– PM Nagamootoo says

“GUYANA’s sovereignty is on trial” was how Prime Minister Moses Nagamootoo commented on the hearings before the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) of an appeal from a decision of the Guyana Court of Appeal.

In his weekend column, My Turn, the Prime Minister described, as spurious, the petition by the political opposition for leave to file an appeal against the interpretation by the Court of Appeal of the Guyana Constitution, to the effect that votes cast in an election of a president means “valid votes”, and nothing else.

He said that it was strongly contended that the CCJ cannot oust the power of the Guyana Court of Appeal to make a final decision on a limited or narrow set of issues.

Nagamootoo who is a veteran politician, journalist and attorney said that the Guyanese people are not without a righteous cause, and any outcome that disregards the country’s sovereignty “could severely impact our Caribbean family of nations”.

He noted that during the preliminary hearing as to whether the CCJ has jurisdiction to hear the appeal, authoritative statements were made advising that the Caribbean court should take a hands-off position.

Mr. Justice Winston Anderson, a member of the CCJ’s panel of judges, but who is not on the Bench in the current matter, was quoted as saying: “If issues cannot be appealed to the CCJ, the CCJ cannot consider them, and if the CCJ cannot consider them, then they cannot be included in the building blocks of the court’s jurisdiction. It is that simple…But there is very little, if anything, that the CCJ can do to change this situation…”

It was contended that the jurisdiction of the Caribbean Court of Justice emerged from a treaty establishing the Caribbean Court of Justice with Senior Counsel Mr. Reginald Armour submitting that “treaties are entered into as a matter of the sovereignty of nations”.
Now, it seems, that Guyana’s sovereignty is on trial, the My Turn article concluded.
The Prime Minister accused the PPP of trying to weaponize the court in its “desperate all-or-nothing war”. He alluded to negative headlines amounting to terrorist threats against top elections officials of sanctions and imprisonment which, he said, is “a cowardly attempt to break their will and to compromise them”.