Monthly Archives: July, 2024

Digital Technology forms partnership with Kares One Guyana T10 Jul 31, 2024 Sports John Ramsingh of FL Sport (left) and Jenifer Persaud of Digital Technology. Kaieteur Sports – As the countdown to the second Kares One Guyana T10 Tapeball Blast nears an end, Digital Technology has gotten onboard as a key partner in enhancing the quality of the 2024 tournament. Digital Technology is a professional Technology engineering and consulting services firm with a specialization in Technology, Cloud Computing, Software Development, Project Management, and Managed IT Services. At their Diamond Public Road, East Bank Demerara, location, Public Relations Consultant Jenifer Persaud underscored that the partnership is about bringing awareness of the company’s service using the most evolving Tapeball tournament in the region. The second installment of the pulsating tournament bowls off on August 3 at the Police Sports Club, Lusignan Community Centre Ground, and Queen’s College Ground, where the best 32 Tapeball teams in Guyana will be on show in a straight knock-out contest. Other match days will be the Round of 16 on August 4 at the Police Sports Club and Lusignan, while the quarter-finals return to the Enmore Community Centre Ground on August 11. The competition promises to be fierce, and a larger prize pool will entice the 32 participating teams. Matches on August 3: MS-13 All-Stars v Team Corruption – QC Pitch 1 at 09:30h; Upsetters v GPL Inc – QC Pitch three at 09:30h; Montra Jaguars v Falcons XI – PSC at 09:30h; Street Ballerz v Village Rams – Lusignan at 09:30h; EC Express v Mahdia – Lusignan at 11:30h; Soesdyke XI v Airport XI – QC pitch one at 11:30h; Renegades Cricket Club v Tarmac Titans – PSC at 11:30h; Eccles All-Stars v Eastsyde – QC pitch three at 11:30h; Titans All-Stars v Stripling Warriors – PSC at 13:30h; PREMIER Insurance v Min. Housing – QC pitch one at 13:30h; Moruca Super Giants v Lil Rams – QC pitch three at 13:30h; The Guards v Mahaica Super Strikers – 13:30h at Lusignan; Green Scorpions v Avinash All-Stars – QC pitch one at 15:30h; Brooklyn Youth Strikers v Cotton Tree Die Hard – PSC at 15:30h; Diamond Gunners v TG Titans – Lusignan at 15:30h; The United Crew v Bartica Bulls – QC pitch three at 15:30h. The competition promises to be fierce, and a larger prize pool will entice the 32 participating teams. The champions will receive G$1.5 million, while the runners-up will receive G$500,000. The losing semi-finalists each get G$250,000. Players will vie for the titles of Most Runs, Most Wickets, and Player of the Final. Each winner will receive a Smart TV and a $75,000 cash prize, all compliments of Regal Stationery. Assuria Insurance is not holding back either, offering a motorbike and $85,000 to the Most Valuable Player. The Kares One Guyana T10 Blast enjoys the support of Kares Engineering, Banks DIH Limited, Star Rentals, Ministry of Culture, Youth and Sport, Montra Restaurant and Lounge, SuperBet, Demerara Mutual, ETS, Metro Office and Computer Supplies, Jacobs’ Jewellery, First Change Builders Inc, KFC Guyana, Building Expo 2024, Giftland OfficeMax, Sankar’s Auto Works, ENet, Avinash Contracting and Scrap Metal Inc., Trophy Stall, ANSA McAL Distribution, Camille’s Academy, Ministry of Human Services and Social Security,  RS53 RestoBar and Lounge, General Marine, Samaroo Investments, and Coel’s Boutique. Related Similar Articles

Van Lange fifty, bowlers inspire 5-wicket win for Guyana  Jul 31, 2024 Sports 2024 CWI Men’s Rising Stars U19 50-Over Championship… Guyana vs. Windward Islands  – Barbados win title  Kaieteur Sports – An unbeaten half-century from Jonathan Van Lange coupled with some potent bowling helped Guyana storm to a 5-wicket win over Windwards during yesterday’s round played at the Park Hill Playing Field. Jonathan Van Lange Opener Rampertab Ramnauth (21), Romeo Deonarain (23) and Mavendra Dindyal (22) had good starts before they were dismissed, but laid the platform for a successful Guyana chase. But it was Van Lange who muscled a pair of sixes and four fours on his way to 50 not out off 62 balls which took Guyana to 152-5 inside 40 overs. Guyana kept Windwards to 148 all out in 40.2 overs after a collective bowling effort from part-time in-form spinner Mavendra Dindyal (3-15) with support from Riyad Latiff (2-17) and seamer Thaddeus Lovell (2-24). Left-arm spinner Golcharran Chulai (1-13), along with Myheim Khan (1-29) playing his first game for Isai Thorne and Krsna Singh (1-23) lent additional support. Only Captain and opener Stephan Pascal who stroked 58 (6×4) and all-rounder Kirsten Murray (21) managed to get going for Windwards. Related Similar Articles

