Carib Scope

分类： society

  • Young athletes shine at summer camp finals

    Young athletes shine at summer camp finals

    More than 2,000 young participants across Barbados have wrapped up the 2026 National Summer Camp Programme, closing out weeks of skills-building and community-focused activities with the annual Sports for Peace Track and Field Finals held Wednesday at the iconic Usain Bolt Complex. The one-day championship event brought together the most promising young athletes who advanced through the summer camp’s regional phases, turning the venue into a hub of energetic competition, collaborative spirit, and cross-community connection that aligned with the programme’s core mission: building peaceful, inclusive societies for Barbados’ next generation.

    The National Summer Camp Programme, run in partnership between UNICEF’s Eastern Caribbean office and Barbados’ Division of Youth Affairs, centers this year’s activities around a broader island-wide anti-violence campaign. Beyond athletic training, the summer initiative was designed to equip participating youth with life and social skills that translate far beyond the running track and playing field.

    Speaking at the opening of the finals, Shorat Orazov, Acting Deputy Representative of UNICEF Eastern Caribbean, highlighted that the championship event marked the official end of months of programming that prioritized youth development over competition. “I’m so pleased to join you today as we celebrate National Summer Camp Sports 2026, the culmination of this year’s anti-violence campaign and a wonderful demonstration of the energy, talent, and potential of Barbados’ young people,” Orazov told the gathered crowd of athletes, coaches, and spectators.

    Over the course of the summer, Orazov explained, camp participants took part in a range of structured activities that balanced recreational fun with intentional skill-building. Young people engaged in workshops and team challenges that helped them cultivate core competencies including clear communication, collaborative problem-solving, empathetic listening, emotional self-regulation, and peaceful conflict resolution. These skills, he emphasized, are not just useful for the camp setting: they create lasting benefits for youth across every area of their daily lives, from classrooms to family homes to neighborhood communities, while laying the groundwork for them to grow into compassionate, effective leaders in the future.

    Cleviston Hunte, Acting Permanent Secretary of the Division of Youth Affairs, echoed the event’s focus on sportsmanship over winning, urging the young finalists to center the joy of participation rather than chasing top placements. “It’s a lovely day for track and field,” Hunte said. “I ask you to remember one thing as we go through this day. The joy of this day is in competing and not necessarily in winning.”

    Hunte reminded every athlete that qualifying for the national finals itself is a significant achievement, noting that every participant who stepped onto the track that day had already earned recognition for their hard work and commitment. “The fact that you are here competing means that you are all winners,” he said. He also called on competitors to uphold the event’s values of mutual respect and solidarity, urging them to cheer on their peers and help keep the day safe, respectful, and incident-free for all in attendance.

  • Kemorley Pemberton Charged After Allegedly Threatening Employee at Little Canton With Imitation Firearm

    Kemorley Pemberton Charged After Allegedly Threatening Employee at Little Canton With Imitation Firearm

    In a recent law enforcement action overseen by the Royal Police Force of Antigua and Barbuda, a local man has been taken into custody and formally charged following a public dispute that escalated into an alleged threat involving a suspected weapon. The incident, which unfolded on the morning of August 19, 2026, has prompted authorities to remind residents of strict new firearm legislation that carries severe penalties for violations of weapons rules.

    According to official police reports, emergency dispatchers received a frantic call for service just before 9 a.m. local time, alerting officers to a confrontation at the Little Canton location along Independence Drive. The complaint alleged that 35-year-old Kemorley Pemberton, a resident of the John Hughes neighborhood, had gotten into a verbal altercation with a fellow employee at the site. During the dispute, Pemberton reportedly brandished an object that appeared to be a loaded firearm, threatening the other individual directly.

    Within hours of receiving the report, responding officers tracked Pemberton to an unoccupied abandoned building situated on Bird Road, where he had been hiding following the incident. A systematic search of the structure turned up the object in question, which investigators later confirmed to be a non-functional imitation firearm. Pemberton was placed under arrest immediately without further incident, and was processed at a local police precinct before being formally charged with possession of an imitation firearm.

    In the wake of the arrest, the Royal Police Force’s Office of Strategic Communications issued a public reminder to Antigua and Barbuda residents about the legal ramifications of possessing and misusing imitation firearms under the nation’s updated legislation. Section 13(1) of the 2024 Firearms (Amendment) Act explicitly classifies the use or attempted use of any real or imitation firearm to commit a criminal offense as a serious indictable offense. Any person convicted of this violation can face a maximum prison sentence of up to 20 years behind bars, underscoring the government’s commitment to curbing gun-related violence and intimidation across the twin-island nation.

