Year: 2018

Farmers from across Berbice will now be provided with the opportunity to be trained and certified in crop protection. According to the Director of the University of Guyana Berbice Campus, Gomathinayagam Subramanian, a special certification programme has been drafted to engage farmers in Berbice with mostly practical training on crop protection. “The certification programme is only for farmers, and it does not contain much reading or writing. It is designed in a way that farmers can do the practicals, which are expected to start this academic year in September,” Subramanian…

President David Granger on Wednesday presented four long-serving legal practitioners with their instruments of commission, elevating them to senior counsel. The new senior counsels are Kalam Azad Juman Yassin, Fitz Le Roy Peters, Andrew Mark Fitzgerald Pollard and Josephine Whitehead. There were all officially appointed at a ceremony held in the Baridi Benab at State House. “The title is: a national symbol, alongside other symbols – national honours and awards, anthem, coat of arms, flag and motto – that define our Guyanese identity; a professional symbol that distinguishes attorneys of…

Several employees – past and present – of the Guyana Sugar Corporation (GuySuCo) are worried about the status of their full pension benefits as the pension fund is in deep trouble. Reports are that the Employees Retirement Benefits is in negative territory by G$1.1 billion as opposed to $2.4 billion in 2014, according to the 2015 financial statements produced by GuySuCo. A GuySuCo source told Guyana Times International on Wednesday that the fund has seen a constant decline over the past few years and the closure of the estates will…

The revelation that Pricewaterhouse Coopers, Guyana Sugar Corporation’s (GuySuCo) asset valuator, has been under investigation by Indian authorities for fraud has come as a surprise for many, including those at the National Industrial and Commercial Investments Limited (NICIL). When contacted by this publication, NICIL Chairman, Dr Maurice Odle affirmed that he had no prior knowledge of the probe into the firm that lead to a two-year ban and a fine from Indian regulators. “It’s difficult to find an international company that has been operating throughout the world that has not…

It was a moment of tension at the High Court on Monday afternoon when Omadatt Persaud was handed a 45-year jail sentence for engaging in ‘sexual activity’ with a child family member. Those sexual acts, which involved penetration, occurred between August 1st and 31st in the year 2015, when the child was only five years old. The jury returned with the unanimous guilty verdict after a little more than two hours of deliberation, and sentence was handed down by Sexual Offences Court Judge Justice Simone Morris-Ramlall, who was forced to…

…Ramkarran says AFC has lost massive political support New possibilities now exist, as Guyana’s political landscape is changing, says former Speaker of the National Assembly, Attorney-at-law Ralph Ramkarran, who, in his most recent Conversation Tree column, noted that there is enough room for a new political party to be established in Guyana. According to him, the mixed middle class is now 19 percent, and it has within it a large contingent which is opposed to the ‘racial politics’ of the two main parties: A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) and…

While making a commitment to continue professionalising the local media corps, the Guyana Press Association (GPA) called on President David Granger to facilitate more frequent interactions with the press apart from informal gathering like the annual media brunch held at State House on Sunday. This call was made on Sunday by GPA Vice President Zoisa Fraser at the same event. She said in light of the theme for World Press Freedom Day 2018, “Keeping Power in Check: Media, Justice and the Rule of Law”, the GPA would like to have…