Another ton (110*) for Keyon Sinclair in Canada as Pegasus beat 11-Man Army in ORSCA tourney Jul 31, 2024 Sports Kaieteur Sports – Keyon Sinclair continued his sensational run in Canada after smacking an unbeaten 110 for Pegasus last Sunday against 11-Man Army in one of the many matches in this year’s Ontario Round-Arm Softball Cricket Association (ORSCA) Regular Season T20 competition. Keyon Sinclair The right-handed Sinclair, registered a century earlier in the campaign, and again looked in sublime form, having slammed 16 sixes and 1 four during his entertaining 40-ball exhibition in Brampton. Pegasus quickly reached 166-1 with 56 balls to spare after 11-Man Army had only gathered up a decent 163 all out in exactly 20-overs. Sinclair, the Berbician, and former Guyana youth player Ricardo Peters, had set the chase with an electrifying, 30-run opening stand. Peters hit 5 sixes to accumulate all 30 runs. Sinclair and Kandasammy Surujnarine finished off things in style with Surujnarine contributing 19 not out. 11-Man Army won the toss and opted to take first knock before proceedings got going. Opener Rabindra Persaud once again demonstrated his consistency with a boundary-studded 74 which included nine sixes and two fours. His innings spanned 74 balls while Raymond Tiwari and Navin Latchman also made an impression with the bat by scoring 40 and 33 respectively. Notably, 11-Man Army was coasting nicely at 153-4 and potentially could have gotten a more respectable total, but they lost 7 wickets for a mere 10 runs. Surujnarine grabbed 3-39 from his maximum four overs to be the most outstanding bowler for Pegasus, while Adrian Sukhwa supported him by accounting for two victims. The competition will resume August 11th with another series of matches. Meanwhile, more details from other fixtures in a subsequent edition. Related Similar Articles

National under17 selectees to benefit from Project “Cricket Gear for young and promising cricketers in Guyana”, compliments of Derek Kallicharran and friends  Jul 31, 2024 Sports Reshma Mathura left present the tokens to Anil Beharry. Kaieteur Sports – Afraz Budhoo, Romario Ramdehol and Micah Amsterdam, players that represented Berbice Under17 team in the recently concluded Guyana Cricket Board Inter County Under17 cricket competition will benefit shortly from gear donated by Derek Kallicharran, Raj Rai, Kumar Dindyal, and members of Kaieteur Cricket Club of Canada. Kallicharran and his friends continue to support this joint initiative between Kishan Das of the USA and Anil Beharry of Guyana. Budhoo and Ramdehol were selected as part of the final team while Amsterdam is on the standby list. Budhoo and Amsterdam will receive one pair of metal spike cricket shoes each, while Ramdehol, one floppy hat. That presentation will be done before the team departs for Trinidad and Tobago to participate in the Regional tournament to be played from August 11. During the tournament, Leslie Solomon, coach of the county team reached out for assistance for the kids. The project had none of the gear requested but reached out to Kallicharran, a former West Indies “B” all rounder and he responded immediately as he normally does. He then reached out to Rai, Dindyal and members of Kaieteur CC. The gear was sent with Reshma Mathura. This project thanks the donors for their continued support. We will continue to support young people and are happy to be associated with the development of cricket especially through youths. Related Similar Articles

Return on investment – the Guyana way  Jul 31, 2024 Features / Columnists, The GHK Lall Column Kaieteur News – Give something to get something.  When all the textbooks are written, lectures and dissertations delivered, this is what an investment is all about.  Of course, it has much more to its DNA, but at a fundamental level, an investment is gambling to get a handsome return. Bigger is better.  I look at this today in the field of politics. GHK Lall What is a political contribution, party donation, campaign funding, if not an investment in hope of sweet returns?  The only objective of these writings is to make my brethren (sisters are certainly included) think. I could have made a statement that, at the crux of it, would stand unchallenged, when the clamoring was over.  A question was chosen.  Relative to Guyana’s politics, I expound upon no law about campaign financing, or that EU report in the dying days of the stormy 2020 elections.  I highlight reality.  Expectations.  