A High Court judge yesterday used a human rights forum to make a strong call for an end to discrimination based on sexual orientation and matters of privacy, starting with the amendment of laws which now affect people in such a manner. 

Justice Frank Seepersad made the call at the symposium organised by the Faculty of Law, University of the West Indies (UWI), St Augustine, in partnership with the European Union.

“We cannot bury our heads in the sand. The world has changed, relationships have evolved and an individual’s right to determine whom he or she should love and forge a future with should be respected,” Seepersad told the forum.

“The courts should not be shackled by antiquated laws that discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation and should not have to mete out treatment that is inconsistent with the treatment that is afforded to heterosexual couples.” 

He slammed the criminalisation of anal sex between consenting homosexual couples and the failure to recognise civil partnerships or marriages between consenting same sex couples

Before an audience of leading jurists, intellectuals and activists, he suggested “that the law has to be dynamic. It has to evolve and it has to be relevant to the society and in this global era it is ill-advised to operate as if we are in a vacuum.  

“Our laws should conform to international accepted standards and our citizens have every right to be afforded the same level of respect and protection that citizens in other parts of the developed world enjoy.” 

The renowned jurist said judges were the guardians of the Constitution and acted as the upholders of the fundamental rights and freedoms therein contained.

Accordingly, he said, judges played or ought to play a pivotal role in advancing the protection of human rights. He said the human rights challenges that faced judges could be readily remedied if there was the political will to do that which was right.

“The challenge for the Judiciary arises when internationally recognised human right norms are not incorporated into domestic law,” he said, in his discourse at the Noor Hassanali Auditorium, UWI.

To illustrate the point, he zoomed in on the controversial topic of sexual orientation and same sex unions. He noted that the Republic Constitution contained no explicit provision that covered non- discrimination on grounds of sexual orientation.  

“Our equality legislation is primarily focused on equality of opportunity and makes no provisions with respect to discrimination that is premised upon sexual orientation,” he added.

He said while in many countries there had been a gradual acceptance of the right to enjoy a meaningful union with a partner of choice, to be able to own property jointly and to receive estate entitlements, in T&T the Sexual Offences Act criminalises buggery as between homosexual couples and did not recognise civil partnerships or marriages between consenting same sex couples.

“This position is viewed as being consistent with the right to enjoy family life and also the right not to be discriminated against because of sexual orientation. Our citizens have and enjoy no such rights and/or entitlements if they decide to be involved with a partner of the same sex,” he said.

He also cast light on T&T’s discriminatory Immigration Act which prohibits entry to homosexuals, a matter which is now engaging the Caribbean Court of Justice in the case of openly gay Jamaican attorney Maurice Tomlinson. 

Referencing matters affecting the right to privacy, he referenced the recent case of West Indies cricketer Lendl Simmons who was ordered to pay $150,000 in compensation for leaking sexually explicit photographs of account executive Therese Ho, with whom he had an extra-marital affair.
Seepersad said the court determined that there was no common law right to privacy and there was no tort of the misuse of private information. 

However, he pointed out that in Europe, the European Convention or Human Rights recognised that there was a right to privacy and therefore issues relating to privacy were determined with regard to the human rights element as laid down in the convention. Seepersad also called for the abolition of the death penalty. 

Kevin Baldeosingh

In the United States and other developed countries, researchers have examined parenting and families to try and figure out what the best practices are. These studies have come up with ten basic competencies that good parents have, most of which are probably also applicable to Trinidad and Tobago. The argument is that parents who have these skills are more likely to raise children who are emotionally balanced, sociable, and intellectually competent.

Now this is so important a task that you would think every society with the wherewithal would conduct such research. But only in 2009 did the Family Development Centre of the University of the West Indies conduct a survey of child-rearing practices in T&T, the first such in almost 40 years. 

The report, which must be required reading for all policy-makers and persons interested in children, was launched last month and is edited by FDC director and pedagogy expert Carol Logie and Caribbean-born US-based child development psychologist Jaipaul L Roopnarine.

Of the ten skills identified by the American researchers, two stood out as especially important. Yet these two primary skills are not what most parents would prioritise. A 2010 article by Scientific American writer Robert Epstein identified the following ten competencies:

1. Love and affection—meaning hugs and quality time

2. Stress management—you reduce anxieties for your child as much as possible, and try to keep yourself calm.

3. Good spousal relationship— even if you quarrel (and who doesn’t) you make sure the children see you making up. If you are not together, you never badtalk the other parent.

4. Autonomy and independence—you encourage your child to be as self-reliant as appropriate for their age.

5. Learning—you expose your child to educational materials, and preferably show yourself learning as well.

6. Life skills—financial stability and securing child’s economic future.

7. Behaviour management—you use positive reinforcement and punish only as a last resort.

8. Health—you feed them healthy food and make sure they’re physically active

9. Religion—you support religious and spiritual activities.

10. Safety—you protect your child and are aware of their activities and friends.

Now obviously some of these have to be modified for our society. In respect to (6), for instance, we don’t live in a developed economy so financial stability is less under our control. 

