THE MINISTRY of Education notes that Nigel Hughes in his attempt to distance himself from the controversy in relation to the Guyana Health Care Education Institute, attempts to mislead the Guyanese public by withholding relevant information.

The Ministry of Education having been deliberately drawn into the fray by political activists of the Opposition feels compelled to respond so as to fully inform the people of Guyana about this issue.

Firstly, the ministry wishes to commend Nigel Hughes for admitting that he advises and represents Nanda Kissoon and Guyana Health Care Education Institute-a body that many young people alleged have robbed them.

The Guyana Health Care Education Institute also known as the School of Nursing and the American Health Institute applied to the National Accreditation Council for registration. The ministry is advised that the NAC denied the application on the grounds that the Guyana Health Care Education Institute had failed abysmally to meet the required standards for registration.

In an effort to force the Council to register the Guyana Health Care Education Institute, proceedings were filed in the high court by Nanda Kissoon and Guyana Health Care Education Institute claiming that the Council had not reached and its decision not to register the Guyana Health Care Education Institute was not according to fair hearing principles. Whether the Council was right or had grounds to have denied registration was never an issue that the court would have considered. What was under examination was the process by which that decision was taken. In other words, it was a procedural incorrectness and not the substantive decision that was being complained about.

The ministry is advised that it is true that the Council consented to the order being sought by Nanda Kissoon and the Guyana Health Care Education Institute.
The Ministry is disappointed in Nigel Hughes for failing to tell the Guyanese nation what the consent order means.

The ministry is advised that consenting to the order sought by Nanda Kissoon and Guyana Health Care Education Institute only means that the decision by the National Accreditation Council not to register the Guyana Health Care Education Institute is quashed.
It does not mean that all of a sudden and automatically, simply because Nigel Hughes and his controversial client wish it were so, that Guyana Health Care Education Institute has now met the required standards to which our young people are entitled and which are internationally set and demanded by the Council.

Once the order by the Council was quashed whether by consent or otherwise, it is the status quo ante that would kick in. This means that the status enjoyed by the Guyana Health Care Education Institute just before the Council made the decision not to register that body is what would kick in. At the time the Council denied registration the Guyana Health Care Education Institute was not registered. Therefore, the Guyana Health Care Education Institute is still not registered.

The ministry is advised that a prudent lawyer would have prayed for and obtained an order compelling the registration of the Guyana Health Care Education Institute. The ministry is advised that such an order was never prayed for and therefore never granted and so the contempt proceedings compelling the members of the National Accreditation Council to register the Guyana Health Care Education Institute or be jailed, is perverse and bound to fail.

In light of the above, what exactly is the relevance of all the legal jargon and fluff written by Nigel Hughes in his press release if not to mislead the nation? He speaks of a consent order but that order does nothing to change what the ministry said the day before in its press release.

Additionally and significantly, Nigel Hughes recognises his constitutional right to practise in whatever matters he desires but characteristically, he fails to recognise the rights of other lawyers to so practise. In fact, in the same missive that he seeks protection of the constitution, he clumsily attempts to chauvinistically drag the name of the young, female lawyer who represents the Council, a statutory body, into disrepute by vulgarly pointing to other matters where she appears. This behaviour is typical of the Alliance For Change (AFC) and its leaders.

The crux of the matter is that the same poor Guyanese students are alleging that they are being robbed by the Guyana Health Care Education Institute. Nigel Hughes has admitted that he advises that body and its owners. He has not apologised to the students or to the nation. He is in fact seeking to jail people who are trying to prevent those students from falling prey to what the students have alleged is a fraud. These are the facts. Nothing he has said in his press release says otherwise.

Contrary to the role of other players in this sad story, the National Accreditation Council and the Ministry of Education are inspired by a duty to ensure that those who seek to offer educational training to our people are duly qualified and competent to do so. From this responsibility, we shall not shirk! (Ministry of Education release)