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Posted: Sunday 15 February, 2015 at 11:02 PM

HURRY DARG DOES EAT RAW CORN!

James McCall
By: James McCall, Commentary

    The recent drama that ultimately played out in the halls of the Privy Council for all the world to see, has been welcomed and dismissed on the local scene, depending on which side one supports.

     

    Here’s the background.  

     

    1. On the afternoon of January 16th, 2015, at around 4:00 p.m., almost immediately following the conclusion of what has come to be known as the final meeting of the Constituency Boundaries Commission, Parliament convened in what was described as an “…emergency…” session for the purpose of tabling the report that emanated from that meeting of the CBC.  

     

    2. For a while, the only parliamentarians present were those from the government side because Opposition members were given little or no prior notice.  In fact, Hon. Vance Amory and Hon. Vincent Byron, Jr., members of the CBC, were at that final meeting but had no idea whatsoever that the report on which they were working, was about to be tabled in parliament.  At the same time, however, their counterparts on the CBC, Hon. Marcella Liburd and Hon. Earl Asim Martin, being ministers of government, knew, and were able to make themselves available for the parliamentary session.

     

    3. Eventually the Opposition members, with the exception of the Leader of the Opposition, Hon. Mark Brantley, who was out of the Federation on official business, made it to the meeting.  However, the Honourable Speaker was in no mood to listen to what they had to say.  He was challenged in terms of the rules relating to the giving of notice to members, but counter-challenged the Hon. Eugene Hamilton as to what rule was being referred to.  When Hamilton left the chamber and returned with his copy of the rule book, he was named and evicted.

     

    4. Hon. Vance Amory bemoaned the idea that no debate was being allowed so, at that juncture, the Speaker allowed Hon. Sam Condor to make some points.  However, throughout that presentation the Speaker kept interrupting him on account of what he deemed to have been repetition and, eventually, shut him down.  Once Condor was shut down, someone on the government’s side moved for the session to end and, with the majority of “Ayes” coming from the government’s side, the session adjourned sine die.

     

    Soon after that session concluded, the Prime Minister stood on the steps of Government Headquarters and proclaimed that he had asked the Governor General, His Excellency Sir. Edmund Lawrence, to dissolve Parliament and, and that the date for general elections would have been announced at a later date.  

     

    Let’s go back a bit further.  In December, lawyers for the Opposition served notice upon electoral officials, advising them that they intended to challenge any boundary changes and requested five days in which to peruse any document relating to such changes and to mount challenges in the courts.

     

    The government, however, was not willing to have any effort of theirs challenged and endeavoured to have everything done in one day, in one fell swoop. In other words, the reading of the Report, the forwarding of the Draft Proclamation to the Governor General for his signature, and the publication thereof in the Official Gazette were all claimed to have happened in one afternoon.  So, satisfied that the cat was in the bag, the Prime Minister moved hastily to announce the dissolution of Parliament, even before he left Government Headquarters that same afternoon, or evening, as the case may be.

     

    The government was very confident that all was set to for the newly-configured boundaries to be the basis of the upcoming elections, steeped in the constitutional provision which says that once the Governor General signs a proclamation, unless it gives effect to Rule 1, it shall not be enquired into by any court.  However, the overarching and countervailing legal principle is, if someone is perceived to have been wronged, there must be an avenue for redress.  

     

    For the record, Rule 1 says that if the number of seats is being increased beyond the current 11, Nevis must be assigned one third of the total.

     

    At the same time when all the drama was happening in Parliament, the Opposition’s attorneys were in court seeking an injunction, and were successful in that endeavor.  When the case was heard on January 27th, 2015, the injunction was discharged.  It was at that time that the Prime Minister moved, again with haste, to announce that Nomination Day was Friday February 6th, and that elections would be on Monday February 16th, 2015, having no regard for the fact that the Opposition would take the matter further.

     

    The Opposition appealed and the OECS Court of Appeals, having temporarily reinstated the injunction, set the case for hearing on February 9th, 2015 but, at the request of the government, brought it forward to the 4th, in order not to have it happen after Nomination Day.  As planned, the case was heard in St. Lucia and the Court of Appeals discharged the injunction on the 5th.  It has been reported that both sides agreed upon certain things.  They agreed that (i) whoever lost would have appealed to the Privy Council in London; (ii) notwithstanding the decision of the Privy Council, nominations, which would have happed within two days of the sitting of the Court of Appeals, would not be affected; (iii) two lists, one based on the old boundaries and the other on the new, would be produced and, (iv) the list that would be used for the election would be the one that the Privy Council decides.

