Recently, a university professor in Great Britain caused a major stir when he announced that, according to his research, the blackman has been proven to be inferior.  According to this white professor, the academic performance of black people has been comprehensively studied for the past 100 years and the data strongly suggests that blacks are academically inferior to whites.  Needless to say, the poor professor has been at the receiving end of some harsh criticisms.  However, putting all the excitement aside though – is the blackman really inferior?

First of all, I must say that I am a blackman (or mostly black, at any rate) and whether the findings of the poor professor are really based on hard facts or not, I am inclined to agree with him – to a very large extent.  Now I am not going to be as emotional about whether we are inferior or not, like those very angry students at that British university.  I am more interested in the truth – whether it is pleasing or not.

It cannot be denied, even if we want to, that black people have some very serious problems.  We don’t have to be rocket scientists to see the very wide gap between ourselves and the other races.  For many centuries and even now, there can be very little doubt that the blackman is definitely inferior.  But why do I say this?

TURIN ITALY - February 15: Walking into the Fiat Pavilion at the Sponsors Village in Torino Italy, the host city for the 2006 Winter Olympic Games, I was a little unsure of what I would find, given that I had not given prior request for an interview with the Jamaica Bobsleigh Team.

I was soon made very comfortable chatting with the team standing in front of the new Fiat Panda.

The original team whose debut in 1988 in Calgary inspired the movie Cool Runnings paved way for the country to be seen as a force to be reckoned with. Says Wayne, “The team in an inspiration to the rest of us and it shows that with determination, we can achieve anything we want”.

Surrounded by fans of adults and children alike, trying to either catch a glimpse or pose for a picture, their sponsor Fiat has ensured that the rest of the world is a long way from forgetting that the spirit of the team carries on.

According to Fiat representative, the purpose of the sponsorship - which ranges from grass-roots promotional activities to TV commercials - is to show a piece of Jamaica to the rest of the world, while also promoting the new Fiat Panda.

The team consists of athletes Winston Watt, Thomas Wayne, Clive Mc Donald, Wayne Blackwood, Ricky McIntosh. Watts reassured that fans would not be disappointed in their outing at the next winter games in Beijing 2008.

Other athletes representing the islands of the Caribbean in the Torino 2006 games are Bermuda’s skeleton competitor Patrick Singleton as well as 48-year-old Anne Abernathy from the United States Virgin Islands.

Oyiza Adaba is a U.S-based International Correspondent.

Kingston harbor is one of the best natural harbors in the world, yet it is of little use to the country; except for an occasional ship it remains idle for most of the year.  The state of the harbor is a token of the state of the country, which is decaying in the midst of immense valuable resources.

The government should restore the harbor to accommodate cruise ships with the thousands of passengers they would bring to the city, which now sees few tourists. Visitors would tour downtown Kingston and see sights like the historic Ward theater, now virtually abandoned due to violence and urban decay; and shop at the crafts market, and from vendors.

After nearly two weeks of hand-counting over a million and a half ballots from the February 5 national elections, the Costa Rican Supreme Electoral Tribunal finally announced the results of the presidential vote. Former President Oscar Arias, of the National Liberation Party (PLN), won the presidency by a surprisingly low 40.9% of the votes, compared with Ottón Solís, of the Citizen’s Action Party (PAC), who ran an equally surprisingly close race with 38.9%. The margin of victory was slightly over 18,000 votes, the lowest in many years. Five other candidates earned the remaining votes, 8% to the Libertarian Movement Party (PML) and 1% to the Homeland First Party. Following the last decade’s trend, the abstention rate was over 30%, similar to the 2002 regular elections’ rate of 31%.

As for the 57-member Legislative Assembly, PLN won 25 seats, PAC won 18, PML won 6, the Social Christian Unity Party (PUSC) won 4, and four small parties won the remaining 4 seats, making this assembly the most divided in the country’s history. Like the president, deputies are prohibited from running for immediate re-election, so there was a complete turnover of elected officials.

Although democracy is considered to have been launched in Costa Rica with the 1899 elections, the contemporary political system was established after the 1948 uprising led by Don José “Pepe” Figueres aimed at protesting a disputed presidential election. While the 44-day civil war, in which 2,000 people were killed, was the bloodiest event in 20th century Costa Rican history, it led to the establishment of a more representative government based on a constitution drafted in 1949.