You are currently browsing the Moontown weblog archives for the day 7. March 2010.
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- 7. September 2010: Priest peeved by Govt plan to enforce hanging
- 7. September 2010: Rowley: PM taking population for fools
- 7. September 2010: EXPLAIN IT, PM
- 7. September 2010: Tourist arrivals up by almost 10 per cent
- 7. September 2010: Hanschell Inniss forced to cut prices
- 7. September 2010: Barbados’ reputation at risk
- 7. September 2010: NYPD ready to help
- 7. September 2010: Security push
- 7. September 2010: Comissiong: Time to save us
- 7. September 2010: SOLAR PUSH
Archive for 7. March 2010
SUNDAY’S SPECIAL MOON TOWN BARBADOS
7. March 2010 by admin.
RICE AND PEAS; VEGETABLE CHOWMEIN
MACARONI PIE; SAUTEED CASSAVA
SCALLOPED POTATOES; BBQ SPARERIBS
BBQ PIG TAIL; SEA CAT
BAKED CHICKEN; BAKED PORK
FRIED SNAPPER; FRIED STEAK FISH
GRILLED STEAK FISH; TURKEY STEW
FISH GRAVY; MIXED VEGETABLES
TOSSED SALAD; COLE SLAW
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National Energy Task Force ‘hits the ground running’ in Antigua-Barbuda
7. March 2010 by admin.
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Indian refiner leases 1.2 million barrels storage in Bahamas
7. March 2010 by admin.
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Nation to celebrate International Women’s Day
7. March 2010 by admin.
Antigua and Barbuda will join the rest of the world in celebrating “International Women’s Day” on 8 March 2010.
Craig R. Rijkaard, research officer for the Directorate of Gender Affairs in the Ministry of Education said International Women’s Day is an occasion marked by women’s groups around the world.
He said the date and occasion will be commemorated at the United Nations and is declared in many countries to be a national holiday.
Rijaard said that Directorate of Gender Affairs will be having a series of activities to mark this occasion.
They will be having church services at the Ebenezer Methodist Church, a concert entitled “Progress for Women-Progress for All” at the Multi-Purpose Cultural and Exhibition Centre, a raffle, school programmes, an address by the Minister of Education Jacqui Quinn-Leandro, several training programmes by DOGA, poetry night and several events organised by POWA. (Antigua Sun)
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Remittances at four-year low - But stability forecast for 2010
7. March 2010 by admin.
Money transfers from Latin American and Caribbean migrants to their home countries are likely to stabilise in 2010 after suffering a 15 per cent drop in 2009, according to a new report last Thursday by the Inter-American Development Bank’s Multilateral Investment Fund (FOMIN).
Remittances to the region fell to US$58.8 billion last year, below the level reached in 2006.
Jamaica’s inflows also dipped but at a rate below the average for the region.
Jamaica’s share of remittances was reported at US$1.798 billion, or 11.6 per cent lower than the US$2.03 billion of inflows in 2008, a peak year for inflows.
The 2009 inflows represent a return to a four-year low when remittances were at US$1.77 billion.
Mexico remained the dominant market with more than US$21 billion of remittance receipts, down 16 per cent from US$25 billion in 2008.
Brazil’s receipts dropped 34 per cent, the largest decline, from US$7.2 billion to US$4.75 billion.
first recorded fall
Last year marked the first time in which the regional volume of remittances was lower than the amount sent the year before since the FOMIN started tracking these flows in the year 2000, said the International Development Bank.
The average growth rate up to 2008 was 17 per cent per annum, the bank said, but noted that signs of a slowdown in transfers was evident from 2006.
The slowdown has been attributed to the economic slowdown and job losses in big transfer markets such as the United States, Spain and Japan.
Until 2009, the average annual growth had been 17 per cent, although it started to slow in 2006 and diminished considerably in 2008, as the global economic crisis hit migrant employment and income levels in countries such as the United States, Spain and Japan.
But FOMIN says the signs of a recovery in regional remittances began to emerge in the last quarter of 2009, tracking with early signs of recovery economic recovery in some big global markets.
But it does not expect a robust return to former remittance highs.
“In the short term, significant recovery in the volume of remittance flows is unlikely, largely due to the uncertain outlook for economic growth in traditional remittances sending countries,” the report said.
“But the signs of stability of the last months could provide a basis for an estimate of stabilised remittance levels, or event the beginning of a new period of single-digit growth in the near future.”
