Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar has ridiculed Blue Wa­ters’ spon­sor­ship of this year’s Di­vali Na­gar cel­e­bra­tions, ac­cus­ing the com­pa­ny’s own­ers of pri­vate­ly us­ing racial slurs against East In­di­an peo­ple while pub­licly fund­ing one of the coun­try’s largest In­di­an cul­tur­al and re­li­gious cel­e­bra­tions.

Claims of in­ter­nal dis­agree­ments are emerg­ing with­in the Na­tion­al Coun­cil for In­di­an Cul­ture (NCIC) over its han­dling of spon­sor­ship arrange­ments for Di­vali Na­gar 2026, amid con­cerns by some board mem­bers that the de­ci­sion to bring Blue Wa­ters on board could be per­ceived as a po­lit­i­cal state­ment against the Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar ad­min­is­tra­tion.

Days af­ter re­ports emerged that sev­er­al state cor­po­rate en­ti­ties had with­drawn their spon­sor­ship from the 2026 Di­vali Na­gar, the Na­tion­al Coun­cil of In­di­an Cul­ture (NCIC) yes­ter­day an­nounced that Blue Wa­ters had come on board as a Di­a­mond Spon­sor for this year’s cel­e­bra­tions. And the com­pa­ny says it is proud to as­sist in pre­serv­ing T&T’s cul­tur­al lega­cy.

Fi­nance Min­is­ter Dav­en­dranath Tan­coo has ad­mit­ted that an er­ror was made in the 2027 Bud­get al­lo­ca­tion for the To­ba­go Re­gion­al Health Au­thor­i­ty (TRHA), while as­sur­ing that the au­thor­i­ty will re­ceive enough fund­ing to meet its op­er­a­tional ex­pens­es.

The Gov­ern­ment’s al­lo­ca­tion for the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly’s (THA) Tourism and Hos­pi­tal­i­ty Sec­tor sup­port pro­gramme has been re­duced by 80 per cent for 2027, while sev­er­al tourism-re­lat­ed en­ti­ties linked to To­ba­go Car­ni­val have al­so re­ceived low­er al­lo­ca­tions.

Deputy Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Ju­nior Ben­jamin was ap­point­ed to act as Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice from yes­ter­day un­til Wednes­day, while Com­mis­sion­er Al­lis­ter Gue­var­ro leads a Trinidad and To­ba­go del­e­ga­tion at the In­ter­na­tion­al As­so­ci­a­tion of Chiefs of Po­lice (IACP) An­nu­al Con­fer­ence and Ex­po­si­tion in Or­lan­do, Flori­da.

To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine has con­firmed re­me­di­al works on the aban­doned Good­wood mi­cro polic­ing unit will be­gin next week.

Rel­a­tives of one of the two To­ba­go fish­er­men who have been miss­ing for near­ly two weeks are turn­ing to DNA test­ing for an­swers af­ter two de­com­pos­ing bod­ies were dis­cov­ered in the wa­ters of St Vin­cent and the Grenadines.

The burn­ing of three Ra­vana ef­fi­gies, in­clud­ing one stand­ing 85 feet tall, will bring this year’s Ram­leela cel­e­bra­tions at the Pierre Road Recre­ation Ground in Char­lieville, Ch­agua­nas, to a dra­mat­ic close to­mor­row, as the an­nu­al Hin­du the­atri­cal por­tray­al of Lord Ra­ma’s life con­tin­ues to draw pa­trons from across Trinidad and To­ba­go.

A del­e­ga­tion of pub­lic and pri­vate sec­tor of­fi­cials from Venezuela’s Su­cre State will vis­it Trinidad and To­ba­go next week to ex­plore eco­nom­ic part­ner­ships, trade and in­vest­ment op­por­tu­ni­ties, and strength­en bi­lat­er­al ties be­tween the two coun­tries.

Op­po­si­tion MP Colm Im­bert has ac­cused the East Port-of-Spain De­vel­op­ment Com­pa­ny Ltd of be­ing in breach of the Com­pa­nies Act, af­ter Hous­ing Min­is­ter David Lee con­firmed that the State com­pa­ny has been with­out a board since May 2025.

The fu­ner­al ser­vice for vet­er­an ca­lyp­son­ian Broth­er Valenti­no will take place on Oc­to­ber 29 at the Cathe­dral of the Im­mac­u­late Con­cep­tion, In­de­pen­dence Square, Port-of-Spain.