…is NOT an ass
Today, the Chancellor (ag) of the Judiciary will offer the Judiciary’s interpretation of Art 161 (2) as to who’s qualified to be nominated by the Leader of the Opposition as GECOM’s Chair. The President and his Attorney General, of course, have spent the last six months offering all sorts of “interpretations” of the Article in an effort to have Art (162 (3) kick in – which is, if the Leader of the Opposition doesn’t submit a list “acceptable” to the President, the latter can unilaterally appoint ANYONE he chooses!
Your Eyewitness knows, dear reader, your eyes will roll out of their sockets if he were to inflict Prezzie’s arguments once again on you. So he’ll desist. But he must address the most recent of a slew of missives on the subject by one Maxwell E Edwards, who evidently was once a Magistrate. The fella’s application to become a Judge was rejected by the Judicial Service Commission – but he blames Jagdeo!
Anyhow, he seems to be carrying a spear for Basil Williams (a torch?) who, it’s assumed, has been advising Prezzie on his responses. It seems the five legal luminaries the Government hired to assist Williams aren’t enough and Edwards has stepped into the breach. Whether its pro-bono or not isn’t known. Anyhow, after perusing Edwards’ letter, your Eyewitness understands why he could never make “Judgeship”!
Firstly, there’s his abbreviation of the Leader of the Opposition” as “the LOO”. Now…really? This is the best witticism an aspiring Judge can come back with at Jagdeo? What next? Fart jokes? C’mon Edwards, suck it in and muster up some dignity. Next, Edwards posits that Jagdeo’s lists are “imperfect” even if ONE of the names is “unacceptable’ to Prezzie. And how does he arrive at this conclusion? By baldly tossing out Justice Massiah’s restatement of the “strict or literal constructionist approach” to statutory interpretation!!
No reasoning or logic – just his conclusion along with gratuitously tossing in an inappropriate Maxim of Equity which he phrases: “Even Equity does not consider as perfect, that which is imperfect.” But if he didn’t cog his way through law school, he’d know the rule’s actually restricted to gifts: “Equity will not complete an imperfect gift”. If he were more conversant with Equity, Edwards should advise his principal Williams (and Prezzie) that on any ambiguities: “Equity prevents a party from relying upon an absence of a statutory formality if to do so would be unconscionable and unfair.”
Which is what’s about to be done with the selection of the GECOM Chair!
But, he forgot, “Equity will not allow a statute to be used as a cloak for fraud”.
As in rigging elections!
…and Indigenous peoples
What’s been dumped on the Indigenous peoples in Kaieteur National Park is a trope for their four centuries of marginalisation in Guyana. Once again, your Eyewitness has to insist: all Guyanese – other than Indigenous peoples – are squatting on the latter’s lands.
What’s the point of us demanding reparations against the British and Dutch for exploiting us back in the day, when we want to gloss over that those same British and Dutch arbitrarily seized those folks’ lands – which we now occupy. Hypocrisy!! All 83,002 square miles – (the last two miles include Ankoko which we allowed Venezuela to occupy.)
So why Government has sent in what has to be an “army of occupation”? All the Indigenous peoples are doing is crossing the Park on their way to hunt and fish. Has the Government forgotten about their usufructuary rights? Look it up!!
This is just too much. And it’s only a hint of what the land titling CoI will inflict.
…and the City Hall Gang of Four
If you buy someone’s service, the law says you gotta pay the bill. But the Town Clerk says the City Council can’t pay for garbage collection.
So why wasn’t 80 per cent demanded from Smart City Parking?