    As of the official media release issued on August 20, 2026, Pemberton remains in custody awaiting his initial court appearance, where formal proceedings will begin. Police have not released additional details about the underlying cause of the dispute between Pemberton and the alleged victim at this time.

  • Nicholas Urges Households to Keep Three-Day Emergency Water Supply

    Nicholas Urges Households to Keep Three-Day Emergency Water Supply

    As Caribbean nations continue to grapple with intermittent infrastructure challenges and the growing risk of unexpected service disruptions, Antigua and Barbuda’s top utilities official is pushing a proactive message of self-reliance for residential water security. Minister of Utilities Melford Nicholas is calling on every household across the twin-island nation to build up and maintain a stored water reserve capable of covering at least three days of normal use, a buffer designed to cushion residents against unplanned interruptions to the public water network.

    Nicholas emphasized that this preparedness measure remains a critical investment even after the Antigua Public Utilities Authority (APUA) hits its planned production target of 14 million gallons of potable water per day. The minister framed the reserve requirement as a foundational step for individual community resilience, noting that unforeseen disruptions—from sudden equipment breakdowns at treatment facilities to scheduled maintenance work that requires temporary supply shutdowns—can strike at any time, regardless of overall production capacity.

    “I would still encourage homeowners to build that resiliency and to keep at least three days’ water supply available in the event that there is a disruption or discontinuation for any reason whatsoever,” Nicholas stated in his public address.

    To support the initiative, the national government has already rolled out a targeted distribution program, delivering 600-gallon water storage tanks to eligible households through local parliamentary representatives. This includes hundreds of families in Nicholas’ own constituency, who have already received the free storage infrastructure to help them meet the recommended reserve target.

    Nicholas pushed back on the common expectation that government or the national utility authority will resolve all supply issues immediately during an outage, arguing that households bear a share of responsibility for their own emergency preparedness. He pointed to the newly completed Booby Alley apartment development as a model of proactive planning: every unit in the complex comes with a dedicated private water storage tank pre-installed, eliminating the immediate strain of temporary supply cuts for residents.

    The minister concluded that widespread adoption of adequate household water storage would not only reduce immediate hardship for families facing outages, but also cut down on the volume of urgent complaints that overwhelm the utility company during unexpected interruptions, letting crews focus on restoring full service more quickly.

  • Justice Protest Scheduled Outside Prison and Legal Affairs Today

    Justice Protest Scheduled Outside Prison and Legal Affairs Today

    Residents of St. John’s will take to the streets on Wednesday for a coordinated public demonstration, pressing authorities for long-delayed accountability over the in-custody death of Rashawn Shabazz and a slate of other unresolved, high-stakes cases that have left local families without closure.

    Organizers of the demonstration have laid out a clear route for the day’s action: participants will kick off the picket outside His Majesty’s Prison sharp at 8:30 a.m., before marching as a group to the Ministry of Legal Affairs to deliver their demands directly to key decision-makers.

    Shabazz died following an unspecified incident while he was being held in custody at the facility, and his family has yet to receive the full, transparent explanation organizers say they are owed. But the protest is not limited to seeking justice for Shabazz alone. Organizers emphasize the demonstration stands in solidarity with dozens of other local families grappling with unsolved homicides, unclosed missing person investigations, deaths linked to law enforcement interactions, and other in-custody fatalities that have gone without formal resolution.

    Beyond pushing for answers in individual deaths, the protest will also bring long-simmering systemic concerns to the forefront: organizers plan to highlight widespread allegations of misconduct among prison staff, including claims of sexual abuse and rape, as well as broader failures to address violent crime and public corruption across local institutions.

    In a statement ahead of the demonstration, organizers stressed that the action is not rooted in partisan political gain. “This is not about politics. It is about accountability, justice and the value of human life,” the group said.

    The organizers are calling on broad public support for the movement, noting that many participating families have repeatedly requested information from government agencies for months or even years, only to be met with silence or incomplete responses that fall far short of what they deserve.

    For those planning to join the protest, free commemorative T-shirts are available to the public, with pickup arrangements able to be made via phone or WhatsApp messaging at the contact number 720-2557.

    The entire demonstration is unified under a rallying cry that captures its core mission: “When Justice Fails, the People Must Rise!”

