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High Court rules appointment of Parliamentary Secretaries unlawful – AG files appeal
…Christopher Jones challenge
Kaieteur News – Chief Justice (Ag), Roxane George-Wiltshire, yesterday declared the appointment of two People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) candidates as Parliamentary Secretaries unlawful by virtue of them sitting in the National Assembly as non-elected parliamentarians, while the Attorney-General’s office filed an immediate appeal last evening.
Opposition Chief Whip, Christopher Jones
Parliamentary Secretary, Sarah Browne
The judgment follows a challenge by A Partnership for National Unity + Alliance For Change (APNU+AFC) Parliamentarian, Christopher Jones. Jones, in his capacity as Opposition Chief Whip had approached the High Court seeking, inter alia, an order to have Parliamentary Secretaries, Sarah Browne and Vikash Ramkissoon, removed from the National Assembly.
Based on her decision yesterday, the Chief Justice (CJ) deemed the appointment of Browne and Ramkissoon unlawful given that they were part of the PPP/C list of candidates but were not extracted to sit as Members of Parliament (MPs) on the government’s side of the House.
The Chief Justice stressed therefore that the two “cannot be elected and non-elected members at the same time.”
“I have concluded that the third and fourth respondents [Browne and Ramkissoon] are not lawful members of the National Assembly since their membership is by virtue of their appointment as Parliamentary Secretaries and I so declare,” Chief Justice said in her ruling yesterday.Further in her decision, Justice George-Wiltshire explained that the Parliamentary Secretaries, who are regarded as junior ministers, can have voting rights if they are extracted from the list of elected members.
“…[But] because they were not extracted from the list of candidates they are not eligible to vote in the National Assembly,” the CJ determined.
Jones had contended that the appointments of Browne and Ramkissoon were done in violation of the Constitution since they were sitting as both elected and non-elected members of the National Assembly.
Jones had stated that as Articles 103 (3) and 186 of the Constitution paragraph (1) dictates, Parliamentary Secretaries may be appointed from among persons who are elected members of the National Assembly or are qualified to be elected as such members.
Added to this, the Chief Justice pointed that the Attorney General, Anil Nandlall, S.C., had held a similar position in an almost identical case where the PPP’s Desmond Morian had successfully challenged then President, David Granger’s appointment of elected APNU+AFC candidates Winston Felix and Keith Scott as ministers without voting rights.
“Having argued otherwise, I have concluded that Mr. Nandlall is now trapped by his previous successful submissions and now seeks to say that the result of Morian is wrong,” the Chief Justice said.
Parliamentary Secretary, Vikash Ramkissoon
The declaration of the CJ has paved the way for Speaker of the National Assembly, Manzoor Nadir, to remove Ramkissoon and Browne as Parliamentary Secretaries, even as Nandlall swiftly moved to issue a notice to appeal the decision just a few hours after it was handed down yesterday.
In his appeal, Nandlall argued that the Chief Justice misinterpreted and misconstrued provisions of Guyana’s Constitution and in the case of Desmond Morian, the challenge was over the appointment of two elected members of the House as technocratic ministers.
“The decision of the learned Judge does not accord with the clear and unambiguous binding language of the Constitution of Guyana,” he said.
In his application filed last December, Jones had sought several declarations that, inter alia, the two Parliamentary Secretaries are not lawful members of the National Assembly; that they were not lawfully appointed to the position of Parliamentary Secretary of the Government of Guyana.
In the application, Jones contended that Parliamentary Secretaries shall be appointed by the President from among persons who are qualified to be elected as members of the National Assembly.
The Opposition Chief Whip noted that Browne and Ramkissoon were not elected members of the National Assembly as Articles 60 (2), 160 (1) and (3) (a) and 232 provides that, subject to the provisions of Article 160 (2), the number of members of the National Assembly shall be elected in accordance with the system of proportional representation prescribed in Article 160 (1). The case was presented by attorneys-at-law, Roysdale Forde S.C., Mayo Robertson, Raphael Trotman, Geeta Chandan-Edmond, Amanza Walton-Desir, Olayne Joseph and Darren Wade.
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