But even as jobs return - expectations are they will, but slowly - and incomes improve, the report suggests that migrants will try to rebuild savings, thereby limiting the amount of funds sent back to families. (Jamaica Gleaner)
business@gleanerjm.com
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Capital and Credit debuts debit card - Joins Easi-Access network
7. March 2010 by admin.
The New Kingston headquarters of Capital and Credit Merchant Bank. - File
Avia Collinder, Business Reporter
Capital and Credit Merchant Bank (CCMB ) has issued its own debit card, giving some of its account holders access to the local MultiLink networks for both automated banking and point-of-sale transactions.
The financial institution will not be developing its own ATM network, but has partnered with the umbrella credit-union group to piggyback on its infrastructure.
The merchant bank said last Tuesday that it launched the card with permission from the Bank of Jamaica (BOJ) and after negotiations with primary members of the MultiLink network, particularly the Jamaica Co-operative Credit Union League (JCCUL), which has given permission for use of its Easi-Access outlets.
“BOJ permission is given as long as the accounts with deposits exist to support the card,” said CCMB Marketing Manager, Michelle Wilson-Reynolds.
The merchant bank joins a network that now numbers 10 issuers.
Edmundo Jenez, general manger of JETS Limited - operators of MulitLink - says the 10 issuers include seven companies that have an ownership stake in the network, and three others, which are individually sponsored by owners.
The seven comprise four banks - Scotiabank Jamaica, National Commercial Bank, FirstCaribbean Jamaica and RBTT Bank Jamaica; the JCCUL; and two mortgage companies - Jamaica National Building Society and Victoria Mutual Building Society.
The three licensees include the CCMB, which was sponsored by JCCUL .
CCMB said its card would be available for subscription by two categories of clients: its Capital Investor Plus and Capital Super Saver account holders.
The Capital Link debit card can be used at any Easi-Access or MultiLink ABM for withdrawals and account enquiries, and POS transactions at merchant outlets where the MultiLink sign is displayed.
CCMB, Jamaica’s largest merchant bank with $27 billion of assets in a market valued at $33 billion, operates only three branches nationwide - Kingston, Ocho Rios and Montego Bay - which the merchant bank said, as a small network, was not the preferred route to debit-card access for its clientele.
JCCUL’s nationwide network will give clients wider access, Wilson-Reynolds said.
Wilson-Reynolds said that the card was a value-added product for the merchant bank’s clients and did not represent a new source of income for the financial institution.
CCMB is the only one of three merchant bankers to issue its own debit card.
By law, any deposit-taking institution regulated by the BOJ has that right upon approval by the central bank.
BOJ Communications Manager Tony Morrison said, however, that in the case of merchant banks, there is a 15-day delay or waiting period to access funds by cardholders after initial deposit.
The card issuer, Morrison indicated, is expected to advise their clients of this condition. (Jamaica Gleaner)
avia.collinder@gleanerjm.com
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Turks and Caicos demand democracy - To march against UK takeover
7. March 2010 by admin.
From left: Turks and Caicos People’s Democratic Movement’s Douglas Parnell and leader of the Progressive National Party, Galmo Williams, at a press conference in Providenciales last week. - Contributed
Janet Silvera, Senior Gleaner Writer
Miami, Florida: BOTH POLITICAL parties in the Turks and Caicos, the Progressive National Party (PNP) and the People’s Democratic Movement (PDM) will unite in a march tomorrow demanding immediate return to democracy and self- rule.
The move comes on the heels of an intended enactment of a new constitution for the country by the British.
Over a year ago, Britain took back interim autonomy of the country, placing one of its governors in charge after former premier Michael Misick, who was embroiled in a huge scandal of abuse of power, was ousted from office.
Both PNP leader Galmo Williams and PDM head Douglas Parnell are accusing the British of high-handedness. “We demand a full referendum of the people of the Turks and Caicos Islands before any changes to our constitution is made, for it is the only way to fully know and understand what the settled will of the people of these Turks and Caicos Islands is,” stated Williams at a press conference in Providenciales last Thursday.
According to his counterpart, the proposed reform has been rejected by indigenous people because it excludes them.
“Constitutionally, we are in a neutered state and the weapons to disenfranchise Turks and Caicos Islanders from our rights have long been formed.”
Urging their supporters to unite and march on Commonwealth Day tomorrow, the two concurred. “We must march to show our support not for the PDM or for the PNP, but for the Turks and Caicos Islands because we need to send the message loudly and clearly both far and near that the people of these Turks and Caicos Islands are united and are fed up with how we are being treated, mistreated and marginalised in our homeland.”
It is the first time in the country’s history that the two political parties have stood on the same platform defending the same cause.
