By Fareeza Haniff
MINISTER of Legal Affairs and Attorney General (ag), Basil Williams, has contended that once Budget 2016 is passed in the National Assembly, Guyana will be making steps to deliver on its promise of making final payments to Rudisa Beverages.Rudisa Beverages had taken Guyana to court over a “discriminatory” environmental tax, which imposed $10 on every disposable container imported into the country. The company won the case by arguing that a similar tax was not imposed on local distributors, such as Banks DIH and Demerara Distillers Limited.
In his budget presentation on Thursday, the AG noted that the US$6M judgment was left unpaid by the former People’s Progressive Party (PPP) Government.
According to the Attorney General, the Rudisa court case is just one of the many cases which the AG’s Chambers lost under the stewardship of former AG, Anil Nandlall.
“That is only one…because the last Government, if they gave us anything, they gave us some hefty judgments under their watch,” Mr Williams told the House.
He further revealed that the Government now has to find $5B to pay in judgements for other cases which were lost in court by the former AG.
“The sums are so hefty that, as a poor nation, we are unable to pay these fantastic judgments in one walk…. The last Government, I don’t know what kind of Chambers they had as an Attorney General Chambers, Sir; but they have lost some huge cases that attracted some hefty judgments,” he revealed.
PARTNERSHIP
Meanwhile, in laying out plans for the Legal Affairs Ministry, the Attorney General noted that Guyana is collaborating with the Canadian Government to strengthen the Criminal Justice System in Guyana.
In this regard, it was note that the Canadian Government has allocated the sum of $110M, of which $75M will be utilised in 2016. The Justice Education Society of British Columbia (JES) is the executing agency of the grant, and has conducted a number of training programmes with various state agencies.
It was also noted that through the leadership of the Ministry of Legal Affairs, a Hague Convention Conference will be held in Guyana, in partnership with UNICEF Guyana and the Hague Conference on Private and International Law. The conference will be held under the theme “International Family Law, Legal Cooperation and Commerce, Promoting Human Rights and Cross-Border Trade in Guyana through the Hague Convention.”
The sum of $16M has been allocated for the hosting of the conference in July this year.
NEW JUSTICE PROGRAMME
According to the Attorney General, the New Justice Sector Programme, which is designed to consolidate improvements in the justice sector, is a collaborative endeavour between the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and the Government of Guyana.
As such, a total of US182,260 has been allocated for the setting up of a Law Revision Office and undertaking a revision of the laws to update them to 2015.
Some US$504,150 have been budgeted for the setting up of a Permanent Law Reform Commission with a Secretariat, for the purpose of continuously examining the laws and making recommendations on areas of reform.
There will also be the training for judges, magistrates and prosecutors, including writing of decisions, sentencing etc; disposal of backlog of cases by measures, including the appointment of part-time judges to deal with the civil backlog within a specified timeframe, will be undertaken.
According to the AG, there will also be the introduction of VOICE Recognition Systems for recording evidence in the Criminal Sessions in the High Courts of Demerara, Berbice and Essequibo, and magistrates courts hearing serious offences, to enhance and speed up trials and cybercrime legislation. And there will be a regime to train investigators, prosecutors, magistrates and judges to understand the nature of these emergent crimes.
