Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter Bar­ry Padarath yes­ter­day stopped short of as­sur­ing cit­i­zens that elec­tric­i­ty rates would not be in­creased to help set­tle the near­ly $10 bil­lion debt owed by the Trinidad and To­ba­go Elec­tric­i­ty Com­mis­sion (T&TEC) to the Na­tion­al Gas Com­pa­ny (NGC).

Broth­er Valenti­no, the Grena­da-born ca­lyp­son­ian whose mu­sic cham­pi­oned black con­scious­ness, equal­i­ty and the strug­gles of or­di­nary peo­ple, died on Tues­day at the age of 85.

Uni­ver­si­ty of Trinidad and To­ba­go (UTT) ex­ec­u­tive chair­man Pro­fes­sor Sel­wyn Cud­joe is cur­rent­ly re­ceiv­ing $10,000 a month as the Gov­ern­ment awaits a de­ter­mi­na­tion from the Chief Per­son­nel Of­fi­cer (CPO) on his re­mu­ner­a­tion for the ex­ec­u­tive chair­man po­si­tion.

As To­ba­go pre­pares to wel­come an es­ti­mat­ed 60,000 rev­ellers for next week’s Car­ni­val, an ad­di­tion­al 100 po­lice of­fi­cers have been de­ployed from Trinidad to bol­ster se­cu­ri­ty, with sup­port from the De­fence Force and oth­er law en­force­ment agen­cies.

Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Roger Alexan­der says the pro­cure­ment process for Trinidad and To­ba­go’s tran­si­tion to an elec­tron­ic pass­port sys­tem has be­gun, but he was un­able to pro­vide key de­tails about the project, in­clud­ing its cost, im­ple­men­ta­tion time­line and the num­ber of com­pa­nies in­volved in the ten­der­ing process.

The with­draw­al of First Cit­i­zens Bank (FCB) from this year’s Di­vali Na­gar has added to the spon­sor­ship chal­lenges fac­ing the Na­tion­al Coun­cil of In­di­an Cul­ture (NCIC), just days be­fore the an­nu­al cel­e­bra­tions be­gin.

Works and In­fra­struc­ture Min­is­ter Jear­lean John says the Gov­ern­ment’s Re­vi­tal­i­sa­tion Blue­print, an­nounced last year af­ter the Bud­get, is “se­ri­ous­ly on­go­ing.”

Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter Bar­ry Padarath yes­ter­day re­fused to rule out pri­vati­sa­tion or a pub­lic-pri­vate part­ner­ship for the Trinidad and To­ba­go Sol­id Waste Man­age­ment Com­pa­ny (SWM­COL), say­ing the state en­ter­prise’s busi­ness mod­el must change to re­duce its bur­den on tax­pay­ers.

Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter Bar­ry Padarath says the On-the-Job Train­ing (OJT) Pro­gramme has been op­er­at­ing on “au­topi­lot” for years, with sev­er­al key po­si­tions va­cant, in­clud­ing those of ex­ec­u­tive di­rec­tor and deputy ex­ec­u­tive di­rec­tor.

The fa­ther of three men await­ing tri­al for the mur­der of Se­nior Coun­sel Dana See­ta­hal has been dis­charged on an ex­tor­tion charge af­ter de­lays in pros­e­cut­ing the case.

A po­lice of­fi­cer fac­ing cor­rup­tion charges has lost his law­suit chal­leng­ing the de­ci­sion to by­pass him for pro­mo­tion.

The Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) is warn­ing the pub­lic against tak­ing vig­i­lante ac­tion against sex of­fend­ers who may be liv­ing in their com­mu­ni­ties.