  • Owner Appeals for Help to Find Stolen Honda Fit

    Owner Appeals for Help to Find Stolen Honda Fit

    A vehicle owner is turning to the public for urgent assistance after their dark-colored Honda Fit RS was stolen recently, in what comes as the latest report in a growing wave of automobile thefts across the region. The stolen compact car carries the registration plate number A 7090, marking the key identifying detail the public can use to spot the vehicle. Law enforcement and the owner have not released additional information about the specific conditions surrounding the theft, including when and where the vehicle was last parked before it went missing. The appeal comes at a time when local communities have seen a marked uptick in vehicle theft reports, a trend that has raised growing attention among local residents. Any individual who spots the matching vehicle, or has credible information about where it might be located, is requested to contact the hotline at 732-0640 to share their tips with relevant authorities.

  • Abiamofo: SWM niet klaar voor olie- en gasontwikkeling

    Abiamofo: SWM niet klaar voor olie- en gasontwikkeling

    As Suriname prepares for rapid growth driven by its expanding oil and gas sector, the country’s national water provider remains woefully underprepared to handle surging demand for safe drinking water, Natural Resources Minister David Abiamofo has told the country’s National Assembly. The minister’s comments, delivered during a parliamentary debate on public utility services, laid out the urgent infrastructure gaps that threaten to undermine the country’s upcoming economic growth and leave thousands of citizens without consistent access to a basic public need.

    Abiamofo emphasized that the growing energy sector will place unprecedented pressure on Suriname’s water supply chain. Expected economic expansion will bring new industrial activity, a growing population, increased housing construction, and higher demand for all public utilities, including water. Currently, more than a decade after the existing water infrastructure was put in place, the Greater Paramaribo region still relies on the same outdated water sources that have not kept pace with rising population and consumption. This mismatch between limited supply and growing demand has already left households across multiple regions struggling with chronic water shortages and low water pressure, while large swathes of the country still lack access to reliably safe drinking water even in 2026.

    To address these gaps, the minister outlined that major investments are required across every part of the supply chain: developing new water sources, upgrading pumping infrastructure, building new production stations, expanding the existing distribution network, and cutting the high volume of non-revenue water lost through leaky pipes and outdated systems. Critically, Abiamofo confirmed that the Surinaamsche Waterleiding Maatschappij (SWM), the country’s national water utility, does not have the financial capacity to fund these critical upgrades independently.

    The parliamentary debate also brought forward longstanding consumer concerns about SWM’s customer service and billing practices. Multiple assembly members from different political parties highlighted widespread confusion over water tariffs, billing calculations, and consumer billing processes. Opposition member Rabin Parmessar noted that consumers currently have no clear way to forecast how much they will be charged for their water usage, and called for the same level of tariff transparency that was previously implemented for the country’s electricity sector.

    Abiamofo acknowledged these concerns, agreeing that public communication from the state-owned utility needs significant improvement. He confirmed that he shared the parliament’s concerns over customer service issues, and pledged to hold discussions with SWM leadership to improve clarity and accessibility of information for consumers around billing, service procedures and general customer support.

    Lawmakers also raised questions about unmetered household connections, pointing out that consumers without individual water meters cannot be charged based on their actual consumption. Abiamofo pushed back on claims that these households avoid paying for water entirely, explaining that utility staff calculate a fair average bill based on multiple factors including household size and regional consumption data for comparable properties.

    In closing, the minister stressed that the push to upgrade Suriname’s water infrastructure extends far beyond preparing for oil and gas development. At its core, the reform effort is rooted in a basic policy goal: ensuring every citizen of Suriname has access to consistent, safe drinking water, a standard that has not yet been achieved for communities across the country.

  • Pipeline leak leaves PoS without water

    Pipeline leak leaves PoS without water

    A sudden underground pipeline leak in downtown Port of Spain triggered widespread water outages across most of the central business district on Wednesday, forcing local businesses including popular fast-food chains to source emergency water from private trucked supplies while prompting fresh demands for long-overdue upgrades to the capital’s aging public utility network.

    The leak was detected along Independence Square North, near the intersection of Richmond Street, prompting the Water and Sewerage Authority (WASA) to immediately shut off water flow to the entire affected district to allow excavation and repair work to proceed. In its initial public advisory shortly after the outage was reported, the Downtown Owners and Merchants Association (DOMA), which represents hundreds of local businesses including 30 food service outlets, confirmed that the full downtown area had been left completely without piped water. WASA initially told DOMA that it could not provide an estimated timeline for restoring service, leading the association to urge all commercial and residential property owners and occupants to implement immediate water conservation measures. Food businesses in particular were advised to arrange alternative water sources to top up their storage and keep operations running.