Resulting government actions. And now the consequential at a national level. A dollar is given, and a dime is anticipated from a winner.  A dozen dimes are even better, grabbed with both hands.  And when those are not forthcoming, they will be seized.  Of course, there is regard for the law.  But by whom, if not dumb suckers.  People like me, and a cohort of little Guyanese.  The law has its application.  Translation: people who have been vaccinated.  It works.  But only for a time. The arc of history is long, but it always bends towards justice. Apologies for that rushing spirit taking over momentarily. What about when it is a million dollars donated, not a dollar?  Or, a hundred (or two, three, even four or five) million contributed to the war chest of a political party?  Fellow citizens-Guyanese and American-donations, contributions, and financing of that magnitude speak their own language at very high volume.  Amounts like those are not songs, they are symphonies that the recipient had best not forget. In practical terms, a hundred million or four, buy open doors, a barrage of fallen regulations, a cadre of leaders and ministers and institutions and institutional heads to march to that music.  Is some Guyanese reading this thinking of carnival and bacchanal?  It is what it was until the dreadful Americans came with their OFAC horrors.  The music stops then, and everybody is wringing their hands, weeping tears of remorse.  I see a school of crocodiles; there are those kinds of tears. When regulations are torn down, institutions are made fun of, and leaders pretend to be truer than me to this country (a difficult undertaking), then Guyanese learn a different language. That of OFAC.  That of Excellency The riot.  And that of the rule of law.  Laughter is a good tonic.  Somebody thinks and takes Guyanese for donkeys crossed with mules, with the spawn being cross-eyed lunatics.  Is not reality?  It is what will make a comeback, when the kettle stops whistling.  Now everybody is an anti-money launderer; everyone is about what is right and justice, but they forgot something.  When yuh tek peeple monee, den deh gah dah ting call payback.  And when the cash is a full container truck, the payback must be bigger.  Budgetary considerations.  Remember infrastructure and capital expenditures?  Somebody must build those.  Then the juiciest part of the curry and cook-up: contracts awarded.  This is how the budget money, oil money, and loan money are redistributed in reverse fashion.  The poor man gets his $25 grand, while the real people have a grand time.  Billions.  Billions for anything that pleases them.  There is always a leader or a minister (or PS) running forward, and lining up: Reporting for duty, sir.  Ready, able (and willing) sir!   Whatever is required, whatever it takes.  Now I call that servanthood, and I am envious.  I must join that extraordinary investment club. My fellow Guyanese, this is how investment works in government circles.  I don’t care if it is PPP Government or PNC.  A little aside: during my public service tenure I ensured that one thing was repeated: anybody who had a problem with me, must feel free to escalate all the way to the head of state.  I know where the door is, and nobody has to whisper to me, push me.  In other words, there is only one sentence of two words: the first begins with an ‘f’.  For sure, investment of capital (campaign money) talks.  But I have my own language with its own speech patterns and strengths.  Whether PPP diehard or PNC fanatic, this is what I was and am, and which I have tirelessly worked to introduce to President Ali and Vice President Jagdeo and Opposition Leader Norton.  Slander and spite became my rewards.  I persevere because that is owed to my brothers. Last, the Americans spoke of a network, not of lone rangers and mavericks.  Take it from this humble source: the Guyana network is sprawling.  It is not three.  Count to 300, and there is still some counting left to do.  The focus has been on a man and his son.  There are their political sponsors, their governmental fathers.  Investments snare the fickle and the fraudulent.  So, they must pay (back).  So, the Americans have their say.  This is my investment to Guyana, whatever the malevolence and insolence of sources, rewards. (The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper.) Related Similar Articles