     

    The Privy Council had originally agreed to hear the case on Monday 9th February, 2015 but did one better by postponing it to Wednesday the 11th, when they would have been able to devote more time.  A number of situations were looked into and, surprisingly, the names certain names of persons who, to my mind, ought not to have had anything to do with the process, were mentioned.   At some stage, the question as to whether or not the Governor General could be held in contempt of court, was raised.  

     

    In the final analysis, in a decision given on the February 12th, 2015, they reinstated the injunction and ordered that the elections proceed on the basis of the old boundaries.

     

    Something had to have been wrong with the process by which the change was engineered on January 16th, 2015.  Some members of the government wrote of, and spoke about, it as one in which the Opposition’s propensity to frustrate the efforts of the government through court action, was thwarted, and that they caught the Opposition “…with their pants down…”

     

    An effort to change the boundaries was made back in 2009, and again in 2014.  In either case the timing was suspect.  Government would have won an election in 2004 and had the span of five years between that victory and the attempt in 2009 to make any changes and allow time for challenges, but chose not to.  It happened again.  Having failed in its attempt in 2009, it proceeded to win the 2010 election and had all that time between January of 2010 and October of 2014, but chose, again, to wait until an election was due to make the attempt.  This last time, however, determined to get it done without the interference of the Opposition, it engaged in the shenanigans of January 16th, 2015, a day that critics regard as Black Friday.  As one judge opined in an unrelated matter, of all the available, proper ways of getting something done, government chose the wrong one. 

     

    Let us examine the boundaries with which government seems to have such enormous difficulty.  They came into being in 1983, under the PAM/NRP administration, which took office in 1980.  The next election happened in 1984.  In 1989, Labour who had two seats, saw the retirement of Sir. Joseph N. France from Constituency No. 3.  They are said to have engineered the retirement of Mr. Charles E. Mills from Constituency No 6.  They were replaced by Sam Condor and Dr. Denzil Douglas, respectively, each of whom was successful in his bid.  In 1993, Labour increased its tally to four by taking Nos. 1 and 7 from PAM.  That was the year of the inconclusive election, and riot.

     

    By 1995, Labour was able to take the reins of government by winning seven of the eight seats on St. Kitts, leaving only No. 5 to PAM.  Following a bruising Commission of Inquiry that was empaneled in 1997, Labour took “All 8” seats on St. Kitts when H. E. Jacinth Henry Martin took No. 5 from Hugh Heyliger.  So, their trajectory was on the up.  However, in 2004, PAM retook No. 5 and, in 2010, added No. 8 to its tally.   After the 2010 poll, an unsuccessful challenge was mounted against the results in No. 4 because PAM was convinced that the registration of non-and-never-resident voters in that constituency contributed largely to the fact that its candidate, Lindsay Grant, lost by a mere 29 votes.  

     

    Keep in mind that every election since 1984 has been conducted under the boundaries established in 1983.  As a matter of fact, the Prime Minister is on the record claiming to love and own those same boundaries, having used them to defeat PAM again and again.

     

    So, what is so wrong now?  Why does he suddenly find that they are “…illegal…”?  And even if he wishes to have them changed, what is wrong with making the attempt in an open and transparent manner, and subject it to challenges from the Opposition?  Why does he find it so necessary to engage in clandestine efforts?  Is it that he has seen that trajectory has begun to point downwards?

     

    For the record, Section 50 of the constitution charges the Constituency Boundaries Commission with the responsibility of reviewing the boundaries and constituencies, “… at intervals of not less than two nor more than five years…”.  As such, the idea of wanting the change the boundaries is not, in and of itself, illegal.  The question is timing and, in particular, by a government that has done all it could to avoid and ignore a motion of no confidence which, had it been heard two years ago, would have resulted in an election, on the basis of the old boundaries.

     

    Whatever the outcome of the elections on Monday February 16th, one hopes that the next effort at changing the boundaries would occur under different circumstances because, as the old Kittitian adage says, “HURRY DARG DOES EAT RAW CORN!”

     

     

     


     

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