A one-man constitutional court is extreme madness

Jul 21, 2015 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

I don’t know what legislation or changes in judicial regulations have to be made in order to widen the Constitutional Court to include more than one Judge, but whatever it takes it should be done as early as yesterday. To have one Judge who presides over the most complex, sensitive and far-reaching cases in the realm of constitutional law is extreme madness.
Guyana’s Constitutional Court consists of the acting Chief Justice only. Over the past four years, he has presided over some of the most important cases that have deep implications legal, social and political.
And a majority of those decisions have been questioned by some of the most profound legal minds in Guyana. We can list a few. He ruled against the DPP bringing a charge of rape against the then Commissioner of Police, Henry Green.
He ordered that Carol Sooba cannot be removed as Town Clerk, because even though the then Minister of Local Government had no legal authority to appoint her, Mr. Royston King has to file a writ against Sooba’s possession of the office itself rather than how she was appointed. I have always maintained that you don’t have to be a lawyer to read a judgement, study the law, and arrive at your own decision. The master layman who understood law as any Attorney was Eusi Kwayana.
The Chief Justice’s decision is that although the Minister of Local Government’s appointment of Sooba was illegal, she can continue as de facto Town Clerk. What I found repellant about the Sooba situation was that one of the most important offices in Georgetown was controlled by someone who didn’t have de jure standing.
If there wasn’t a change of government after the May General Elections, this country would have had to live with a Town Clerk that no one knew who appointed her. This should not have surprised the Guyanese people because the nation knows that Guyana is a huge social caricature.
From the time President Ramotar led a minority government after the 2011 elections, all writs pertaining to the budget cuts were heard by the one-man constitutional Court. Apart from the budget cuts, the then opposition asked the Constitutional Court to rule as illegal, the spending of monies by Minister of Finance for items in the budget that the opposition had curtailed.
The one-man Constitutional Court has given judgement in favour of a plaintiff who asked that the term limit for Presidents be struck down.
The one-man Constitutional Court has ruled in a matter in which the opposition asked that the GGMC’s loan to the central government of three billion dollars for the housing sector be deemed as illegal.
The Constitutional Court made two intriguing rulings earlier this month – that Minister Simona Broomes acted unconstitutionally in requesting the Public Service Commission to stay appointments to the Public Service that were already made and that the Ministry of Education could not appoint Trevor Williams as Director of Sports as it is unconstitutional for the position to be filled by someone outside of the Public Service.
As we all know, the PPP has an election writ that asks the Constitutional Court to strike down the 2015 election results. These are just a few examples where some of the most disturbing grey areas in constitutional law have been decided by one judge manning the Constitutional Court.
To date only one public figure has openly criticized the shape of the constitutional Court and that is Mr. Anand Goolsarran. This columnist has now joined Mr. Goolsarran. The debate does not, and should not focus on the Chief Justice but on the sensitive, theoretical question – how proper and wise is it for a country to have just one judge who must decide all dimensions of constitutional law when litigations are before the court.
The people that need to zero in on this danger (and there is no question in my mind that this is a clear and present danger) are the lawyers. We have a Bar Association and a Women Lawyers’ Association. They are yet to offer their opinion on the shape of the Constitutional Court. Are they afraid?
My opinion is that lawyers are inflexible when it comes to the attitude of reticence. They will not criticize Judges’ decisions and judicial indiscretions. The reason is fear. They may mask this weakness by a bravado response but fear is the key.
Lawyers have to appear in front of the Chief Justice. They will reason that it is not in the best interest of their clients for them to be calling for a three-man constitutional court. This country may well see a declaration that the 2015 election was null and void.

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A one-man constitutional court is extreme madness

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