August 20, 2017 Source

IT was my intent, in keeping with Emancipation Month, to address several aspects of Africans’ struggles and achievements for human dignity and respect, and their contributions to societal development. However, due to actions that are now evidently becoming clear and present threats to effective and efficient functioning of the Executive/Government, this week’s intended attention to “Empowerment and Affirmative Action” is being forgone. We are facing a very serious situation and what I am about to say is intended to right a ship, veering wildly off course, and posing dire implications for the Rule of Law, the legitimacy of the Executive, and protecting the well-being of the society.

The David Granger/Moses Nagamootoo government has been hauled before the court or threatened with court action for matters that, had time been taken to understand the authority of the Executive and limits of the President, could have been avoided. This nation has witnessed at least five such instances which are humiliating to the administration and moreso the President, who heads it and under whose name the decisions are taken. These issues are:

-1) the termination of leases to land in the Mahaica- Mahaicony- Abary Development Scheme,

2) interpretation of the qualifying criteria to be considered among those eligible to be on the list of nominees for GECOM Chairman,

3) termination of the Red House lease and moving to evict,

4) seeking to possess the private property of Clarissa Riehl et al, and

5)  instruction given to the Police Service Commission not to act now on a list for promotions.

On every occasion, the nation has witnessed the government stuttering to find justification for its actions when questioned or called on to account. The cases that have appeared before the court and where decisions were handed down, indicate the government has fallen short. And it has come to a point where questions are being asked as to whether President Granger is being afforded proper legal advice, or the advocacy in the court on his government’s behalf is weak, or he is not favourably disposed to taking legal advice.

The Constitution is very clear on the scope, authority and responsibility of the branches of government, identified institutions, stakeholders, citizens, and office holders. Read, understood and respected it would guarantee smoother management of the nation’s business and welfare of its citizens. Though myth has taken hold that the President is above the very Constitution he/she swears to uphold, the Constitutional Court is proving that the office holder’s decision-making has to operate within permissible boundaries.

Two significant advantages with the court being called on to adjudicate on constitutional contentions is that citizens are assured of recourse to what they may consider excesses or injustice, and the foundation for clarifications on interpretation of the Constitution is being reinforced. At the same time, one cannot help but wonder why the APNU and AFC, when in opposition, did not take similar approaches in challenging the excesses of the PPP/C government. I fervently believe that were this avenue utilised, conversations about and understanding of the Constitution would have been more meaningful/productive.

They are some who may think going to the court and having its interpretation is healthy for a democratic society, while there is the view that as the government continues to make decisions which are hit down by the court, indicates absence of thoroughness in its decision-making processes or preparedness to govern by diktat and run roughshod over the people.  There is merit in all the positions.  In the former, it represents respecting the role and responsibility of the Judicial Branch and in the latter, where the perceptions exist ,it should serve as caution to government, if that is not its intent, to engage in due diligence before acting.

The Granger/Nagamootoo government needs to be careful as to how they go forward on the issue of governance. My study of the political actors in the society notes the PPP/C government’s cunning and crookedness in how it treated with the economy and its contempt for the rule of law and the rights of citizens. Such misconduct has deservedly placed it in the opposition. The PPP/C is a shrewd and wily Opposition, though it is instructive to note the issues its leadership prosecutes and condemns today it had been guilty of when it was in government.

The nation is witnessing a strategy of the PPP/C to paint itself as a government that respected the Constitution and the APNU+AFC as lawless, when both are guilty of constitutional infractions. At the same time, this government is failing to recognise and appreciate that the hunger of the PPP/C to return to office in such a competitive environment it ought not to be engaging in such conduct.

Note is taken of Anil Nandlall’s articulation and demands that the APNU+AFC  respect the Constitution, and we must question why he failed as Attorney General and Minister Legal Affairs to render similar advice to the PPP.  Apart from that, I encourage him to continue to make public his positions, for such augur well, given his tendency to reference the articles in advancing his arguments which aids public education on the instrumemt.

The Executive has at its disposal the Attorney General’s Chambers and sitting in the Cabinet is the Attorney General and Minister of Legal Affairs. The holder of the office, Basil Williams, has also added to his repertoire of legal minds, luminaries in the persons of Justice Claudette Singh, Professors Keith Massiah, Harold Lutchman, Bryn Pollard, Rudy James as advisers.

I refuse to believe that were the input of any of the five sought they would have advised the government to have the President take the course of action he has embarked on. 

Something is definitely wrong in the administration and while it may prove difficult to specifically pinpoint what or who is responsible for these poor legal decisions, in the interest of protecting the legitimacy of and respect for the Executive and welfare of the citizens, action must be taken forthrightly to arrest the crisis.