Labour Party Representative, Dr Earl Asim Martin

Resident judge, Mr Justice Frances Belle, made the decision after Mr Ariel Missick, Senior Counsel for the opposition People's Action Movement (PAM) candidate, Mr Glenroy Blanchette, informed the Court that his client was withdrawing the petition challenging the re-election of the four-term East Basseterre parliamentarian.

Dr Martin's lead counsel, Dominican-born Anthony Astaphan S.C. said following the hearing that at the start of the proceedings he filed an amended notice or motion to have significant parts of the petition and affidavits struck out against Dr Martin based on prior concessions by Blanchette's counsel.

"To our considerable surprise they sought to resile from the withdrawal and to proceed on a fundamentally different and new basis. Naturally we objected to it and learned Queen Counsel, Mr Maurice King argued on behalf of the Attorney General and the second and third respondents; and I responded on behalf of Dr Asim Martin," said Mr Astaphan.

Justice Belle was in agreement with the respondents that to permit Mr Blanchette to withdraw from the earlier concessions and permit them to proceed on the new basis would have "constituted an abuse of the process of the Court."

After a 20-minute adjournment at the request of the lawyers for the People's Action Movement, Justice Belle was informed that Mr Blanchette was withdrawing the petition against Dr Martin.

Justice Belle in dismissing the election petition awarded costs to be assessed to Dr Martin; the Attorney General, Delano Bart; Supervisor of Elections, Pastor Leroy Benjamin; and the Returning Officer, Mr Arthurlyn Belle (no relation to Justice Frances Belle).

"The significance of that is there is a general rule of practice in the OECS that you don't award costs in public interest litigation, unless the Judge is satisfied that the claim was spurious, frivolous, vexatious or an abuse of the process of the Court," said Astaphan.

He added: "The ruling of the Judge tells us that certainly in relation to the case of Dr Martin, he felt that it was spurious, vexatious, and frivolous and an abuse of the process, which were our thinking and our position from day one. As we saw it, this was a political matter devoid of any legal or forensic merit, either on the facts or on the law," said Astaphan.

Mr. Glenroy Blanchette East Basseterre Constituency #1 P.A.M. Candidate

Senior Counsel Astaphan noted that during the trial in the Cedric Liburd matter, when the Court was asked to order the ballot papers to be inspected by the Judge following testimony by a PAM witness, there were marks at the back of the ballots, "we were shocked, horrified and surprised when they objected to the disclosure of the ballot paper which is astonishing, considering that they have been saying all along that the ballot paper was too thin and there were marks on the back of the ballots."

"In the minds of the public who hears that, there must be serious questions as to the integrity of the case being presented. When that occurred, we decided that we were not going to take any further chances and we applied to have further parts of the petition in the Asim Martin matter struck out because of concessions made at the application to strike before Mr Justice (Davidson) Baptiste. By that I mean that they (PAM) having conceded that the margin of victory was so big between (Labour's) Asim Marti and

(PAM's) Glenroy Blanchette that they would not question any issue relating to registration of voters," said Astaphan.

"They having realised what had happened with the two previous cases, they decided to renege on the earlier representations made to Justice Baptiste. I took a very strong position on that and so did Mr Maurice, Queen's Counsel from Barbados and the rest of the legal teams, the judge ruled that any attempt by the People's Action Movement and their lawyers to resile, to retract, to withdraw the earlier concessions made would be an abuse of the process of the Court," said Astaphan, who opined that the election petition brought by Mr Blanchette was entirely without merit and nothing more but a political red-herring calculated to embarrass Prime Minister Dr Denzil Douglas and his St Kitts-Nevis Labour Party's victory in the 2004 General Election.

On the election petitions brought by the two other PAM candidates, Astaphan said: "We now have to wait and see what's going to happen. We remain confident and sooner or later we would get the judgement from the learned trial judge so that the Government can move forward with governing this country and not be distracted by these political games."

On the steps of the Lee Llewellyn Moore Judicial and Legal Services Complex, Dr Martin thanked his legal team headed by Senior Counsel Astaphan and which included Anthony Johnson and Patricia Dublin-Lewis.

"I also thank the general public and my constituents for their support throughout this period. This is a clear indication that the Court has agreed with the result of the election in my constituency as well as the integrity of the conduct of the poll," said Dr Martin.

Although he had instructed his legal team to withdraw the petition, the defeated PAM candidate, Glenroy Blanchette

said: "What these trials have done is undermined my confidence in the CCJ."

The PAM candidates are represented by Ariel Misick, Q.C. of the Turks and Caicos Islands; Constance Mitcham, Marguerite Foreman and Fitzroy Eddy of St Kitts and Nevis.