    Repair work wrapped up faster than initially expected, with WASA confirming it completed fixes at the leak site by approximately 3:30 p.m. DOMA later updated its advisory to note that full water service began to be restored to the downtown area shortly after 4:50 p.m., with normal pressure returning just after 5 p.m. WASA did not release any further details about the cause of the leak or the scope of the damage beyond confirming completion of repairs.

    In the wake of the incident, DOMA president Gregory Aboud emphasized that while unexpected equipment failures are unavoidable, the outage exposes a long-running, unaddressed problem: the critical state of disrepair of Port of Spain’s core public water infrastructure. Aboud noted that while downtown has historically had reasonably consistent water access compared to other parts of the country, frequent low-pressure events and multi-hour unplanned outages have become a regular drain on local business operations. He added that this latest disruption is just one example of a national-scale water management crisis, with widespread unaddressed leaks across the country leading to massive waste of treated potable water that could otherwise support communities during periods of dry weather.

    Aboud’s call for proactive infrastructure upgrades comes as the region prepares for looming dry conditions. Earlier the same week, the Trinidad and Tobago Meteorological Service issued a drought watch for Trinidad set to take effect in September, and a more severe drought warning for Tobago scheduled for October. Aboud stressed that urgent, preventative upgrades and leak management are critical to avoid widespread panic and more severe service disruptions if drought conditions develop as forecast.

  • Guinea Grass Swimmer Survives Crocodile Attack

    Guinea Grass Swimmer Survives Crocodile Attack

    On a quiet early Sunday morning in Guinea Grass Village, a routine swim turned into a life-or-death struggle that has upended community trust in one of the area’s most beloved local recreation spots. Twenty-nine-year-old Leomar Narvallez became the victim of a sudden crocodile attack in New River Park, a riverside space that for decades has served as a go-to cooling retreat for residents during warm Belizean summers. He has survived the terrifying encounter, but the incident has left the community demanding urgent action to prevent future tragedies.

    When reporter Shane Williams visited the site days after the attack, the normally crowded riverbank told the full story of the community’s new fear. On a picture-perfect warm summer afternoon, the calm, cool waters that once drew crowds of swimmers sat completely empty—no families picnicking, no teenagers cooling off, no locals gathering to relax after a week of work. The quiet that now hangs over the park is a direct result of the horror that unfolded here just days earlier.

    Narvallez, speaking to reporters by phone from his home after release from the hospital, recounted the split-second shock of the attack. “I went in the river; I was swimming and that when I feel like something grab me in my head,” he said. “And that’s when I feel like it shaking. The crocodile shook my head like two times. So in my mind I just asked what is this, because I never expected that to happen.” Through a desperate fight for his life, Narvallez managed to escape the crocodile’s jaws. He was rushed to Northern Regional Hospital, where clinicians closed his wounds with roughly 28 stitches before clearing him to go home.

    The attack was not a completely unforeseen risk, according to Guinea Grass Village Chairman Benito Uk. He revealed that local leaders had already flagged crocodile activity in the area more than a year prior. “Last year, I did a post on my village council page in regards to the crocodile,” Uk explained. “I took a video because the same time we were cleaning early morning we were cleaning there as usual and I saw the crocodile around that area and then I posted that. But usually, our community usually use that for recreation and so forth.” Even with the prior warning, the community continued to rely on the free, accessible riverside spot—until last week’s attack.

    Now, Uk says the village is calling on national authorities to act immediately. The incident has left residents not just mourning the loss of their go-to recreation spot, but worried that a lack of intervention could lead to another, deadlier attack. Uk is pushing for the crocodile to be relocated from the area that villagers regularly use for swimming and bathing. “I was expecting that the Department of Environment contact us to see what measures we could take with the community and with them to see what we could do to, I don’t know, to either the crocodile be placed in another area,” he said. “I don’t know what else we could do to not have them around the area where our community go and take a bath there.” For now, the village chairman is urging residents, especially parents, to remain alert and keep unsupervised children away from the river, as the community waits for a response from environmental authorities.

    The attack serves as a sobering reminder for communities across the globe that even the most familiar, frequently used bodies of water can hide unexpected dangers. This report from Shane Williams was produced for News Five.

