Black Immigrant Daily News

In an effort to increase transparency and accountability, board of directors of the National Roads Authority (NRA) amended their Board Communication Policy this week to include warnings and, ultimately, suspension without pay from board meetings in cases of a breach of the Board Communication Policy.

Speaking about the changes, NRA board chairman, Alric Lindsay, said that one of the aims was to help the NRA board and Minister Jay Ebanks address some of the concerns raised by the Office of the Auditor General.

Lindsay explained:

One of the things discussed with the Auditor General was that, in previous election periods, over 80 per cent of NRA’s budget was spent within 3 to 4 months of the election date. This drew serious concerns about the NRA’s spending and the need to stay within an operational plan and within budget.

To address the concerns, the new NRA board established a Board Communication Policy setting out parameters for communication with the NRA, including who may give instructions to the NRA.

As Lindsay explained, this Board Communication Policy was important to ensure that the NRA only acts on instructions from authorized persons i.e., the managing director or via directives from Cabinet or the NRA board.

Elucidating on the point, Lindsay said:

The issue that was highlighted in previous years was that members of Parliament reportedly contacted the NRA from time to time to provide instructions for road works in various areas.

The Auditor General noted that some of these works were not set out in an operational plan and, as such, referred to them as “ad-hoc” projects.

With the guidance of Minister Jay Ebanks, the NRA board worked on, and finalized a strategic operational plan last year, together with the recently revised Board Communication Policy, to eliminate the practice of “ad-hoc” projects and to establish proper communication channels where no member of Parliament may give casual instructions to the NRA.

Lindsay added that this approach of prohibiting ad-hoc projects also means that monies must not be spent by the NRA outside the NRA board’s approved strategic operational plan (amended from time to time).

To shore up the NRA’s position, Lindsay noted that the NRA’s managing director, Edward Howard, is also finalizing internal control and operational risk management policies to ensure that these meet the overall objectives of accountability and transparency.

Lindsay emphasized, however, that “none of this works if board members are not also accountable.”

“For this reason, all board members have agreed that any Board Communication Policy breaches will met with initial warnings, followed by suspension without pay,” Lindsay concluded.

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Black Immigrant Daily News

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Black Immigrant Daily News

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Some of the 16 guns, ammuniation and marijuana seized by police in the Central Trinidad on Friday night. Photo courtesy TTPS –

POLICE seized 16 high-powered rifles, five pistols, several thousand rounds of 7.62 ammunition and, $2.6 million worth of marijuana during an exercise in Central Trinidad on Friday night.

In a statement, the police said the exercise took place between 2.30 pm and 8.15 pm on Friday. Officers from the Customs and Excise Division were also involved in the exercise.

Also seized by police and customs officers during the raid were 22 rifle magazines, two pistol magazines and several component firearm parts.

The marijuana was found in several cans hidden amongst grocery items. The rifles, pistols, ammunition, firearms parts and marijuana were found in two barrels.

The statement said police officers intercepted an international crime network, which resulted in the seizure of a large quantity of firearms, ammunition, and narcotics

Acting Commissioner of Police (CoP) Mc Donald Jacob congratulated officers on another successful intelligence-led exercise.

“These seizures were as a result of months of meticulous intelligence gathering and surveillance by a dedicated team of officers attached to an intelligence unit in the TTPS (TT Police Service).”

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Independent Senator Dr Maria Dillon-Remy speaks during debate in the Senate. FILE PHOTO/OFFICE OF THE PARLIAMENT –

INDEPENDENT Senator Dr Maria Dillon-Remy urged the Government to initiate a mass screening of the population for cancer, which she said was needlessly killing thousands of citizens each year who die from undetected colon, cervical, breast and prostate cancers.

She spoke in Thursday’s budget debate in the Senate. Dillon-Remy asked aloud what was in place for the thorough screening of the ordinary person who turns up at a public health centre.

“Endless people are dying of breast cancer, cervical cancer and prostate cancer when they could have been saved by proper screening.” she said. Each regional health authority (RHA) should have a plan to do mass screenings of residents in their zone, she urged. While a reduction in maternal mortality was to be celebrated, she said current successes had been built upon the work of previous ministers of health.

However, she alleged the former People’s Partnership government had stymied efforts by their predecessors to initiate a cardiac catheterisation programme in collaboration with Johns Hopkins University, despite huge sums having been spent on this heart health initiative. She said the result of not having that programme was that today, if someone doesn’t have the money for private treatment, he/she will die. Dillon-Remy inquired as to the Government’s plan to address a backlog of requests for non-urgent surgery, such as that on a slow-growing cancer tumour, after a build-up of cases during the lockdown periods of the covid19 pandemic. While admitting it was a worldwide problem, she said TT now needed a plan to deal with the backlog.

Dillon-Remy also called for the passage of an autonomy bill for Tobago, saying Parliament should not be debating every line item of expenditure for Tobago in budget documents, but rather, simply award the requisite sum and let representatives in Tobago debate the detailed allocations. Urging cheaper air flights, she suggested the Government revert to the Dash-8 aircraft which had previously dominated the inter-island air route, suggesting these were cheaper to operate than the aircraft currently used. Dillon-Remy wanted more action against crime, urging inputs from all quarters including parents, businesses and faith groups.

“Crime is out of control.”

The senator called for efforts for dealing with crime at the root cause, “not just waiting for them to get bad and you build more prisons.

“She reflected that social decay did not happen overnight, but came in incremental steps. Reflecting on having to rebuild after hurricanes had hit her home, Tobago, she said now was as good a starting point as any to rebuild TT.

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