Jagdeo risks deserving ridicule Jul 31, 2024 Editorial Kaieteur News – What policies, and which minister, Mr. Jagdeo, when they are barely allowed to speak, usually have little to offer, because those reside with the chief national policymaker for everything?  When Jagdeo makes these pronouncements in public, the first reaction is that he is working hard to be the premier national joker.  Unfortunately, it is worse than that, for when he engages in these hollow, childish public exercises, he makes himself into a running national joke. In the latest creative spin from the mind of the chief policymaker, ministers must be, “out there for the people who are listening to defend their policies and to speak about their policies.”  Was Jagdeo being facetious, or being the narcissist that he is, he failed to see the contradiction between the promptings of his words and the strength of his own actions.  Since his return to power in 2020, ministers have been reduced to nothing but messenger boys and errand girls. Yet he is pushing them to advocate what they may know nothing about, or about which they seriously disagree.  Jagdeo has hogged policy, basks in the limelight, but still pushes ministers to take a stand on their policies.  Is Bharrat Jagdeo a chief policymaker or the chief prevaricator in Guyana?  More in keeping with today’s realities, is this leader a former president, or is he some cheap circus performer?  We tell Jagdeo what his people should tell him, but cringe from doing: he is running stale, he registers as a big empty barrel, everybody sees through him, no matter how much noise he makes. Jagdeo can no longer help himself, settle for saying his piece and holding to a safe line.  He had to dive deeper into the traps he continually sets for others and ensnare himself further: “I assume that we want to be available to everyone and we have nothing to fear about our policies. We believe that if you cannot defend the policies, then you shouldn’t be implementing them.” Now he is slick enough in public to make it appear as though he is giving ministers a choice.  There are reports of ministers being shouted down in cabinet meetings, either to muzzle them or introduce every manner of insecurity in them.  They go along with Jagdeo’s policies or get out, but he is enough of a hypocrite and slippery worker to say that they have a choice: “shouldn’t be implementing them”, if they cannot defend them.  Of all people, the chief policymaker has the audacity to assert that “we have nothing to fear about our policies….”  Isn’t this the same man, the oil czar, the policy kingpin, whose tongue is tied on most matters that have something to do with the nation’s oil wealth?  Isn’t the now fearless Jagdeo who is stricken by some paralyzing fear the same person who refuses to release billions in oil expenses, who delays and delays the publication of oil audit findings? Further, Jagdeo has made it his standing policy to camouflage his fears by lashing out at any Guyanese who criticizes his policies.  Jagdeo is the one who tries futilely to hide his fears about renegotiation pressures exploding, so he hides new oil discovery amounts.  Jagdeo is so frightened about the holes in his latest dark masterpiece, the Wales Gas-to-Energy project that he buries pertinent details.  He is calling on ministers to do what he shrinks from doing.  Jagdeo has nothing about boldness or brawn about him.  He is just a bluffer and a bragger. Related Similar Articles

If oil prices collapse, Guyana can find itself in a serious debt crisis Jul 31, 2024 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom Kaieteur News – In the early 1990s, the People’s Progressive Party (PPP), then in opposition, was vocal about Guyana’s staggering per capita debt, one of the highest in the world at the time. They criticized the then-government for making Guyana one of the most highly indebted countries in the world per capita and for having an unsustainable scheduled debt servicing. At the time the external debt was a mere US$2.1b but given the country’s small population this translated to one of the highest per capita debt burdens in the world at the time. Scheduled debt servicing also exceeded 100% of revenues. The PPPC highlighted this burden as a major campaign issue in the 1992 elections, which they subsequently won. Today, however, the situation has taken a paradoxical turn. While the per capita debt has risen to levels even higher than in 1992, the current PPP/Civic (PPPC) government appears less concerned, choosing instead to focus on favorable metrics such as debt servicing and the debt to GDP ratio. This shift in rhetoric and metrics is risky, particularly given the volatile nature of the global oil market, upon which Guyana’s economic future heavily depends. The crux of the current administration’s