  • Stone Thrown at MBS Office as Public-Sector Buildings Face Fresh Damage

    Stone Thrown at MBS Office as Public-Sector Buildings Face Fresh Damage

    A wave of targeted vandalism against public infrastructure in Antigua’s capital St. John’s took a new turn Wednesday afternoon, when an unidentified object believed to be a stone was thrown through a window of the Medical Benefits Scheme’s Human Resources division. The incident unfolded just after 1:00 p.m. at the office, which occupies an upper floor above the MBS Pharmacy on the busy Nevis Street corridor. The sudden act of vandalism left office staff shaken by the unexpected, dangerous event. In response to the incident, management authorized all employees to clock out early and leave the premises for the rest of the workday. Wednesday’s attack comes on the heels of overnight vandalism that left three separate government agencies on Independence Drive with damaged property. Between Tuesday evening and the early hours of Wednesday morning, unknown perpetrators damaged glass entryways at three major public institutions: the Antigua Public Utilities Authority, the national Treasury Department, and the Antigua and Barbuda Social Security Board. Law enforcement officials have already launched formal investigations into the three earlier overnight incidents. As of the latest update, investigators have not confirmed any formal link between the earlier vandalism spree and Wednesday afternoon’s stone-throwing attack at the Medical Benefits Scheme office, leaving open multiple lines of inquiry into the recent string of destruction targeting public-sector buildings.

  • NHC reports progress on housing handovers, tenant ownership

    NHC reports progress on housing handovers, tenant ownership

    Decades of uncertainty over property ownership for thousands of long-term public housing tenants in Barbados have moved closer to resolution, following new legislation passed by national lawmakers that clears the way for full legal transfer of occupied National Housing Corporation (NHC) units, though residents continue to voice frustration over lingering delays.\n\nThe long-running push to grant ownership to eligible long-term tenants gained formal legislative backing in May this year, when Parliament approved the State (Acquisition and Vesting of Property) Act. The legislation, designed to cut through years of crippling administrative backlogs, paves the way for 3,892 long-term NHC tenants to become official homeowners, with upper house senators hailing the law as a long-overdue reform expected to deliver sweeping social benefits. The measure covers nine major housing estates across the country: Deacons Farm, Grazettes, Fernihurst, Wildey, Bonnetts, Golden Acre, Silver Hill, Gall Hill and Wotton.\n\nIn an update on the programme’s rollout, NHC General Manager Ian Gill confirmed that progress is already visible in the initial distribution phases. To date, nearly 500 households across the first two allocation batches have successfully taken full ownership of their properties through the initiative.\n\nThe government’s scheme builds on the existing Twenty-Year Programme, a policy that grants full legal ownership to NHC tenants who have continuously rented their units for 20 years or more and met all eligibility criteria. For many qualifying residents, however, the promise of ownership has remained unfulfilled for more than a decade, leaving them grappling with serious practical and financial barriers.\n\nWithout official title deeds, many households cannot leverage their property as collateral for loans, unlock equity for home improvements or development, or formalize inheritance arrangements after the death of a property occupant. One long-term Deacons Farm resident, who has waited more than 10 years for her title, shared her experience following her mother’s death: despite having lived in the home her entire life, she was still required to produce formal legal proof of ownership to secure rights to the property. “When my mother got the keys for this house, she put them in my hand. I was the first one to open this door, and to this day I am still waiting for papers,” she said, adding that without formal documentation, she cannot even access basic banking services that rely on property proof.\n\nOther residents have pointed to a pattern of broken political promises around the title transfer process. Multiple residents reported that electoral candidates routinely pledge fast-tracked title deeds during campaign periods to win votes, only for the process to stall immediately after elections conclude. “When election time comes, they bring a piece of paper telling you that they will give it to you after the election in a couple of weeks or months, but it never happens. It is empty promises, and that has been going on for four or five elections now,” one long-term tenant explained, adding that every change in NHC leadership requires residents to restart the entire application process from scratch.\n\nGill acknowledged the frustration among waiting residents but sought to reassure them that the administrative process is moving forward, stressing that legal property transfers require thorough, deliberate oversight to avoid errors. “Everybody across Barbados who has been approved under the twenty-year programme will eventually receive their houses,” he said. “Whatever the legislation states, they will receive their houses. It is only a matter of time. Everything takes time, especially where legal work is concerned.”\n\nWhen asked to address separate resident concerns about the Grotto housing complex, Gill declined to comment on the record but invited local outlet Barbados TODAY to tour the site to observe ongoing work. During the outlet’s visit, two construction cranes were on site carrying out tree removal, and residents reported that the work is part of a broader estate beautification project that will include power-washing and repainting building exteriors, as well as cleaning up common green spaces and grounds.