Therefore, we have to prepare our children to cope fiscally in other ways. In respect to (9), the FDC report found that “more Indo Caribbean caregivers engaged in religious and ethnic socialisation than African Caribbean caregivers.” 

Epstein, however, notes that most child development experts do not consider religious upbringing important or even consider it harmful, and he argues that the experts are wrong.

So, of these ten competencies, what are the two most important things parents should work on? It turns out to be (2) and (3)—managing stress and having a good relationship with your spouse. Unfortunately, it appears that most people are better at all the other parental competencies than this one. 

By the time that Raphael and Ricardo Rambaran had taken their second gulp of seawater a terrible tragedy was in the making. 
The two innocent young brothers had probably been pushed out by the backwash of waves at Balandra which had just broken on the shore line.
 Tragically for these 15 and 16 year old boys this everyday wave/beach action probably caught them by surprise and created tremendous fear. Great fear caused them to lose their senses in the precious moments when their lives could easily have been saved. Unable to touch the ground they probably panicked, their breathing became rapid and they ingested more and more water. By the time that they had taken 3 or 4 more gulps of water a great sorrow had been determined for their family and for all those who value precious young lives.
This unspeakably sad story has been retold time and time again and in the majority of tragic cases reported in Trinidad and Tobago in 2014 and 2015 the victims are principally children.  
Anyone who has ever been involved in a near drowning experience as I was, when I was eight years old will know immediately the great helplessness and panic that sets in. From that moment of panic all risks increase and the chances of survival grow slim. 
The antidote for panic in the water is the confidence that comes from even a few basic swimming lessons. 
In a country like ours, surrounded by sea on four sides and blessed with countless rivers and streams it seems unthinkable that we are not teaching our children to swim at any stage of their educational process.
Here then is a place where we can put ourselves to good purpose as a nation and save so many of the young lives which are going to be lost in the months and years ahead.
Perhaps our swimming heroes George Bovell and Dylan Carter can use their influence to encourage the Ministry of Education to add swimming to the school curriculum and to begin the process of building swimming pools at schools all over our country. 
Saving lives is heroic and heroes are urgently needed in this situation.
With deepest sympathy to the Ramberan family on their tragic loss.

Gregory Aboud
Port-of-Spain 

HOBART, Australia—Darren Bravo is on the verge of a century leading a courageous fight-back against Australia who inflicted more misery on West Indies on the second day of their first Test yesterday.

Bravo played with class to be undefeated on 94 as West Indies stumbled to 207 for six after Australia declared their first innings on 583 for four at Bellerive Oval.

After another dreadful performance in the field, the visitors put on a woeful batting display capitulating to 89 for five before a sixth wicket stand between Bravo and Captain Jason Holder carried them past 100.

At the close, Kemar Roach on 31 with three fours, is providing solid support to Bravo and their stubborn seventh wicket stand is nine runs shy of a century.

Adam Voges and Shaun Marsh put on 449, the highest fourth-wicket stand in Test history after Australia resumed from their overnight score of 438 for three.

Voges, who resumed on 174, finished unbeaten on 269 after Steven Smith declared the innings closed during the lunch break.

He scored 33 fours, no sixes and ended the day with a Test batting average of 76.83, second only to Australian legend Sir Donald Bradman.

Jomel Warrican broke the stand by removing Marsh to finish with three wickets for 158 runs.

Marsh, 139 overnight, was caught by Bravo for 182 after sweeping to deep midwicket.

West Indies endured a disastrous start to their first innings, losing four wickets in their first session after Josh Hazlewood trapped Kraigg Brathwaite who scored 2 from 26 deliveries.

Nathan Lyon claimed three for 43 including six maidens with his spin attack to undermine the West Indies middle order while Hazlewood picked up two for 43.

Rajendra Chandrika struggled against the spin until he drove at Lyon to be caught at first slip for 25.

Then Lyon struck again, twice in one over, as the visitors crashed to 78 for four.

He hurled himself to his left to complete a brilliant return catch to remove Marlon Samuels for nine.

Five balls later Lyon picked up his third wicket when Jermaine Blackwood played defensively only to see his inside edged taken by Joe Burns fielding close.

Denesh Ramdin was bowled by Hazlewood for eight just after the tea break before Holder joined Bravo in 27 run stand that took Windies past the three figure milestone.

Holder, who scored 15, suffered an unfortunate dismissal with his side on 116, refusing to ask for a review when Marais Erasmus gave him lbw to a Peter Siddle ball which replays show was sailing over the bails.

But Bravo stood firm, scoring a half century for the 14th time in his Test career, to lead the resistance and playing a class above his colleagues in an innings in which he also had to endure some rain delays.

He played frequent shots through cover and mid-off, with 15 of his 17 boundaries coming through the offside and appears set to achieve his seventh Test century. 