United, the two feel that they can defeat their “common opponent - a spirit of vengeance, fear and ignorance perpetrated by a system of governance and of minority forces who are against the interest and rights of Turks and Caicos Islanders”.
majority support
Both parties are calling for the removal of Governor Gordon Wetherell, who they contend does not have the support of the majority of the people. “The people of these Turks and Caicos Islands demand an immediate return to democracy and self-rule,” stated Williams.
They describe the current rulers as opponents fighting and diminishing their rights and privileges, while seeking to unjustly bind their country with greater levels of destructive policies that will not bring about the change needed to spiritually, politically, economically and socially develop the country. “Put simply, we have to stand to stop our voice from being silenced and our people overshadowed,” said Parnell.
Janet.silvera@gleanerjm.com
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POWER OF A DON - Putting politicians to shame
7. March 2010 by admin.
Coke
Phipps
Arthur Hall, Senior Staff Reporter
THEY HEAD major criminal networks in Jamaica, even extending to North America and the United Kingdom. But no one seems to know for sure exactly how many of them are in play. Dons - rulers of the criminal underworld - are buttressed by legitimate government contracts, extortion, offbeat business enterprises, political, and even police support. They hold tremendous power in the trenches that rivals legitmate authority and puts elected leaders to shame.
In many an inner-city community, the don is not only the father figure, he is the role model for manliness, the great provider, judge, jury and strategist. Many young men aspire to become dons, as they see the position as an enviable one.
From ‘Claudie Massop’ to ‘Burry Boy’, ‘Willie Haggart’ to ‘Bulbie’, and scores of others, the legendary figure of the community don has straddled Jamaica for most of the past 50 years.
They have, at times, been labelled community leaders, area bosses, or some other euphemism that fails to mask the fact that they hold unbelievable power over geographic areas and large sectors where their word is final.
Those geographic areas could be as small as a street off Maxfield Avenue where a man called ‘Gov’ is the ‘area leader’ for the Stinger gang, which operates in a manner where it seizes the cellular phones of residents to monitor their calls.
However, the don could also wield a level of influence where his word is law over parish barriers, and could even have control over questionable enterprises on foreign soil.
The nation had a frightening look at the power of a major don in September 1998 when former Matthews Lane strongman Donald ‘Zekes’ Phipps was arrested and charged by the police for attempted murder, illegal possession of a firearm and unlawful wounding.
While he was being interrogated at the Central Police Station, Zekes’ supporters rioted, leaving four persons - including two members of the security forces - dead.
It was not until he appeared on the balcony of the police station and ordered his followers to return to their homes that the demonstrations ended.
All charges against him were eventually dropped, but Zekes was found guilty of two other murders in 2006 and sent to prison.
By then, his influence and control were waning, particularly behind reports that the police had seized millions of dollars in cash from his upper St Andrew home.
But most of the so-called dons who rule the communities across the island do not have the power of a Zekes.
“You have different degrees of donship,” Horace Levy, executive member of the Peace Management Initiative, told The Sunday Gleaner .
“Many are quite ordinary and in charge of the gang on their corner, but you have a few very powerful ones,” Levy added.
organised gang structures
Usually, the more powerful dons emerge from communities loyal to one political party, with organised gang structures.
“The leader emerges by earning his stripes through his viciousness and his access to financial resources. You get to emerge by winning your stripes through hard work, killings, and all the rest,” said Levy.
That is a far cry from the Jamaican don who emerged in the 1960s as a knife-wielding ‘rude bwoy’ who kept order in Kingston’s dance halls.
That is a development traced by university lecturer Dr Clinton Hutton in a 2004 interview with The Gleaner .
At that time, Hutton traced the influence of the don to the 1950s when there was mass migration from rural parishes to some of Kingston’s most hardened areas.
“These communities were re-peopled, meaning one political tribe in one area. It was the beginning of what (the late professor) Carl Stone called garrison communities,” Hutton explained.
“A lot of this took place in the 1960s in West Kingston (when the Jamaica Labour Party formed the Government); but when the People’s National Party came to power (in 1972), they reinforced it by building their own garrisons,” Hutton said.
Since then, the don has morphed into a creature almost independent of the politicians for financial support, turning instead to the lucrative drug trade, extortion, and other economic crimes.
“They were still under the patronage of the politicians, but they began to travel more to the United States and started to access their own source of arms,” said Dr Hutton.
“The drug trade started to open up and some of these guys became extremely wealthy and independent of the parties,” added Hutton.
financially independent
Today, that financially independent don is no longer hanging on to the coat-tails of the politician for his wealth, but the umbilical cord is uncut.
