New Registrar of Deeds Azeema Baksh-Singh was appointed although she did not have the qualifications sought by the Judicial Service Commission (JSC), in vacancy notices published in November of 2010.
The advertisement placed in the daily newspapers seeking applicants for the job stipulated that to qualify for the position, the applicant should be an attorney-at-law with a minimum of five years’ professional experience or alternatively have ten years’ experience as an officer attached to the Deeds Registry as a Sworn Clerk and Notary Public. But Baksh-Singh was only admitted to the local bar in October of 2007 and does not have five years professional experience as an attorney-at-law.
Asked to comment on the situation, Attorney General Anil Nandlall, who through the Government Information Agency (GINA) announced the appointment of the new registrar, directed all queries to the JSC. “Appointment of the registrar of deeds and the deputy is made by the Judicial Service Commission under Article 199 of the Constitution. And all queries and questions of the appointment should be directed to the Judicial Service Commission,” he told Stabroek News.
The ad was signed by Secretary of the JSC, Mrs Jagnandan, who is also the secretary to acting Chancellor Carl Singh, a member of the JSC. She, however, said today that she is only the secretary of the commission and could not comment on the appointment. She also informed that Chancellor Singh had left his office for the day and could only be reached tomorrow.
Baksh-Singh has become the first substantive female registrar of deeds. When contacted by this newspaper, she confirmed that she would have completed five years as a lawyer in October, but she would not comment on that aspect of her appointment. “I would not comment on the Judicial Service Commission’s decision as to why they appointed me and in respect to your technicality [her qualification] that you brought to fore, I cannot comment on it,” Baksh-Singh said.
Her appointment has been under discussion in legal circles, since it was revealed that the two senior persons at the registry were appointed acting registrar and deputy acting registrar by the Public Service Commission (PSC) and their contracts for the acting appointments were not up until next month. The appointment of Baksh-Singh has effectively revoked their respective appointments. It was also noted that both of these persons have more than ten years at the registry and that one of them, who is also a lawyer, had applied for the job back in 2010 but her application did not find favour with the JSC, although she was interviewed for the job in June, around the same time as Baksh-Singh.
Questions have also been raised as to whether the JSC was fully constituted when it made the appointment of Baksh-Singh, since the appointment of two commissioners, former Justices Prem Persaud and Brynmor Pollard SC had expired and no new appointments have since been made. It was also pointed out that Ganga Persaud, another member of the JSC, is now Minister of Local Government and no longer sits on the commission.
Stabroek News was told that Chancellor Singh, acting Chief Justice Ian Chang and Carvil Duncan, by virtue of his being Chairman of the PSC, were the JSC members who interviewed Baksh-Singh and later hired her. Legal sources have argued that the three did not constitute a quorum.
‘Reforms’
Meanwhile, Baksh-Singh has emphasised that she is on a mission to reform the Deeds Registry and lift its image.
She could not recall when she saw the advertisement for the post and she noted that upon completion of her Master’s Degree, it was not her intention to apply for the position. However, she realised that there was a gap within agencies at the Supreme Court, which was among the reasons that prompted her to apply for the job. At the time she applied for the post she would have been a lawyer for only three years – less than the five-year requirement at that point.
Her Master’s Degree was in Democratic Governance and the Rule of Law, which she pursued in light of her interest in development law. “I applied for the Master’s because we are a developing country, we have serious issues in all our agencies, whether it is public or private… and I felt it was what I wanted to do as a development lawyer,” Baksh-Singh said, adding that during her studies she focused on administrative reform and competitiveness and corruption. “Researching where we have our most problems of inefficiencies and issues of corruption, the Deeds Registry comes up and I decided why not go for it, because we are to choose an area within our country that has to be reformed and I chose Deeds Registry…,” she told Stabroek News.
In her application to the JSC, Baksh-Singh said she stated that she had studied the Deeds Registry and that she had ideas to reform it and questions about how she planned to do so were put to her by the members who interviewed her for the job.
“It is my personal hope that we can actually lift the image of this registry,” Baksh-Singh said, while adding that during her tenure in the Governance Unit at Office of the President, she had seen many persons who had issues with the registry and in her effort to assist those persons she had developed a good working relationship with the senior staff members of the registry, who were very helpful. “So I was au fait with what was going on in here before I came here, though I was not a practising lawyer as some people would have anticipated,” she said. “I would really ask that members of the public and the media give me as the registrar and give the Deeds Registry some amount of time before they begin to throw their criticisms at what we plan to do,” she added.
Baksh-Singh said she is thankful for the reception she received from all staff members and she is optimistic that they all—including the staff member who had applied for the position of registrar—would give her an opportunity to implement some of the changes and also be willing to work along with her.
“I have been very frank to them [the staff]; that ‘I have come here with the theory… you have come with the experience. I would love if we could put the two together to move this place forward,’” she said.
She added that the staff members also want to see the image of the registry improved.
The new registrar pointed out that any new lawyer regardless of where they start out has to rely on the experience in the field to assist them and in this regard she plans to tap the expertise of her senior colleagues, some of whom have already indicated a willingness to assist her.
Stabroek News has been told that since the time of now retired High Court Judge John W. Ramao and attorney-at-law Neville Alfred Bhulai, who held the post of registrar in the 1970s and 80s, respectively, no lawyer who held that position until Baksh-Singh. The last substantive registrar was Leon Stewart and after him Carolyn Paul acted in that position. More recently, Paula Ann Ferdinand was appointed in the acting position in March of this year.