(Continues on Page A54)

The Trinidad and Tobago Football Association (TTFA) has failed to workout a soluation that would avoid having its best players selected for the 2016 COPA America qualifier against Haiti scheduled for January 8, 2016 in Panama City, Panama.

In an emergency meeting of the newly elected executive of the sport at the TTFA Offices, Hasely Crawford Stadium, Mucurapo, last evening, to address a threat from members of the senior men’s national team that they will withhold their services until outstanding match fees from the Gold Cup Tournament and two World Cup qualifies against Guatemala and USA are settled. At the conclusion of the meeting no solution was found. 

In a news release last evening the TTFA states: “On the evening of December 10, 2015, it was brought to our attention that the players on the Trinidad & Tobago Senior Men’s national team had issued a press release.

The Press Release stated that the players decided that if selected for the 2016 COPA America qualifier scheduled for January 8, 2016 in Panama City, they will not take the field. 

This was underlined by one of the senior players, during his participation in a radio programme, confirming the origin and content of the said press release. The reason cited for the players adopting this position is the fact that they are owed monies that they were promised months ago for representing our country.”

The release continued: “We appreciate the frustration of the players and we are endeavouring to address the position as soon as is practicable. Our ability to address the plight of all the people we owe is a function of the TTFA being in the financial position so to do.

Since we were elected to office on November 29, 2015, some ten (10) working days ago, we have been working assiduously to establish the financial position of the TTFA. In doing so our progress has been severely hampered by the lack of documentation, poor recordkeeping and the inability to collect monies due for gate receipts.”

The release added: “This also applies to this situation, apparently it has been custom and practice to operate in accordance with oral agreements, in many cases the parties often lacked the authority to commit the organisation.  “This places the new administration in the position of having to locate the parties to the said oral agreements, not unsurprisingly, their recall of the circumstances and what was agreed to is both inconsistent and contradictory.

Although this could take some time to unravel, please note that the players are not out of pocket. As is the norm, they continue to receive their club salary and all the costs they incurred when representing the national team, such as flight, accommodation, meals and sundry expenses, have been met by the TTFA.

Having said all the above, the absence of a policy governing the entitlement to match fees is also a serious oversight. For instance, based on our findings to date it appears that match fees are not a function of experience, number of appearances at national level, time on the field, or category of staff. This will be corrected as we go forward, and more specifically the policy will include an undertaking with respect to the timely payment of sums due.

In future, the operational protocol of the new administration will mirror that of the best run companies.

MUMBAI, India—India and Pakistan will play their group match at the World Twenty20 in the hill city of Dharamsala on March 19, and New Delhi and Mumbai will host the semifinals.

Kolkata’s Eden Gardens was already announced as the venue for the final of the 16-team tournament from March 8 to April 3. South Africa, England, the West Indies, and Sri Lanka are in Group 1, while India, Pakistan, Australia, and New Zealand are in Group 2 of the Super 10 stage.

They will be joined by two of the eight other teams competing in a qualifying competition.

Chennai was not chosen yesterday as a venue since three stands at M.A. Chidambaram Stadium are not in use because of a legal issue with local authorities.

It will, however, host matches in the Women’s World Twenty20 to be played concurrently. The men’s tournament, which carries prize money of $5.6 million, has been won once each by India, Pakistan, England, the West Indies, and Sri Lanka.

Defending champion Sri Lanka is the only team to have reached the final three times. (AP)

First Round (group winners to progress to second round):

Group A: Bangladesh, Netherlands, Ireland, Oman.

Group B: Zimbabwe, Scotland, Hong Kong, Afghanistan.

Second Round (Super 10):

Group 1: Sri Lanka, South Africa, West Indies, England, winner of Group B (Q1B)

Group 2: India, Pakistan, Australia, New Zealand, winner of Group A (Q1A)

Fixtures: First Round

March 8: Zimbabwe vs Hong Kong, Nagpur; Scotland vs Afghanistan, Nagpur.

March 9: Bangladesh vs Netherlands, Dharamsala; Ireland vs Oman, Dharamsala.

March 10: Scotland vs Zimbabwe, Nagpur; Hong Kong vs Afghanistan, Nagpur.

March 11: Netherlands v Oman, Dharamsala; Bangladesh vs Ireland, Dharamsala.

March 12: Zimbabwe vs Afghanistan, Nagpur; Scotland vs Hong Kong, Nagpur

March 13: Netherlands v Ireland, Dharamsala; Bangladesh vs Oman, Dharamsala.

Second Round (Super 10):

March 15: India vs New Zealand, Nagpur.

March 16: West Indies vs England, Mumbai; Pakistan vs Q1A, Kolkata.

March 17: Sri Lanka vs Q1B, Kolkata.

March 18: Australia vs New Zealand, Dharamsala; South Africa vs England, Mumbai.

March 19: India vs Pakistan, Dharamsala.

