Kamla gets CCJ wish

DA­REECE PO­LO

Se­nior Re­porter

da­reece.po­[email protected]

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s months-long chal­lenge to the process used to reap­point Cari­com Sec­re­tary Gen­er­al Dr Car­la Bar­nett will now be de­ter­mined by the Caribbean Court of Jus­tice (CCJ), af­ter re­gion­al lead­ers yes­ter­day agreed to seek an ad­vi­so­ry opin­ion from the re­gion­al court.

The de­ci­sion, an­nounced dur­ing a me­dia con­fer­ence at the 51st Reg­u­lar Meet­ing of the Con­fer­ence of Heads of Gov­ern­ment in St Lu­cia, was wel­comed by Per­sad-Bisses­sar and po­lit­i­cal an­a­lysts, who said it al­lows both Trinidad and To­ba­go and Cari­com to move for­ward while pre­serv­ing re­gion­al uni­ty.

Read­ing from a pre­pared state­ment yes­ter­day, Cari­com Chair and St Lu­cia Prime Min­is­ter Philip J. Pierre said T&T had main­tained its ob­jec­tion to the process used to reap­point Bar­nett dur­ing the heads of gov­ern­ment re­treat.

“To fa­cil­i­tate this re­quest, the com­mu­ni­ty agrees to com­mence pro­ceed­ings to se­cure such ad­vi­so­ry opin­ion in ac­cor­dance with Ar­ti­cle 212 of the Re­vised Treaty of Ch­aguara­mas. The com­mu­ni­ty ac­knowl­edged that this is the very pur­pose for which the CCJ was cre­at­ed – to be a treaty in­ter­pre­ta­tion body,” Pierre said.

He said Cari­com al­so agreed to main­tain the cur­rent arrange­ments un­til the CCJ ad­ju­di­cates on the mat­ter.

“The Com­mu­ni­ty fur­ther agreed that the sta­tus quo with re­spect to the reap­point­ment of the Sec­re­tary Gen­er­al shall re­main un­less and un­til the Com­mu­ni­ty con­sid­ers the said ad­vi­so­ry opin­ion from the CCJ,” he said.

“The com­mu­ni­ty agreed that this way for­ward al­lows for this mat­ter to be re­solved in an am­i­ca­ble man­ner, with­out prej­u­dice to the abil­i­ty of the com­mu­ni­ty to con­duct its af­fairs.”

He added, how­ev­er, that the re­fer­ral should not be in­ter­pret­ed as a re­flec­tion on the con­duct of any mem­ber state or of­fi­cial.

“This process does not im­pugn the in­tegri­ty of any mem­ber state or in­di­vid­ual; rather it re­flects the com­mu­ni­ty’s col­lec­tive com­mit­ment to con­tin­u­ous in­sti­tu­tion­al im­prove­ment with the high­est stan­dards of good gov­er­nance.”

Pierre said re­gion­al lead­ers re­mained com­mit­ted to the ob­jec­tives of re­gion­al in­te­gra­tion and would con­tin­ue work­ing to­geth­er to ad­dress the chal­lenges fac­ing the com­mu­ni­ty.

In a state­ment is­sued hours lat­er, Per­sad-Bisses­sar wel­comed the de­ci­sion, re­it­er­at­ing that T&T’s ob­jec­tion had al­ways been to the process used to reap­point a Sec­re­tary Gen­er­al, not to Dr Bar­nett her­self.

She thanked fel­low lead­ers for sup­port­ing T&T’s pro­pos­als and praised Pierre’s role in bro­ker­ing an agree­ment.

“This out­come is a tes­ta­ment to the chair­man­ship of Cari­com by the Ho­n­ourable Philip J Pierre, Prime Min­is­ter of St Lu­cia, who fa­cil­i­tat­ed con­sen­sus and the op­por­tu­ni­ty for the re­gion to move for­ward in uni­ty, to ad­vance the well-be­ing of all the peo­ple of Cari­com,” Per­sad-Bisses­sar said.

Ar­ti­cle 212 of the Re­vised Treaty of Ch­aguara­mas gives the CCJ ex­clu­sive ju­ris­dic­tion to is­sue ad­vi­so­ry opin­ions on the in­ter­pre­ta­tion and ap­pli­ca­tion of the treaty at the re­quest of mem­ber states in­volved in a dis­pute or by the com­mu­ni­ty it­self.

Con­tact­ed yes­ter­day, po­lit­i­cal an­a­lyst Pe­ter Wick­ham said the agree­ment rep­re­sent­ed a diplo­mat­ic so­lu­tion that ben­e­fit­ed both sides. “I think that it’s the type of diplo­ma­cy that al­lows Trinidad and To­ba­go to claim a win, and it al­so al­lows Cari­com to claim a win. And I think that that’s how democ­ra­cy should work. And I like the fact that the Heads would have hud­dled overnight to come to a con­clu­sion, and they have es­sen­tial­ly com­mu­ni­cat­ed an out­come that all sides are sup­port­ing. So, I’m hap­py with how things went,” Wick­ham said.

