Trop­i­cal Storms Juli­ette and Fer­nand are churn­ing over open wa­ters, one in the Pa­cif­ic and one in the At­lantic, the Mi­a­mi-based U.S. Na­tion­al Hur­ri­cane Cen­ter said.

Fire One Fire­works has an­nounced that all its stores and satel­lite lo­ca­tions will re­main closed on In­de­pen­dence Day (Au­gust 31), in sup­port of the Gov­ern­ment’s de­c­la­ra­tion of a Na­tion­al Day of Prayer and Re­flec­tion in place of the tra­di­tion­al pa­rade and fire­works dis­play.

The Na­tion­al Ram­leela Coun­cil of Trinidad and To­ba­go (NRCTT) is call­ing for $1 mil­lion to stage this year’s cel­e­bra­tions. The an­nounce­ment was made by NRCTT pres­i­dent Dhi­raj Ramkissoon, fol­low­ing the launch of the 2025 fes­tiv­i­ties on Sun­day at the Cou­va Point Lisas Cham­ber of Com­merce, Cam­den, Cou­va.

Mur­der ac­cused Ra­jaee Ali was among 15 men whom the State yes­ter­day is­sued de­ten­tion or­ders for un­der the State of Emer­gency (SoE). The or­ders were gazetted yes­ter­day.

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar is com­ing un­der in­tense crit­i­cism from the Op­po­si­tion Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) over her sup­port for the de­ploy­ment of a US am­phibi­ous squadron and Navy de­stroy­ers to the south­ern Caribbean, part of Wash­ing­ton’s lat­est coun­ternar­cotics op­er­a­tion.

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar is stand­ing firm in her sup­port for the US Navy’s pres­ence near Venezuela, telling crit­ics that for the next five years her for­eign and do­mes­tic pol­i­cy will un­apolo­get­i­cal­ly be “Trinidad and To­ba­go first.”

Venezuela’s Jus­tice Min­is­ter Dios­da­do Ca­bel­lo is de­scrib­ing Trinidad and To­ba­go’s in­ter­fer­ence in Venezuela’s af­fairs as “shame­ful.”

With just two weeks re­main­ing be­fore the new aca­d­e­m­ic year be­gins on Sep­tem­ber 8, the Op­po­si­tion is ques­tion­ing the Gov­ern­ment over what it calls a de­lay in dis­burs­ing the promised School Sup­plies and Book Grant.

That was the blunt warn­ing is­sued by Op­po­si­tion Leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les yes­ter­day, as she con­demned what she de­scribed as po­lit­i­cal in­ter­fer­ence in the af­fairs of one of the coun­try’s lead­ing fi­nan­cial in­sti­tu­tions.

Op­po­si­tion Leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les is ac­cus­ing the Gov­ern­ment of fail­ing to pay dai­ly-rat­ed work­ers last Fri­day, while al­so de­lay­ing pen­sions and with­hold­ing pay­ments to CEPEP con­trac­tors and em­ploy­ees of the Na­tion­al Main­te­nance Train­ing and Se­cu­ri­ty Com­pa­ny Ltd (MTS).

Trinci­ty/Mal­oney Mem­ber of Par­lia­ment Camille Robin­son-Reg­is is re­port­ed­ly re­cov­er­ing fol­low­ing a re­cent med­ical pro­ce­dure, though she has yet to re­turn to full health.

Pi­o­neer of the Point Lisas In­dus­tri­al Es­tate, Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) par­lia­men­tar­i­an, pub­lic ser­vant par ex­cel­lence, gov­ern­ment min­is­ter, Patrick Man­ning’s right-hand man and, through decades of ser­vice, al­ways soft-spo­ken and hum­ble.