The Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) has extensive powers to make the orders that had been sought in the no-confidence motion cases. Without serious justification, it declined to do so. Its ‘timid and ineffectual’ decision has intensified the constitutional chaos in Guyana. High Court cases are now being brought for orders and declarations that the CCJ ought to have made. In their absence, the Government has refused to act on the CCJ’s decision.
Mf. Andrew Pollard, writing in the Stabroek News on 28 August, pronounces the CCJ’s decision as fine and is horrified at my criticism. As a newly-minted Senior Counsel, Mr. Pollard should know that criticizing judges and courts in far sharper language than mine, is quite an accepted activity in normal countries. What is not normal is for a court that finds constitutional violations, to decline to make orders to rectify those violations, but relies instead on the ‘integrity’ of politicians. But no word from Mr. Pollard about this abject failure of the CCJ and of the Government’s continuing violations of the Constitution.