“The don still needs the politicians to legitimise them,” said Noel Smith, a social worker in the Corporate Area.
“If there is work to be given out in the community, the don must get, or the work might mash up. When the politician goes into the community, he can’t deal with every individual, so he depends on the area leader or don,” Smith said.
The don is also expected to ensure that persons turn out for political meetings, keep out supporters of the opposing party, and ensure that residents are protected if they are attacked by their political rivals.
For this protection, residents pay a heavy price.
“They have to accept the ruling of the don in any dispute, and that ruling could be that a man must get a broken hand or foot, or be killed for breaking the rules,” claimed Smith.
In addition, the don gets his pick of the young girls in the community by free will or force.
“But is not every don force people to send their young girls to him. The real big don has women falling over themselves to be with him, so he has no reason to force any woman to sleep with him,” Smith said.
Neither does he bow to the politician, putting an end to the days when the member of parliament could dictate what happens in a community.(Jamaica Gleaner)
arthur.hall@gleanerjm.com
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‘New leglislation threatens credit union survival’
7. March 2010 by admin.
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The Co-operative Credit Union League of Trinidad and Tobago Ltd is gathering its troops to deal with new legislation which it feels would adversely affect its ability to continue to provide the services now offered to its membership. At a mass public meeting at the Oilfield Workers’ Trade Union Convention Centre in San Fernando yesterday, Brian Moore, president of the League, said that while discussions with stakeholders, the Central Bank, the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Labour, have brought some amendments, some removals and some additions to the impending legislation, it still has concerns. ’We will not sit quietly by and see the introduction of legislation that has the potential to threaten our survival and threaten the environment in which we look to grow and expand to continue to serve our membership,’ he said. Moore told the people, that the League wanted one piece of legislation to govern the operations and regulation of credit unions rather than the many that existed previously. He said the League also wanted no unsurmountable burdens on small credit unions. He said the environment has changed since and T&T now had certain objectives including becoming an international financial centre. He said the implementation of those objectives were in the hands of the international lending agencies who were demanding that credit unions no longer be allowed to operate outside of the formal financial sector. Moore said credit unions which were not being subjected to the Central Bank or any financial regulatory agencies were the institutions least affected by the global financial meltdown. (Trinidad Express) |
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Charges for river water pushing up food prices
7. March 2010 by admin.
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Farmers across the country are now required to pay ten cents for every 220 gallons of extracted river water. The new system is taxing Aranjuez farmers already heavily affected by the harsh dry-season conditions. Norris Deonarine, spokesperson for the National Foodcrop Farmers’ Association, said the farmers were being harassed by the water police who were charged with enforcing new regulations. ’These farmers are trying to survive this hard dry season and feed the country and now water police making it harder to do that,’ Deonarine said. He said it was ridiculous to expect farmers to pay for water that they are pumping out of the river for their gardens, urging Water and Sewerage Authority (WASA) officials to use ’common sense’ and help farmers keep the cost of produce down. ’The water is from the San Juan River, which empties into the Gulf of Paria and is lost. Why charge people for water that is not being used in any case?’ Deonarine asked. ’We are seeing the slow climb of prices at the market. Now is known as ’crop time’, around this time of year prices are usually lower,’ he pointed out, adding that the NFFA believes that farmers should be exempt from the water restrictions. ’You have big businesses that are exempt from the restrictions, but they are not contributing to the food for the county,’ he said. Farmers understood the need for conservation, he said, but the authorities must come up with a new plan going forward. ’They need to establish designated catchment areas, small dams and reservoirs,’ he advised, adding that the Government needed to help farmers with the equipment to dig ponds and teach them modern techniques to deal with the problems. Ellen Lewis, WASA’s communication manager, said water usage was generally unregulated, but the drier-than-usual dry-season conditions has prompted a change in that approach. She said under the Water and Sewerage Act, all the natural water in the country is under WASA’s jurisdiction. ’The new system is part of WASA’s attempt to regularise the use of water during one of the most worrying dry seasons the country has ever experienced. The type of pinch we are seeing now we usually only see in April,’ she said. She also urged farmers to visit the Water Resource Management office to get their licences to extract water, adding that this licence was not about making money but about creating a database of farmers and regularising the usage of the water. She also said water police had discovered 14 illegal water extraction points along the Caroni River. No one was charged but the pumps were removed, she added. She said 35 per cent of the country use water from the Caroni Reservoir and that supply must be regulated to last the duration of the dry season. (Trinidad Express) |
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