a house that began to fall apart during the storm. They were in the process of relocating when disaster struck.

We express condolences to the family during these trying times as they, and the people all across the Caribbean, continue to pick up the pieces after a historic storm.

By some estimates, the total death toll from Irma – including in Florida and the Caribbean – was at 61 yesterday, though fatalities may number even higher as authorities continue recovery operations.

Those operations now also involve the evacuation of 50 people from Sint Maarten, including 19 Trinidad and Tobago nationals.

Those nationals are expected to return to Trinidad and Tobago in coming days.

The extent of the damage and the close ties between this country and our Caribbean neighbours call for a continuation of assistance. While the loan of a helicopter was clearly an invaluable gesture, it may well be that Trinidad and Tobago, and Caricom as a whole, should do more and also provide monetary assistance that will be crucial in the months ahead. This should be limited to countries that are not dependencies.

With indications that the frequency of serious storms may well grow more unpredictable due to climate change, perhaps the time is also right to revisit the idea of a Caribbean Disaster Relief Fund.

Such a fund could be capitalised by contributions from Caricom states and then be perpetuated as a self-sustaining funding mechanism.

Member states could draw upon the fund for two areas: the funding of measures that enhance immediate capacity to deal with the aftermath of storms, and fiscal support in a period in which substantial reconstructive effort is required by the damaged economy.

The fund would have to have clear rules and criteria and regular top-ups from member states could be one way of replenishing it. It may also become a central agency capable of receiving support from international bodies.

Of course, any fund would have to be run with the highest degree of transparency and there must be accountability it its management.

Unfortunately, our experience with Caricom-wide funds, such as the Caricom Petroleum Fund, has led to questions over how the money has been applied.

Care must also be taken to ensure there is no overlap with another regional fund, the Caribbean Development Fund (CDF).

The CDF already has a mandate “of providing financial or technical assistance to disadvantaged countries, regions and sectors.” Perhaps development goals should be aligned in such a way that prioritises the bolstering of capacity in the long run to ensure CDF countries are more resilient in the wake of disasters.

We should also look to the signs of improvements in the US’s own relief efforts for lessons locally.

There, systems have been praised for limiting the death toll. Technology, building codes, weather forecasts and a better understanding of mass evacuation are said to have helped.

If storms are going to get worse in the coming years, we will need all the help we can get and must learn what lessons we can from Irma’s deadly lash.