The Kara Kara conundrum

Sep 07, 2026 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

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(Kaieteur News) – The Linden Town Council does not possess an untouchable constitutional right to administer its affairs. The Constitution does not confer upon the Linden Town Council an unfettered right to govern Linden in whatever manner it chooses. It establishes local government within the constitutional and statutory framework of Guyana.

Indeed, the Municipal and District Councils Act itself is an emphatic reminder that local government does not operate in a legal vacuum. Parliament has prescribed what councils may do, how they may do it and, importantly, when the approval of the minister is required.

Consider by-laws. Section 305 of the Municipal and District Councils Act provides that by-laws made by a council must be submitted to the minister for approval. The minister may approve them with or without amendment or reject them, and a by-law has no force of law until ministerial approval has been given.

That brings us to the central question in the Kara Kara controversy. If parliament has given the minister the statutory power to approve a by-law before it becomes law, why should it necessarily follow that the minister’s authority ends forever at the precise moment of approval?

The answer offered by the council’s critics appears to be that there is no express provision saying that the minister may revoke an approved by-law. But that is not necessarily the end of the matter.

The interpretation and General Clauses Act provides that subsidiary legislation may be amended, suspended or revoked by the same authority and in the same manner by which it was made. The question therefore becomes whether the statutory process by which a council by-law acquires legal force is simply an act of the council, or a composite statutory process in which ministerial approval is an essential component.

It is difficult to ignore the fact that parliament has said that without ministerial approval the by-law has no force of law. That makes the minister’s approval considerably more than a ceremonial rubber stamp.

One can therefore make a perfectly respectable argument that the power of approval carries with it an implied power of withdrawal or revocation. That does not mean that every power of approval automatically includes an unrestricted power of revocation. It means that the question must be determined by construing the legislation as a whole.

And the legislation plainly contemplates substantial central-government supervision of local councils. Section 306, for example, provides mechanisms for intervention where a council has exceeded or abused its powers, defaulted in its duties, failed to maintain reasonable efficiency or incurred excessive or unreasonable expenditure. This is hardly evidence of an arrangement in which central government is forbidden from touching anything a council does.

Saying that the revocation of the toll, removes the revenue and strips Linen of its democratic voice is therefore a case of rhetoric getting ahead of the law. If the toll is lawfully imposed and the minister unlawfully removes it, then the council has a legitimate grievance. But if the minister possesses statutory authority to revoke or otherwise terminate the legal instrument, calling that centralisation does not make the action unlawful.

If parliament has deliberately placed ministerial approval into the machinery by which a council’s by-laws acquire legal force, it is at least arguable that parliament also contemplated a corresponding ministerial capacity to withdraw that approval when the statutory circumstances justify it.

Nor does Article 13 of the Constitution automatically require consultation before every decision affecting a local authority.  Article 13 expresses a constitutional objective, but does not, by itself, create a legal right that an individual or organisation can enforce in court. Article 13 is an unenforceable provision that declares that the political system should provide increasing opportunities for citizens and their organisations to participate in state decision-making, particularly in matters affecting their well-being. But it does not say that a citizen, local authority or other affected body must be consulted before every particular decision is made.

The same arguments now being advanced in relation to the Kara Kara toll were made when government announced the abolition of the Wismar-Mackenzie Bridge toll. The council quite properly pointed out that the decision would deprive it of roughly $6 million a month in revenue and raised concerns about the absence of consultation.

But the government’s policy was not directed at Linden alone. It was explicitly announced as a policy to abolish tolls on the country’s major bridges, including the Demerara Harbour and Berbice River bridges. The Wismar toll was consequently removed along with the others on 1^st August, 2025. That decision obviously had financial consequences for the council, just as the present decision concerning the Kara Kara toll will have consequences for its revenue.

Those consequences are legitimate matters for discussion between the council and central government. Indeed, government has met with the council to address its concerns.

What should not be done, however, is to transform a dispute over the financial consequences of a national policy into an argument that the right of the council to administer the affairs of Linden is under siege.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper)

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• Constitution, conundrum, Kara Kara, Linden Town Council, Peeping Tom

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