In the latest in a string of legal battles with the Dental Council of Guyana, Embattled Colombian dentist Ruben Dario Mercado Navas is in court again challenging the refusal to register him as a dentist for the year 2009.
He has filed a motion in the High Court citing oppression and maliciousness, among other things as the reasons behind the Council’s refusal. Justice Roxanne George-Wiltshire has since granted temporary orders calling on the Dental Council to show cause why its decision not to grant Navas permission to work here should not be quashed.
The judge is also calling on the council to show cause why it should not be compelled to register Navas for the 2009 work year and also for it to show cause why it should not be restrained from taking any steps or measures or any action whatsoever towards preventing Navas from practicing dentistry or from trading as a dental practitioner.
In court papers filed through his attorneys, Anil Nandlall and Euclin Gomes, the Colombian dentist said that he has been fighting to stay and work in Guyana since 2005 when his registration to practice dentistry in Guyana was revoked by the council and according to him all his troubles began after he quit working for Dr Cheddi Jagan Jnr.
Navas, in an affidavit, said that all of his applications, that is, in 2006, 2007 and 2008, to the Dental Council of Guyana for registration have been unlawfully and unreasonably refused since the day he was arbitrarily terminated from working as a dentist at the Grove Health Centre.
But he noted that he has successfully challenged the Dental Council’s decision by legal proceedings, quashing their decisions on each occasion. “In order to be registered as a dental practitioner with the Dental Council of Guyana under the Dental Registration Act for the years 2006, 2007, and 2008, I was required to engage the attention of the court on each occasion and obtain court orders compelling the Dental Council of Guyana to register me as a dental practitioner,” Navas stated. Since June 28, 2006, Navas said he has been employed with Cobeer Persaud of Kitsingh Dental Lab located at 14 Public Road, Peter’s Hall, East Bank Demerara practicing general dentistry on a ten-year contract.
Last month, Navas said that he made an application to be registered as a dentist for the year 2009 under the Dental Registration Act 1996, but it was refused.
Chairman of the Dental Council Ovid Isaacs wrote to Navas informing him of the refusal saying that any future registration with the council depends on him furnishing the original certificate of registration for the year 2007 together with the official receipt for $2,000 that is given to every dentist who registers with the council. Also, Isaacs said that Navas is aware that he was never registered with the council in 2007 that he and obtained such registration by fraudulent means.
Further, he said that Navas was registered in 2008 by order of the courts of Guyana but that he is yet to pay the fee of $2,000 for 2008. He advised Navas to take the letter from the council as an order to cease working as a dentist immediately until this matter is resolved. But Navas said that he obtained orders from the High Court compelling the council to register him for the years 2006, 2007 and 2008; and therefore denies categorically the allegations of fraud in the letter.
Navas said that he is advised by his attorney and do verily believe that the refusal of the council to register him as a dentist and its order directed to him “to cease working as a dentist immediately…” unfairly disappoints his legitimate expectation, is biased, made in bad faith and based on irrelevant and improper considerations and is unreasonable, arbitrary, capricious, mala fide, malicious, vindictive, oppressive and is contrary to the principles of natural justice, unlawful, ultra vires, null, void and of no legal effect.
“I verily believe that the respondent, a statutory tribunal, is being used, misused and manipulated as an instrument of oppression and vendetta against me by persons who are pursuing their personal agenda,” the dentist added.
In September 2008, Navas was forced to approach the court seeking several orders against the Chief Immigration Officer and/or Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Home Affairs, and/or the Head, Immigration Support Services in which he challenged their refusal to grant him the necessary extension of Stay/ Work Permit/ Multiple Entry Visa and for them to show cause why these facilities should not be granted to him.
Subsequently, Justice William Ramlal made a “Consent Order”, inter alia, directing and compelling the respondents named in the motion grant Navas any of the immigration relief he was seeking. Navas said he was duly issued with an Extension of Stay/ Work Permit/ Multiple Entry Visa which will be renewed annually for the next three years.