March 20: South Africa vs Q1B, Mumbai; Sri Lanka vs West Indies, Bangalore.

March 21: Australia vs Q1A, Bangalore.

March 22: Pakistan vs New Zealand, Mohali.

March 23: England vs Q1B, New Delhi; India v Q1A, Bangalore.

March 25: Pakistan vs Australia, Mohali.

March 26: New Zealand vs Q1A, Kolkata; England vs Sri Lanka, New Delhi.

March 27: India vs Australia, Mohali; West Indies vs Q1B, Nagpur.

March 28: South Africa vs Sri Lanka, New Delhi.

Knockouts:

March 30: 1st semifinal: Group 1 2nd v Group 2 1st, New Delhi.

March 31: 2nd semifinal: Group 1 1st v Group 2 2nd, Mumbai.

April 3: Final, Kolkata.

Lavinia Rose represents an excellent example of a solid ‘price to chance’ each-way bet in the Maiden Stakes over five furlongs of Wolverhampton Tapeta today, when ‘Saturday-night diners’ will enjoy an eight-race programme menu.

As mentioned several times it’s a unique floodlit experience on a superb surface; Lavinia Rose improved considerably on turf time-handicap marks at Chelmsford last time out and, signicantly, gets a 5lbs fillies’ allowance under Graham ‘The Enforcer’ Gibbons!

Previously sharpened up by an experience against handicappers, in a Newmarket nursery, this Ralph Beckett-trained Compton Place filly comes out similarly on the TH to Entertaining Ben.

William Muir’s charge has to be ‘on the premises’ and others with form figures are fancied but Lavinia Rose ticks enough boxes; ‘Gibbo’ has been booked for a good reason!

Leoncavallo puts an unbeaten record on the line at Cheltenham in the £20000 Triumph Hurdle Trial over an extended two miles, what beats John Ferguson’s charge will surely win!

His mark when an unchallenged winner at Market Rasen makes Leoncavallo nigh on a ‘cert’ and he’s game; that was illustrated in the following race at Wetherby six weeks ago.

Penalised Leoncavallo was ‘under the cosh’ a long way from home but kept battling and eventaully drove others into submission, scoring by a dramatic short-head; no wonder he’s been ‘spelled’ since, that was tough.

These juvenile hurdles start to get classier, several rivals could improve and be in line for the ‘Festival’ next March, if they can beat an in-form Leoncavallo! 

Later ‘Triumph’ winner Peace And Co makes his seasonal debut but needs to imrove in what preomises to be an informative International Hurdle; we’re more interested in Atlantic Gold for the Novices’ Hurdle over three miles of ‘good to soft’ Doncaster.

Trainer Charlie Longsdon has booked his stable conditional jockey, Tom Humphries, and takes advantage of conditions which allow him to claim 10lbs. 

Take the hint, get on! 

Kevin Baldeosingh

It’s one of those sayings which has been used so often that it is now a cliché: “Those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it.”

The argument in this aphorism from the Spanish writer George Santayana is that, by remembering the past, we can avoid making similar mistakes in the present or the future. The problem, however, is the premise that, once human beings are aware of the possibility of error or negative consequences of a course of action, they change their behaviour. This, as the most cursory survey of people’s lives would show, is patently untrue. Most human beings are unable to learn even from their own past as individuals, and instead repeat their patterns of behaviour from childhood to old age, dying essentially no wiser than when they were born.

If this is true for individuals, it is magnified to tenth degree for polities. After all, does not a large part of human history consist of leaders and nations repeating the actions of leaders and nations before them, always thinking that they would succeed where all others had failed? It is not that these countries forgot the past—indeed, many of the nations who lived up to Santana’s aphorism, from Germany to Japan to Britain, were the creators of historiography and the main sources for not only their own nation’s past but the world’s. But the assumption that mere knowledge could affect behaviour, either individually or collectively, was based on the myth of psychotherapy which has only begun to be eradicated more than a century after Sigmund Freud infected the public mind with it.

None of this, let me hasten to add, means that history is useless. Indeed, if we had to abandon all humanities subjects save one, history would be my choice to be retained. All fact-based knowledge does prove useful at some point, and history tells us what is possible (and, perhaps more importantly, what is not possible) in the realm of human institutions. This is surely the fundamental requirement of policymaking. Indeed, any policymaker who does not have a qualification in history, or is not well-read in the subject, is surely more likely to make errors in their recommendations no matter what their particular field of expertise.

At the same time, if this saying was ever true, it has been at least misleading since the mid-19th century. This was when the course of human history changed in a fundamental way. Before that, the history of the past 3,000 years, which is the era we have written records for, was more or less the same story with different characters and details. And for pre-history, for which we use archaeological and geological and paleontological and biological data, drastic change only occurred because of genetic mutation or immense natural disasters and, in those circumstances, memory of the past would have made not one whit of difference.