argument lies in the favorable debt servicing and its rising GDP. With oil revenues contributing significantly to the national economy, the country has seen a surge in GDP, which has helped manage debt servicing more comfortably. However, this approach overlooks the fundamental issue: the sheer amount of debt per capita that every Guyanese citizen is burdened with. As the country’s debt continues to rise, so does the individual share of that debt, which could spell disaster if the global economic conditions change unfavorably. One of the most significant risks facing Guyana’s economy is the potential for a sudden and severe drop in oil prices. The history of oil-dependent economies is replete with cautionary tales. Venezuela, once a wealthy nation due to its vast oil reserves, experienced an economic implosion when oil prices plummeted. The reliance on oil revenues, coupled with high levels of debt, led to a catastrophic economic collapse that plunged the country into a severe crisis. Guyana, now an emerging oil producer, faces a similar risk. If oil prices were to fall to levels below US$20 per barrel, the country’s economic situation could become dire. This is why Jagdeo’s current emphasis on debt service-to-revenue and debt-to-GDP ratios and G can create a false sense of security. While these metrics are important, they do not paint a full picture of economic health. High GDP growth can be misleading if it is heavily reliant on a single, volatile industry. In Guyana’s case, the oil sector’s contribution to GDP is significant, but so too is the risk that comes with it. Should oil prices collapse, the revenue streams that currently seem robust could dry up, making debt servicing increasingly difficult and putting the country at risk of default. Given these risks, the PPPC government needs to exercise caution in contracting new debt. While borrowing to invest in infrastructure and development can be beneficial, it must be done with a clear understanding of the potential future economic risks. The current favorable debt servicing ratios are contingent on sustained high oil prices. However, history has shown that oil prices are subject to significant fluctuations due to a variety of factors, including geopolitical tensions, changes in global demand, and advancements in alternative energy technologies. In 1985-86, oil prices collapsed from around $30 per barrel to below $10 per barrel. The global financial crisis of 2008-2009, led to a sharp decline in oil prices, which fell from a peak of about $147 per barrel in July 2008 to around $32 per barrel by December 2008. Oil prices dropped from over $100 per barrel in mid-2014 to below $30 per barrel in early 2016. During the pandemic prices plunged from round $60 per barrel in early 2020 to as low as $20 per barrel in April 2020. By now Jagdeo ought to know that lowering per capita debt is important even in the context of rising GDP and lower debt service payments because it directly impacts the financial burden on individual citizens and the country’s long-term economic stability. High per capita debt can limit the government’s fiscal flexibility, making it challenging to respond to economic downturns or unforeseen crises. While a growing GDP and manageable debt service payments may suggest economic health, they do not account for the potential volatility of revenue sources, such as oil. Should a downturn occur, the higher the debt burden per citizen, the more severe the consequences, including possible austerity measures, reduced public services, and increased taxes. Therefore, reducing per capita debt helps ensure that economic growth benefits are more equitably distributed and sustainable, providing a more robust buffer against future economic shocks. The government must, therefore, be circumspect about the levels of debt it is willing to take on. It is crucial to maintain a manageable debt-to-GDP ratio, not just based on current revenues but also considering potential downturns in the oil market. The Venezuelan experience demonstrates how quickly a country can move from apparent prosperity to economic despair when over-reliance on a single commodity, combined with high levels of debt, leads to a financial crisis. The PPPC government, while enjoying the benefits of a growing economy driven by oil revenues, must not lose sight of the potential dangers of rising per capita debt.  High levels of debt can become a significant burden, particularly if the country’s main revenue source falters. (The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper.) Related Similar Articles