He al­so not­ed Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s praise for Pierre con­trast­ed with her crit­i­cism of the pre­vi­ous Cari­com chair­man­ship.

“If she is hap­py to es­sen­tial­ly throw shade at a for­mer chair­man and throw sup­port at the cur­rent chair­man, and if that’s what it takes for us to get past it, then so be it. So, I not­ed that, and I’m not par­tic­u­lar­ly con­cerned be­cause clear­ly, she had some con­cerns with how it was be­ing han­dled in the past. But, you know, I con­tin­ue to main­tain that part of the rea­son why Dr Drew had chal­lenges is be­cause she did not at­tend the meet­ing. If she did, those chal­lenges would not have arisen.”

Mean­while, po­lit­i­cal sci­en­tist Dr In­di­ra Ram­per­sad said the out­come demon­strat­ed the val­ue of diplo­ma­cy and re­gion­al co­op­er­a­tion. She said Per­sad-Bisses­sar could have pur­sued the mat­ter di­rect­ly be­fore the CCJ be­cause T&T re­mains sub­ject to the court’s orig­i­nal ju­ris­dic­tion, de­spite not ac­ced­ing to its ap­pel­late ju­ris­dic­tion. How­ev­er, she said the Prime Min­is­ter chose to work through Cari­com.

“She opt­ed to go the mul­ti­lat­er­al route through Cari­com and that is laud­able be­cause, you know, it speaks to col­lec­tive good and it speaks to re­gion­al in­te­gra­tion. So, I think what­ev­er the out­come is from the CCJ, I think that this de­ci­sion of Cari­com led by the ho­n­ourable Philip Pierre is a mag­nan­i­mous one.”

Ram­per­sad said the de­ci­sion al­so ben­e­fits T&T be­cause tax­pay­ers fund the coun­try’s con­tri­bu­tions to Cari­com. She added that, re­gard­less of the CCJ’s even­tu­al opin­ion, re­solv­ing the dis­pute through the court is a pos­i­tive out­come for the coun­try.

What is the CCJ and why is Cari­com turn­ing to it?

The Caribbean Court of Jus­tice (CCJ) is the Caribbean's re­gion­al court, es­tab­lished in 2001 to serve two main roles. It is the high­est court of ap­peal for coun­tries that have adopt­ed its ap­pel­late ju­ris­dic­tion, and it in­ter­prets and ap­plies the Re­vised Treaty of Ch­aguara­mas, the le­gal foun­da­tion of Cari­com.

It was of­fi­cial­ly in­au­gu­rat­ed on April 16, 2005, in Port of Spain.

The court was cre­at­ed to strength­en Caribbean in­te­gra­tion by pro­vid­ing an in­de­pen­dent re­gion­al ju­di­cial body. It per­forms two dis­tinct func­tions: in­ter­pret­ing Com­mu­ni­ty law (Cari­com) and, for some coun­tries, serv­ing as the high­est court of ap­peal.

The court's orig­i­nal ju­ris­dic­tion

In its orig­i­nal ju­ris­dic­tion, the CCJ in­ter­prets and ap­plies the Re­vised Treaty of Ch­aguara­mas, which gov­erns the Caribbean Com­mu­ni­ty and the Cari­com Sin­gle Mar­ket and Econ­o­my (CSME).

The court hears dis­putes be­tween mem­ber states and Com­mu­ni­ty in­sti­tu­tions, as well as cer­tain cas­es in­volv­ing busi­ness­es and in­di­vid­u­als. It can al­so is­sue ad­vi­so­ry opin­ions when re­quest­ed by mem­ber states or the Com­mu­ni­ty un­der Ar­ti­cle 212 of the treaty.

It is this ju­ris­dic­tion that Cari­com will in­voke to de­ter­mine whether the process used to reap­point the Sec­re­tary Gen­er­al com­plied with the treaty.

All 15 Cari­com mem­ber states par­tic­i­pate in the court's Orig­i­nal Ju­ris­dic­tion. The CCJ al­so serves as the fi­nal court of ap­peal for coun­tries that have cho­sen to re­place the Unit­ed King­dom's Ju­di­cial Com­mit­tee of the Privy Coun­cil.

On­ly five coun­tries have adopt­ed the court's Ap­pel­late Ju­ris­dic­tion, name­ly Bar­ba­dos, Be­lize, Do­mini­ca, Guyana and St Lu­cia.

The re­main­ing Cari­com mem­ber states, in­clud­ing Trinidad and To­ba­go and Ja­maica, con­tin­ue to send their fi­nal ap­peals to the Privy Coun­cil in Lon­don.

Un­like a law­suit, an ad­vi­so­ry opin­ion does not de­ter­mine guilt or li­a­bil­i­ty. In­stead, it pro­vides an au­thor­i­ta­tive in­ter­pre­ta­tion of Com­mu­ni­ty law.