CARIBBEAN ROUND-UP
Two more murders in Guyana
GEORGETOWN – Two more murders have been committed in Guyana over the weekend with the death of a city taxi driver and that of a retired school teacher of the village of Annandale on the east coast of Georgetown.
Their deaths brought the number of murders to 23 in 18 days for this month. Five of them are lawmen, five suspected bandits and wanted men by the police and the others, civilians killed by criminals.
Linden Hoyte, the 37 year-old taxi driver of Alboustown was shot and killed on Friday night when his vehicle, which is owned by a cousin, hijacked by his killers.
On Saturday, 52 year-old retired school teacher, Jainarine Singh, died in hospital from a gunshot wound to his head – another victim of armed robbers who attacked villagers at Annandale the previous day, carting off some G$110,000 in cash from one business place.
And yesterday the local media were reporting the terrorising by armed bandits of residents of Vigilance/Bladen Hall, another East Coast Demerara village, from where they stole television sets, videos, money and even molested a few female villagers, firing shots wildly to cause maximum scare with no police in sight.
T&T’s $10-billion mega merger deal
PORT-OF-SPAIN – A mega merger deal involving approximately TT$10 billion (TT$6=US$1) between a major commercial and a leading insurance corporation is underway in Trinidad and Tobago.
The deal, according to a “special report” in yesterday’s Sunday Express, is being negotiated between Royal Bank of Trinidad and Tobago (RBTT) and Guardian Holdings Limited (GHL).
The plan is to come up with a new corporate entity with a market capitalisation of some TT$9.7 billion, second only to the Caribbean region’s number one merged entity of banks, now known as First Caribbean International Bank involving about TT$12.3 billion.
RBTT’s executive chairman and Group CEO Peter July declined to comment on the negotiations but said that the two groups “will continue to meet and look at ways they can operate to mutual advantage”.
However, Peter Ganteaume, Group CEO of GHL, admitted to the newspaper that negotiations were “at phase one level” with RBTT seeking to convert its two blocks of 20 per cent shares in two of GHL’s insurance subsidiaries to a 20 per cent block in the holding company.
Managing director of Scotiabank, Richard Young, said a mega merger or an RBTT acquisition of GHL will transform the proposed new entity into “a very powerful financial conglomerate controlled by a few…”.
Youth focus on drug abuse
BRIDGETOWN – The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime for the Caribbean region (UNDOC), in collaboration with the Caribbean Community Secretariat and the Barbados National Council on Substance Abuse (NCSA) are co-operating on a new approach to combat the use of illicit drugs with a specific focus on young people.
Starting today, the UNDOC will host a five-day workshop at UN House in Hastings that will mark the launching of the United Nations Global Youth Network in the Caribbean. Participants will include representatives from Jamaica.
The occasion will be a gathering of Caricom youth ambassadors, representatives of National Youth Councils and other youth leaders from across the region with a view to encouraging integration in their work programmes.
A statement from the UN Office on Drugs and Crime dealing with next week’s event at UN House, said that promoting more than a typical “just-say-no-to-drugs” approach, the Global Youth Network seeks to encourage “innovative techniques for drug prevention through the dramatic arts, sports and other esteem-building programmes”.