THE Government’s High Court case filed against the Speaker of the National Assembly challenging the cuts to the 2012 National Budget has been adjourned once again. The adjournment is to allow for the hearing of the appeal filed against Defendant David Granger, Leader of the Opposition.

Chief Justice (Ag.) Ian Chang yesterday announced his intention to allow the appeal to be concluded before he continues with the current case. The appeal was filed after the June 19 ruling by the CJ which stated that since Members of Parliament have immunity and cannot be sued, Minister of Finance, Dr. Ashni Singh and Leader of the Opposition, David Granger are therefore excluded from being a part of the case.
Attorney General, Anil Nandlall, representing Government, feels that the appeal is a strange legal precedent since he has never heard of an appeal being filed against a court order removing a defendant from a case.
However, he expressed no doubt that the appeal would be heard and determined quickly, “and we can have a conclusion of this budget cuts case.”
The AG pointed to the importance of the case and the many agencies which are dependent on the determination of the case for their funding out of the 2013 budget. “From the beginning, I have been working to get an early conclusion of the matter, but all my efforts are being frustrated by all kinds of legal manoeuvring that I believe are deliberate and designed to dilate and delay these proceedings,” Nandlall said.
The High Court case began on June 7, 2012 with Government’s application to the Supreme Court for an Interim Order to allow the Minister of Finance to access the money cut from the National Budget.
On July 18, 2012 in a Preliminary ruling, the Chief Justice stated that the National Assembly has no power under the constitution to reduce the National Estimates when they are presented for approval.
The ruling stated that in relation to the National Estimates, the National Assembly “performs a gate-keeping function, a power of disapproval is not contemplated by the Constitution.”
The Attorney General explained that the basis of the court case has to do with whether the National Assembly, either in the Committee of Supply or in the outer assembly, has the power to reduce the estimates presented by the Finance Minister.
“In the 2012 budget case, two motions were made, one by Carl Greenidge, one by Khemraj Ramjattan, in the Committee of Supply, to effect certain reductions to the estimates presented by Minister Singh and they were both passed. As a result, more than $20B were taken out of the 2012 budget and we went to court for that. The preliminary ruling was rendered,” the AG said.
At that stage, he explained, no one disputed the facts, because there were no facts to be disputed. “It’s a pure question of law, no one can dispute that the budget was cut, no one can dispute that Mr. Ramjattan and Mr. Greenidge cut the budget. These are matters of public notoriety and recorded in the Hansard (Parliamentary records) and televised live; and understandably no one is willing to dispute those facts,” he stated.
The 2012 budget was slashed by $20.9B. As a result, there were no financial allocations made for several Government agencies, and the jobs of state employees were put on the line. The agencies and projects that were affected include the Government Information Agency; National Communications Network; Ethnic Relations Commission; State Planning Secretariat, Low Carbon Development Strategy; Guyana Elections Commission; Office of the President; Office of the Prime Minister; ICT development – One Laptop Per Family; Customs Anti Narcotic Unit and the Guyana Power and Light.
The 2013 Budget was also slashed by the Opposition, reducing it by $31B. Among the projects that they have cut are multi-year projects such as the Amaila Falls Hydro, Cheddi Jagan International Airport Expansion and the Specialty Hospital, and state media entities GINA and NCN.