Attorneys representing the United National Congress (UNC) have been granted conditional leave to appeal the Court of Appeal’s decision to dismiss its case challenging the composition of the Judicial and Legal Service Commission (JLSC) last week.
State attorneys sought to challenge the grant of permission to appeal to the United Kingdom-based Privy Council when the issue came up before the Appeal Court at the Hall of Justice, Port-of-Spain, yesterday.
Senior Counsel Deborah Peake, who is representing the Office of the Attorney General (AG), claimed the case filed by former agriculture minister Devant Maharaj was “frivolous, vexatious and without merit”.
In response, Maharaj’s lawyer Anand Ramlogan, SC, said final determination of the case was necessary, as it raised matters of immense constitutional and public importance concerning the administration of justice.
The appeal panel, comprising Justices Gregory Smith, Charmaine Pemberton and Andre des Vignes, agreed to grant leave, as they said the case could not be described as “unarguable” as contended by Peake.
In a brief interview afterwards, Opposition Senator Gerald Ramdeen explained that Maharaj would be seeking an expedited hearing of the appeal.
“We have confidence that a hearing will be given in a short time because we understand that in matters of this nature, the Privy Council understands how important it is for these matters to be determined expeditiously,” Ramdeen said.
He also said he was disappointed by the decision of the AG’s office to challenge the granting of leave.
“I would have thought that the AG, being the guardian of the public interest, would have wanted the country’s highest court to determine the issues that arose in this matter,” Ramdeen said.
Maharaj filed the lawsuit last month following the fiasco involving the JLSC’s appointment of former chief magistrate Marcia Ayers-Caesar.
He had applied for an injunction last week in a bid to block the swearing-in of new judges Jacqueline Wilson and Kathy-Ann Waterman-Latchoo.
The injunction was initially granted by Justice Frank Seepersad following a marathon hearing the night before the appointments were due to take place.
Seepersad’s decision on the injunction was reversed by the Court of Appeal the following day, clearing the way for the appointments. The court also struck out Maharaj’s substantive lawsuit.
However, Appellate Judges Allan Mendonca, Nolan Bereaux and Peter Rajkumar did not give explicit reasons for their decision and promised to do so within two weeks.
Maharaj was contending that at the time of the decision, the JLSC only had four members instead of the five as required under the Constitution. The State claimed that the Interpretation Act allowed commissions to make decisions even in circumstances when there is a vacancy.
The current JLSC members are Chief Justice Ivor Archie, head of the Public Service Commission Maureen Manchouck and retired judges Roger Hamel-Smith, Humphery Stollmeyer and Ernest Koylass, who was appointed on May 17.
As a secondary issue in his lawsuit, Maharaj was challenging Stollmeyer’s position, as the Constitution states the JLSC members are the Chief Justice, head of the PSC, a sitting or retired judge and two “persons with legal qualification...not in active practice as such”. Ramlogan claimed a retired judge does not fall in the last category, which was meant for lawyers.
The State claimed that judges were attorneys before their appointment and were still qualified after retirement, albeit without permission to appear before courts for 10 years.
