— for some lawyers retained by former AG Chambers in elections fiasco
By Richard Bhainie
THERE has been a recent discovery by the Attorney-General (AG) Chambers that there is no paper trail, including contracts or invoices, to account for some of the external counsel who appeared on behalf of the former AG Chambers in the series of legal actions that followed the March 2, 2020 Elections. This was disclosed by Attorney-General and Minister of Legal Affairs, Anil Nandlall, S.C., during an interview with the Guyana Chronicle. Nandlall explained that attempts were made to locate the paper trails in light of the recent disclosure of the $99.6M spent by the former AG Chambers in 2019, to retain outside counsel despite being adequately staffed. “Every effort expended to locate a paper trail of any kind including, of course, invoices in relation to most of the lawyers who were retained in the year 2020 has proven futile,” Nandlall said. Nandlall explained that in 2020, a number of lawyers were hired by the former AG Chambers in politically motivated cases subsequent to the March Elections.
He highlighted that some of the cases were Reeaz Holladar v Returning Officer for Region Four, Clairmont Mingo et al; Ulita Moore v Bharrat Jagdeo et al; Misenga Jones v The Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) et al and Eslyn David v Chief Elections Officer et al, all of which the former Attorney-General was privy to. “The lawyers, most of them were from Trinidad and all over the Caribbean. I don’t think they did work for free, but there is no paper trail for how these lawyers were hired and paid,” Nandlall said.
In one of the cases, Mohamed Irfaan Ali and Bharrat Jagdeo v Eslyn David et al, in the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) on appeal from the Court of Appeal of Guyana, the former Attorney-General, who was the fifth named respondent, appeared with Caribbean-based lawyer, Justin Simon Q.C. Meanwhile, in another case, a Notice of Intention to the Court of Appeal filed by the former Attorney-General challenging the High Court’s decision in the Misenga Jones case was through his lawyer, Maxwell Edwards. “One is left to speculate how these lawyers were retained and how they were paid,” Nandlall stressed.
