The Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) yesterday set May 10th for the hearing of the appeals on the validity of the December 21st vote on the no-confidence motion against the APNU+AFC administration and added the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) as a party to the proceedings.
At a case management conference yesterday morning, the Trinidad-based court also set a date for hearing the challenge to the decision of the local Guyana Court of Appeal to uphold President David Granger’s appointment of GECOM Chairman James Patterson. That hearing is scheduled for May 8th.
With the challenge to Patterson’s appointment potentially having a direct bearing on the final determination of the no-confidence motion appeals, the court set the hearing in the matter to precede them.
President of the CCJ Justice Adrian Saunders along with Justices Jacob Witt and David Hayton announced that the three separate appeals filed on the no-confidence motion will be consolidated into one hearing as the matters are all related.
The three appeals on the no-confidence motion are Christopher Ram against the Attorney General (AG), the Leader of the Opposi-tion and Minister of State Joseph Harmon; Bharrat Jagdeo against the AG, Speaker of the National Assembly Dr Barton Scotland and Harmon; and Charrandass Persaud against Compton Herbert Reid, Dr Scotland, Jagdeo and Harmon.
In granting the appellants special leave to appeal, the court said it had taken into account the urgent attention which the matters require, while noting that they would be treated as such and timelines would therefore be abridged. Ram had sought to have his application urgently heard and determined within seven days, with the abridgment of all timelines as is necessary in order to prevent the “violation of the Constitution” and “the threat to democracy and adherence to the rule of law” that follow from that violation.
Ram has asked the court to, among other things, validate the December 21st passage of the motion by the National Assembly and to order that President Granger and GECOM ensure that elections are held no later than April 29th, 2019.
In addition to setting the date for a hearing, the CCJ yesterday also outlined those timelines which are to be adhered to by all attorneys representing the various parties as regards the filing and serving of submissions and cross appeals with each other.
Ahead of the May 10th hearing, the court has scheduled April 24th for hearing of a pre-trial review in the matters.
Underscoring what he described as the importance of GECOM in the proceedings involving the no-confidence motion, Justice Saunders ordered that the entity be added as a party. In the same vein, the court also ordered that Patterson be added as a party to the appeal contesting his appointment.
Ram had applied for GECOM to be added as a party. The court, however, dismissed a similar application for President Granger to also be added as a party. On this point, Justice Saunders reminded that all suits against the state which embodies the executive/president have to be brought against the AG, since the president cannot be sued in any personal capacity and for which reason he would not have to be named a party to any litigation.
The court also expressed its desire for all attorneys to appear at the seat of the court in Trinidad for hearing of the appeal so that the occurrence of technical glitches would be minimised as the hearings would have to be done via teleconferencing.
The no-confidence mo-tion, sponsored by Jagdeo, was declared passed by Speaker Dr Scotland following a vote in its favour by then APNU+AFC parliamentarian Charrandass Persaud on the night of December 21st.
Following a challenge by government in the High Court, Chief Justice (Ag) Roxane George-Wiltshire found that even though Persaud was made a parliamentarian in violation of the Constitution, his vote was valid and that the December 21st no-confidence motion against the APNU+AFC government was validly passed with the votes of 33 elected members of the 65-member Assembly. She has also ruled that the passage of the motion should have triggered the immediate resignation of the Cabinet, including the President.
The Guyana Court of Appeal, by a majority decision, last Friday overturned the Chief Justice’s ruling, saying that the correct mathematical formula for finding the “absolute” majority was not used.
While Chancellor Yonette Cummings-Edwards (Ag) and Justice of Appeal Dawn Gregory agreed that 34 votes were required for the motion to be carried, Justice of Appeal Rishi Persaud dissented.
Meanwhile, the matter regarding Patterson’s appointment stems from an application filed by PPP executive Secretary Zulfikar Mustapha for urgent hearing, which the CCJ also granted.
Handing down its ruling in October last year, the local appellate court upheld the legality of President Granger’s unilateral appointment of Patterson, a retired judge, as Chairman of GECOM, saying that he did not act unreasonably in doing so.
The court disagreed with arguments advanced by Mustapha’s attorney that President Granger’s resort to the constitutional proviso in Article 161 (2) for the unilateral appointment of Patterson was unlawfully invoked and resultantly dismissed his appeal of a previous ruling of Justice George-Wiltshire.
Mustapha is arguing, among other things, that the decision of the Guyana Court of Appeal failed to give effect to the “letter and spirit” of the constitution.
In addition to AG Basil Williams SC, the state is being represented by Solicitor General Nigel Hawke and Eamon Courtenay SC and other attorneys.
Persaud is being represented by attorney Sanjeev Datadin and other lawyers, while Ram is being represented by attorneys Kamal Ramkarran and Devindra Kissoon.
Representing Reid is Neil Boston SC and other attorneys, while Jagdeo is being represented by attorney Anil Nandlall and other lawyers.
Representing Harmon is attorney Roysdale Forde, while Scotland is being represented by attorney Rafiq Khan SC.