Then, in the 19th century, the world-changing set of discoveries and inventions and events now summed up as the Industrial Revolution occurred. The majority of human beings who benefit from this today remain unaware of how fundamentally this technological advancement, which started only in one island nation off the coast of Western Europe, altered human existence.

Until the IR, human beings, like all other animals, lived in what is called a Malthusian trap. Based on a famous essay by the Reverend Thomas Malthus (whose argument provided Darwin with the insight that led to his theory of natural selection), the basic point is that population size is always constrained by resources: if resources increase, populations will grow until they outstrip the resources and then the population will decrease until resources and numbers match. Malthus predicted that, unless strict population control measures were implemented, famines would the inevitable result. He was wrong, because he did not (and in a real sense could not) predict the effect of technology.

The IR made the Malthusian calculation irrelevant (even though doomsayers wrote best-selling books based on this false premise up to the 1970s and such prophecies remain popular today). For the first time in history, human populations began expanding beyond their natural ecological niche. It had taken human beings over 100,000 years to reach a world population of one billion; within one hundred years after the IR, the world’s population surpassed five billion.

But the magnitude of the change went beyond population figures. The Scientific Revolution had preceded the IR by just a few centuries, the enlightenment by just a few decades: now scientific theories and technological devices and philosophical ideas were joined to create a world no humans in the past had ever experienced. And now, here we are in the 21st century, where the working poor live like yesteryear’s merchants, a middle-class Westerner lives better than the wealthiest emperor of the past, and where our very brains are wired differently because we walk around with orchestras in our pockets and libraries in our hands.

From a historical perspective, we 21st century denizens are aliens in our own world. What, then, can the past teach us?

Kevin Baldeosingh is a professional writer, author of three novels, and co-author of a history textbook.

This week, the Attorney General accepted a European Union mission and UWI Law Faculty invitation, as part of a funded human rights strengthening project, to sit on a Human Rights Day panel with senior members of the local legal academy, bench and bar. Children’s Authority board member Hazel Thompson-Ahye and I were added to provoke issues about LGBTI and children’s rights. Parliamentary human rights committee member Glenda Jennings-Smith attended—to learn, she shared.

Justice Frank Seepersad, fresh from his landmark decision finding a place in the law to hold Lendl Simmons culpable for distributing his ex’s nudes, drew the main headlines the day after. Guardian’s photographer wanted a shot of him and the AG, without the rest of us. New poster child for using the law to find justice, he turned questions about judicial activism into answers about judicial responsibility.

I felt a bit out of place in the high-powered room with my PowerPoint video and irreverent memes, a world apart from lawyers posing questions as if the purpose of law was to withhold rights, not enable them. “Is it right for judges to extend protections of international law locally, when our legislatures haven’t domesticated them?” one asked. The panel, titled Diagnosing human rights, made me wonder whether the sad diagnosis was, for many of us, our sense of rights is that they ought to be hoarded, not widely shared.

Justice Seepersad’s simple reflections—that judges can play a pivotal role in advancing protection of human rights, and our citizens have every right to be afforded the same level of respect and protection guaranteed by international standards—became the surprising headline judge’s plea at human rights forum: End gay laws.

Many of us talked pointedly about leadership, something Law Association president Reginald Armour, noted clearly. So did the judge—noting human rights challenges judges face could be remedied if there was the political will to do what is right.

But the AG also said some powerful things well worth noting, much more notable than the wanton pink silk pocket handkerchief matching his pink tie. First of all, he said that LGBTI rights are being actively debated within the PNM; and he glanced at a brief to cite a few of over 20 laws he noted might need to be amended to address that.

One of his main “boufs”, as one participant posted to Facebook during the session, taking the discussion well beyond any empty chairs, was that he expected the room to be filled, that there ought to be a lively culture of student activism (it’s exam season on campus). Although he acknowledged activism was not as robust as he liked even in his protest days at Cave Hill. But his larger critique was that he doesn’t see a culture of sustained civil society advocacy, that we advocate by vaps and reactively, and that he doesn’t see people signing up for public service and nation building—despite the deterrent of Integrity Commission filings—or in consistent engagement with policymaking.

Two participants disagreed with him strongly. One, who chatted with me after, asked how people who don’t move in the AG’s social circles were going to have access to him as advocates, and suggested citizen advocacy is taking place in ways a blue-lights crowd will never see. I know that our legislators don’t have a robust system for email access by the public, or offices where phones are answered by listening people. The first question I’m usually asked if I get through to a minister’s office is the gatekeeping, “Where are you calling from?” …“My house. In my own country.”

Gabrielle Hosein, asking the last question of the session, noted that gender policy advocates have been speaking up till they’re hoarse to successive governments. He missed the opportunity to take credit for his Prime Minister going back on the decision to eliminate gender and children as a cabinet portfolio as listening.

But he did cast a broad welcome, I’m not aware of another AG offering, for people to serve and to advocate. And we all need to take him up on that. I am hopelessly eager to.

