How many viewers knew that the Chief Justice of Belize was also a Guyanese

Mar 05, 2014 Letters

Dear Editor,
One couldn’t help wondering how many of the various generations of those who would have witnessed the very recent celebration of Guyanese Justice Desiree Bernard’s contribution to the local and regional justice system, by members of the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ), realised that it was a watershed occasion in the history of at least equally impressive contributions made by a number of her predecessors who have practised in the West Indies, ever since colonial times.
Coincident with the movement of local banking officials (from Barclays Bank DC&O and Royal Bank of Canada) who were disposed to their respective branches in some Eastern Caribbean territories, individual legal practitioners sought and achieved successful careers in the justice systems across the West Indies. Others were officially rotated as part of Colonial Office policy.
So that this momentous occasion was not only an explicit recognition of individual performance; but perhaps more importantly a display of the cumulative appreciation of the pre-eminent role of Guyanese in the growth of West Indian jurisprudence – a scenario which projected the establishment of the CSME and the free movement of professionals as a logical eventuality; except perhaps that movement was freer then than now!
So it is worth asking how many viewers and readers would have recognised that the Chief Justice of Belize, who was front-paged accompanying CCJ’s Justice Bernard at the ceremony, was also a Guyanese (whose father, incidentally, served as Chaplain to the Guyana Defence Force).
Chief Justice Kenneth Benjamin is but one in a long line of successful legal luminaries who have contributed to the Region’s jurisprudence in various capacities. The names which come readily to mind (in no specific sequence) include: Sir Donald Jackson; J. A. Luckhoo; Aubrey Fraser; Guya Persaud; Joaquin Gonsalves-Sabola; Sir Kenneth Stoby, Sir Shridath Ramphal, Sir Fenton Ramsahoye, Satrohan Singh, Doodnauth Singh (who with Miles Fitzpatrick was identified with the Grenada Prime Minister Maurice Bishop’s assassination trial); Odel Adams; Stanley Moore; Donald Trotman (the Speaker’s father); Oscar Ramjeet. The name of Duke Pollard has been left last specifically to mention that with Desiree Brenard, he constituted the only country team to sit on the CCJ at the same time – a record that would be hard to emulate.
But there was also the inflow of counterpart West Indian talents who served in the local judiciary, outstanding amongst whom must be Barbadian Sir Frank Holder, as Attorney General, then Chief Justice; his compatriot Justice Erskine Ward; Frederick Boland of Grenanda, and others: from St. Lucia, Jamaica and elsewhere whose names escape immediate memory.
Hopefully by now all interested parties would demand to know why our justice system should not again benefit from the participation of counterpart Regional expertise, particularly at the higher levels – a process that would at least represent a reciprocity of respect for those practitioners of whom there are many of internationally acknowledged repute – a status of evaluation not known to be conferred on local performers.
We must now grasp this enlightening opportunity to pursue profitable options available in the Regional structure, of which Guyana is an evocative and active member, to rehabilitate the palpable malfunctioning of our legal system, and retrieve its image amongst the legal comity.
E.B. John

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How many viewers knew that the Chief Justice of Belize was also a Guyanese

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