Eight MPs given final warning to pay outstanding court cost

Aug 20, 2023 Court Stories, Features / Columnists, News

Kaieteur News – Eight Opposition Members of Parliament (MPs) were given a final warning to pay outstanding court costs or face possible consequences of their action.

Attorney: Sase Gunraj

Last January, the eight MPs Annette Ferguson, Christopher Jones, Ganesh Mahipaul, Vinceroy Jordan, Tabitha Sarabo-Halley, Sherod Duncan, Maureen Philadelphia and Natasha Singh-Lewis were ordered to pay court costs to the tune of $350, 000 each to three respondents involved in the case filed over their suspension from the National Assembly.

Letters from local law firm, Gunraj and Co. addressed to the eight MPs, outlined that they will face the consequences of failing to pay the outstanding sums.

“In the circumstances, we are instructed to demand, as we hereby do, that the said costs be paid within 14 (fourteen) days hereof, failing which our clients will institute proceedings to recover the same without further notice to you,” Attorney Sase Gunraj wrote to each of the MPs.

In the case, Attorney General (AG), Anil Nandlall, SC, Speaker of the National Assembly, Manzoor Nadir and Clerk of the National Assembly, Sherlock Isaacs were listed as respondents.

Nandlall had revealed during his programme “Issues in the News” recently that those steps have already been taken to recover the judgment sums from those who refused to pay.

He explained that “the Opposition could also face jail time for failing to honour the judgments or cost orders. He said another option is going to their employers to garnish wages/salaries due to them monthly, or depending on how they receive their remuneration.”

He revealed that, “They were sent notification letters, they were sent reminders, the matter was widely published in the press when I made comments that enforcement proceedings would be filed and notwithstanding all the above, they have refused, obstinately refused, to pay the costs.”

“This constitutes contempt of court and I have already instructed my lawyers to begin the process of enforcing the judgments or the cost orders. It means that persons’ vehicles and other movable properties will be seized by Marshals of the High Court and sold at an execution sale to recover the monies.”

Among the cases in which the Opposition is yet to pay costs is the case in which Christopher Jones and Norris Witter were each ordered to pay some $1.2 million in costs after the judge had dismissed their case against the State over the legality of the Natural Resource Fund (NRF) Act passed in National Assembly in December, 2021.

The High Court had refused an application to overturn the suspension of eight Opposition parliamentarians for their role in the unrest in the Chamber of the National Assembly in December 2021 over the passage of the Natural Resource Fund Bill.

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Annette Ferguson, Christopher Jones, Ganesh Mahipaul, Maureen Philadelphia, Sherod Duncan, Tabitha Sarabo-Halley

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