I tried to make some points myself, about human rights in general. About the importance of independent oversight of human rights decisions, which the UNC removed in the 1990s to hang people, leaving us only the Inter-American Human Rights Commission, where they didn’t show up last March for our first hearing in 15 years. Ironically, on the importance of having machinery to fulfil rights, where I quoted Senator Wade Mark’s eloquent wisdom. He and I spent a morning session together in El Salvador last month at a global meeting of parliamentarians talking about how parliaments can fulfil human rights obligations to LGBTI people.

I reminded the panel of an important decision on human rights oversight and machinery the Government will make the day after Human Rights Day, before this column appears, and whether it will take us a step backward from where the last one left us, and opt to chair the new parliamentary committee overseeing its human rights record—something Diana Mahabir-Wyatt reminds us is what dictators do.

Let me declare an interest. I handle media relations for Caribbean Airlines. The intention here has always been to stimulate discussion on the service offered by our national gateway. The Guardian was clear that this commentary must not be a pitch for Caribbean Airlines, but to start a conversation. Given how busy airports are at this time of the year, this one is timely. I think we can start by agreeing that Piarco International Airport is not the best connection experience for visitors. Let’s take that a step further. If tourism is going to develop in the way that the Tourism Development Company envisages, Piarco is going to have to offer much better service, particularly in this area.

Tourism has long been hailed as one of the viable options for diversification of the economy of T&T. While strides have been made in the area, there is room for improvement. In recent weeks, the TDC has been telling the public about various programmes offered to tourism industry stakeholders to enhance their tourism readiness. One is called Star (service training attitude and respect), getting operatives at the sharp end, those who interact with visitors and the public, to understand what service really means.

Public education and awareness building are critical elements in helping a country to serve tourists well, and getting them to return. However, these elements are just two of many which are necessary to close the gap between the government’s vision and our current reality. While individually we are all stakeholders, some have greater delivery responsibility. To use an analogy, there are frontline and backline stakeholders. 

Airlines, for example, have a key role to play in getting people to destinations. Airlines are particularly relevant to the Caribbean, where the absence of affordable and consistent ferry service, as well as the absence of bridges, makes air transport in many instances an essential service. However, airlines do not function alone, they require effective infrastructure, including well-laid-out airports, since the functionality of an airport can enhance or erode the efficiency of their operations. 

If we look at the Caribbean and Latin American region, the Panama airport—Tocumen International—stands out for ease of interconnection. Copa Airlines operates an efficient and strategic hub at Tocumen Airport, facilitating hassle-free gate-to-gate connections. Piarco International Airport’s infrastructure needs to be redesigned to facilitate this type of seamless international, hassle-free transit. Naturally, security and regulatory systems need to be assured before the airport can have this kind of new arrangement. 

Visualise what Piarco International could become—a regional transit hub providing efficient and needed north-south connections for origin/destination markets that would otherwise have insignificant traffic. This concept of a strategic hub would auger well for airlines using the Piarco International Airport, where increased numbers of passengers could easily be accommodated. This hub would also be a substantial revenue generator for the Airports Authority and by extension, the country. Copa Airlines and Tocumen International Airport serve as a real success story. 

Copa Airlines has been consistently profitable and has refined its hub strategy in Panama over the last 20 years. The airline has achieved sustained profitability, delivering net-profit margins above the airline industry average. Copa Airlines currently ranks in the top ten airlines globally in terms of operating margin. Additionally, Tocumen’s success with business travellers should be carefully studied and emulated. For business travellers, the hub at Tocumen Airport has resulted in more routes and flight options. As the hub has grown, it became easier to add spokes (flights) to new destinations. 

This kind of arrangement at Piarco would enhance T&T’s appeal as a regional financial and manufacturing centre, building on the country’s reputation in the Caribbean through ease of access.

Yes, I’d have to admit that Caribbean Airlines, which is based at Piarco, would benefit significantly from this type of hub set up, but the bigger national argument is leveraging T&T’s strategic location to build a vibrant, high connectivity hub that can powerfully support our other tourism and trade efforts.

Dionne Ligoure is the head of Corporate Communications at Caribbean Airlines. Another viewpoint will appear here next week. Have something to say about this? Write to letters@guardian.co.tt or visit our Facebook page.

The sudden passing of “Raf,” a most respected and adventurous Caribbean iconic musician, is for me a great loss to the kaiso, jazz music direction.

For me, Raf was more than a pianist/composer. He was an intellectual who always had another view point on music that inspired and stimulated my imagination. He recorded and performed one of my first kaiso jazz iconic compositions, Fancy Sailor that has become a Caribbean kaiso jazz standard.

We were regularly in touch up to two months before his passing. His contribution to the kaiso jazz music direction is unquestioned. He will be missed.

May God have mercy on his soul and may he rest in peace.

