VIEWS expressed by Moses Nagamootoo, newspaperman now lawyer, member of the Alliance For Change, Presidential hopeful, formed the basis and the headline “AFC warns of move to govern without Parliament” (Stabroek News, Nov 7, 2014).

Nagamootoo expects that the President, rather than have his Government face the AFC’s “no-confidence motion” in the National Assembly, will, by proclamation, prorogue the Parliament. The remit of this, claims Nagamootoo, would be “an extra-Parliamentary dictatorship”. Continuing to elaborate, Nagamootoo is reported as saying that were the President to prorogue the Parliament, that would amount to “an underhand method” of dealing with the “no-confidence motion.” Nagamootoo reportedly observed that for the President to prorogue the Parliament is for him “to meander, to duck, to hide and to avoid the motion.”
So I was troubled that the Head of State would, as Nagamootoo observed, be involved in underhand action to prorogue the Parliament. I asked a UG law student, who told me that Nagamootoo needs a refresher course in Constitutional law. I was told by this law student that our Constitution clearly provides that our President may, at any time, prorogue Parliament. I researched my newspaper clippings and I’ve noted that Nagamootoo, in the past, has said that our Constitution is the supreme law of our country. I would like therefore to be corrected if I’m wrong, but if by law the President may, at any time, prorogue Parliament and as Nagamootoo has observed, that if the President opts to prorogue the Parliament the result would be an “extra-Parliamentary dictatorship,” then it must mean that such a situation is constitutionally permissible and that this flowing naturally from Nagamootoo’s reasoning is what the framers of the Constitution intended. This is the effect of Nagamootoo’s utterances. The law student told me that if the President issues a proclamation to prorogue Parliament, the President would be constitutionally entitled to so do, and his proclamation would be perfectly lawful.
By doing so, is the President avoiding the AFC no-confidence motion? The President himself gave the answer. His Excellency said if the combined Opposition is going to use their one seat majority in continued opposition to his party’s majority in the National Assembly he will either prorogue or dissolve Parliament. The President laid his cards on the table.
If the President were to prorogue the Parliament, it would be a mark of his politically astuteness. It would occur to a discerning public that the PPP, with a proud history dedicated to working class political struggle, would not be recorded for posterity by defeat on a no- confidence motion. It is just simply a matter of practical politics.
I thought it a little more than exaggerated, but more hypocritical, that the present configuration in the National Assembly, Nagamootoo is reported to have said that if he was the President he would confront the no-confidence motion head on. In other words, Nagamootoo suggested that President Ramotar should put his neck on the block and invite the AFC/APNU executive to chop it off. Nagamootoo doesn’t come over as bright as I thought, but then I notice he carries four naughts (0000) in his name.

Romaine DeAbreau