GEISHA ALON­ZO

Christ­mas came ear­ly for some 24 or­gan­i­sa­tions and in­sti­tu­tions who are shar­ing in an $839,678 do­na­tion from the Ansa McAL Foun­da­tion.

At a cer­e­mo­ny at Tatil Build­ing ion Mar­aval Road yes­ter­day, foun­da­tion chair­man A. Nor­man Sab­ga praised the groups for their con­tri­bu­tions to so­ci­ety, es­pe­cial­ly help­ing those in need. He al­so laud­ed mem­bers of staff for their ef­forts in help­ing neigh­bour­ing coun­tries re­cent­ly rav­aged by Hur­ri­cane Maria.

“The Ansa McAL Foun­da­tion, and al­so the Ansa McAl Group, try to do what we can for so­ci­ety. Apart from these grants, the Group and our staff mem­bers al­so rose to the oc­ca­sion to help our Caribbean broth­ers and sis­ters. Some 6,000 strong staff mem­bers rose to the cause,” Sab­ga said.

He said five con­tain­ers filled with food­stuff and oth­er much-need­ed items were dis­trib­uted to Caribbean coun­tries.

Last week the An­tho­ny N Sab­ga Caribbean Awards for Ex­cel­lence an­nounced four lau­re­ates for 2018: Arts and Let­ters—Prof Kei Miller, Po­et, Nov­el­ist, Ja­maica; En­tre­pre­neur­ship—William An­drew Boyle, Guyana; Pub­lic and Civic Con­tri­bu­tions—Chevaughn and Noel Joseph, T&T; Sci­ence and Tech­nol­o­gy—Dr Adesh Ram­sub­hag, Mi­cro­bi­ol­o­gist, T&T.

The lau­re­ates were pro­posed by coun­try nom­i­nat­ing com­mit­tees and se­lect­ed by a re­gion­al pan­el. The An­tho­ny N Sab­ga Caribbean Awards has been in ex­is­tence since 2005.

The prizes are worth $500,000 each and lau­re­ates al­so re­ceive a medal and ci­ta­tion at the awards cer­e­mo­ny which is ex­pect­ed to be held on May 5, next year, at a venue to be an­nounced.

Sab­ga said each of the lau­re­ates had not on­ly made valu­able con­tri­bu­tions to his or her home­land but had al­so shaped the re­gion.

“Those awards give us tremen­dous hope for the re­gion and we do have such great tal­ent among us,” he said.

Sarah Eliz­a­beth of the Holy Name Train­ing Cen­tre said the do­na­tion had come at a time when the fa­cil­i­ty is in need of re­fur­bish­ment. The cen­tre takes in un­der­priv­i­leged chil­dren, in­clud­ing those var­i­ous homes, to teach them life skills so they are equipped for the world of work.

“Most of all we teach them to be in­de­pen­dent so then they can take their right­ful place in so­ci­ety. We al­so have chil­dren from the Chil­dren’s Au­thor­i­ty and from homes through­out the coun­try... once they are 15 and over.

“Right now our dor­mi­to­ry needs some re­pairs so we are def­i­nite­ly go­ing to use the mon­ey for that so we can take in more chil­dren,” she said.