Clive Zanda

Composer/Pianist

I have been wondering about the shortages of gas to the petrochemical plants at Pt Lisas and the consequent drag on the economy. I have also read about the strength of the Singaporean economy although they have little natural resources and they manage by importing what they need, including gas.

It would seem, therefore, that it may be prudent to consider importing gas to alleviate this shortage. If we import gas, we will need a regasification terminal. We also export gas through Atlantic LNG and we should be able to take advantage of the low gas prices and buy gas on the open market to satisfy Atlantic LNG customers and divert their gas to Pt Lisas. In doing so, we can avoid the cost of a regasification terminal. We may also make money if we source gas close to the customer and so save on shipping.

Vesh Maharaj

Palmiste

It was reported that Christopher Henry, president of the Steel Workers Union, is insisting that the Government repay the Joint Trade Union Movement’s support during the last election by employing the workers laid off from ArcelorMittal. But under the previous administration they complained bitterly about supporters and financiers receiving beneficial treatment, and labelled the practice corrupt. Are they now asking the present administration to do the very same thing they condemned not too long ago?

Richard Trestrail

The ratio dicendi identified by Central Bank Governor Jwala Rambarran for the historic and unprecedented disclosures of the highest users of the scarce, rapidly dwindling and vital stock of forex over the past three years may be summarised as high and compelling public interest, potential threat to the integrity of the sensitive and fragile current financial system and the Central Bank’s own core remit as clearly set out in statutes and objects. 

These ecological considerations that underpinned and appeared to justify his circumstantial albeit conditional disclosure of the names of private companies accessing the forex that is regarded as, and is in fact public property or “patrimoney,” may be summarised as follows:

• The high public involvement/outcry for the resolution of the market shortage of forex and the range of difficulties occasioned to and suffered by citizens and companies including SME’s in their quest to conduct legitimate international transactions expeditiously

• The reversion to the 2014 system of forex distribution and allocation to banks ordered by the Minister of Finance, the release of US$500 million gobbled up in a short time and the re-occurrence of the shortage at a time of intensified Christmas imports

• Purchases of forex by Venezuelan nationals for the black market trade

• The potential threat to the integrity of the current financial system posed by the plummeting of energy prices aggravated by the concatenation of calls for the devaluation of the TT-dollar as a conservation antidote geared to stem the current tide of frenetic forex purchases

• That fact that the confidentiality duty of the Central Bank was not carte blanche but clearly conditional as unambiguously stated in Chap 79: Section 8(6) of the Financial Institutions Act

• The calls made by the Prime Minister, Minister of Finance and the general public to know the recipients/beneficiaries of the US$500m released by the Central that transformed and elevated the issue into a public interest matter that now evoked the transparency and accountability duty of care of the Central Bank.

• The advent of the clutches of a recession and the consequent reduction of inflows of forex from the energy sector that will exacerbate and decimate the already fast dwindling stock of economic—driving forex below the US$10 bn mark.

Let me congratulate Governor Jwala Rambarran for having the testicular fortitude and courage to address the issue frontally, surgically, creatively and in the national interest and not to succumb in imposed silence to the powerful capitalist ethic of commercial confidentiality even if using vital state resources.

Stephen Kangal

Caroni

By the time Raphael and Ricardo Rambaran had taken their second gulp of seawater, a terrible tragedy was in the making. 

The young brothers had probably been pushed out by the backwash of waves at Balandra, which had just broken on the shore line.

Tragically for these 15 and 16-year-old boys, this everyday wave/beach action probably caught them by surprise and created tremendous fear. Great fear caused them to lose their senses in the precious moments when their lives could easily have been saved. Unable to touch the ground they probably panicked, their breathing became rapid and they ingested more and more water. 

By the time that they had taken three or four more gulps of water, a great sorrow had been determined for their family and for all those who value precious young lives.

This unspeakably sad story has been retold time and time again and in the majority of tragic cases reported in T&T in 2014 and 2015; the victims are principally children. 

Anyone who has ever been involved in a near drowning experience as I was when I was eight years old will know immediately the great helplessness and panic that sets in. From that moment of panic all risks increase and the chances of survival grow slim. 

The antidote for panic in the water is the confidence that comes from even a few basic swimming lessons. 

In a country like ours, surrounded by sea and blessed with countless rivers and streams, it seems unthinkable that we are not teaching our children to swim at any stage of their educational process.

Here then, is a place where we can put ourselves to good purpose as a nation and save so many of the young lives which are going to be lost in the months and years ahead.

Perhaps our swimming heroes George Bovell and Dylan Carter can use their influence to encourage the Ministry of Education to add swimming to the school curriculum and to begin the process of building swimming pools at schools all over our country. 

Saving lives is heroic and heroes are urgently needed in this situation.

With deepest sympathy to the Rambaran family on their tragic loss.

Gregory Aboud

Port-of-Spain 

The governor of the Central Bank, in releasing the names and amounts of foreign exchange purchased by certain companies, raises more questions than answers. 

For me, the governor's statement provided no context. For example, how do we know that the companies he listed were merely buying their usual amount of foreign exchange as in prior years when we had no foreign exchange shortages in the system? 

However, the big elephant in the room is the fact that the governor's statement only accounted for about US$4.5 billion. According to the governor himself, that only accounts for about one third of the foreign currency sold by the Central Bank. Add that to the fact that commercial banks have purchased over US$15.5 billion from their customers and we have a huge gap between the figures released by the governor and the inflows of US dollars into the system.

Therefore, for me, the governor's statement told me absolutely nothing. I am still totally at a loss to explain where the foreign currency is going, and the public speculation that it may be going to fund nefarious activities will continue.

Vikram Persad

Chaguanas

KEVIN RAMNARINE

In 2014 I listened to a speech by former US Secretary of Energy and Nobel Laureate, Dr Stephen Chu, on climate change. He was at the time speaking at the annual Energy Conference right here in Port-of-Spain. He made the case that the actions of mankind in the last 200 years had contributed to the warming of the planet which consequently had increased the frequency and intensity of weather-related natural disasters. 

There is also a link between climate change, poverty and political instability. Prince Charles recently suggested that the civil war in Syria was the result of a climate-change-induced drought that caused millions of people to move thus precipitating conflict. Another consequence of global warming is rising sea levels. This makes small islands like those of the West Indian archipelago and the coastline of Guyana and Suriname particularly vulnerable. 

How urgent is the problem? NASA has reported that the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide is now over 400 parts per million. This is the highest level in the last 400,000 years and it means that humanity has a huge existential problem which is largely self-inflicted. 

This problem is global in nature and therefore requires a global solution and a global response. The scientific community has identified the main culprit as the burning of fossil fuels. There is consensus that we have to transition the global energy system towards a low carbon future. One of the elements of this transition is replacing coal-fired power-generation capacity with more environmentally-friendly natural gas or with renewable energy.

The rapid economic expansion of China and India in the last 30 years has come with environmental consequences. Both countries depend heavily on indigenous coal deposits to fuel their economic rise. In the case of China, 66 per cent of its energy comes from coal and in the case of India it is 57 per cent. China alone accounts for half of all the coal the world consumes. 

China is an economic juggernaut that needs to be fed with energy to maintain levels of growth. Writing in the New York Times in October 2012, the Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Thomas Friedman commented that if the Chinese dream was just like the American dream, “a big house, a big car and a big Mac for all then we need another planet.”

I must point out that there are those who accuse the developed world of a degree of hypocrisy considering that they too used coal to drive their industrial expansion albeit in a different era. 

But what of the global response? We have had the 1997 Kyoto agreement which has not achieved much. During the last two weeks, representatives of 195 countries gathered in Paris for the United Nations COP21 conference. In attendance at COP21 were presidents, prime ministers and celebrities. There was an added significance to the meeting given the terrorist attack on Paris last month.  

One of the aims of COP21 was to create internationally binding targets for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. These are called “Intended Nationally Determined Contributions” or INDC’s. This makes COP21 different from previous climate change gatherings. In the end, what was achieved was a climate change deal that will commit all signatories (including T&T) to reduce GHG emissions and therefore limit the impact of climate change to an increase of less than two degrees Celsius by the end of the century compared to pre-industrial levels.   

T&T submitted its INDC’s to the UN earlier this year. T&T’s commitment is to reduce its overall carbon dioxide emission level by 15 per cent in its power generation, industrial and transport sectors by 2030. This is estimated to cost US$2 billion.

Why is this important to T&T? There are two reasons. Firstly, T&T is the second highest emitter of carbon dioxide in the world on a per capita basis. We are second only to Qatar. Of course T&T and Qatar have something in common. Both are heavily industrialised and both have small populations. 

The second issue is that T&T is a small island state. This makes us unique in that we are both a contributor to global warming and a potential victim of it. I am of the view that this unique position means that we in this country have a moral obligation to be world leaders in the global response to climate change. 

Starting here at home, we must accept that T&T is a very energy-inefficient country and this impairs our economy and contributes to our GHG emissions. We use too many units of energy to produce a single unit of GDP. We waste energy and that culture of waste is driven by subsidies on energy. 

Some excellent work has been done by the young researchers at the University of Trinidad and Tobago to understand our local carbon dioxide problem.

A study by UTT concludes that some of the avenues for us to transition to a lower carbon economy is conversion of our transportation sector to CNG, the banning of incandescent bulbs and replacement with CFLs and LEDs, the sequestration in mature oilfields of carbon dioxide generated from Point Lisas and a more efficient power generation system. To different extents all of the aforementioned initiatives are being progressed. 

T&T has a duty to do its part in the global response but we must also fix our own house. Our ranking as the second highest carbon dioxide emitter in the world on a per capita basis makes the case for our obligation stronger. This is a task not only for governments but for the private sector, educators, civil society and indeed all citizens. This is the global challenge of the century and we must do our part.