The parliamentary opposition yesterday signalled plans to proceed with cuts to the budget estimates if necessary despite a ruling yesterday that previous reductions were unconstitutional.
Acting Chief Justice Ian Chang yesterday declared that the National Assembly acted “unlawfully and unconstitutionally” by effecting cuts to the 2012 budget estimates. He also held that the Assembly’s power is limited to either giving or withholding approval to the estimates presented by the Finance Minister. (See other story on page 12.)
Both APNU and the AFC said they would challenge the decision.
Attorney General Anil Nandlall, who challenged the cuts in the High Court, told reporters after the decision that the Chief Justice had confirmed what he had said in an interim ruling—that the National Assembly has no power under the law to cut the estimates of expenditure presented by the Minister of Finance. He also stated that even though the Speaker has ruled that the Standing Orders empower the opposition to cut the budget, the Chief Justice has ruled that it is wrong since, “Standing Orders are not law and therefore cannot confer a power which does not exist in law.”
“Hopefully this judgment will guide future treatment of budgets for 2014… those who feel they have a scissors, well the scissors has been declared an unconstitutional instrument when it comes to cutting of the budget,” Nandlall declared.
But main opposition APNU said yesterday that Justice Chang’s decision was erroneous, while indicating that it is the party’s position that cuts can and will be made to the budget if necessary.
The party’s Shadow Minister of Legal Affairs Basil Williams told a press conference that APNU believes that opposition leader David Granger was prematurely struck out as a defendant in the case by Justice Chang.
“Having struck out the Leader of the Opposition as a defendant without giving him a hearing, the Chief Justice has now refused to let the law take its course in the Appellate Courts and has rushed to finish the case before the ruling of the Full Court on the opposition’s leader’s application for leave to appeal its decision” he said.
The Full Court recently ruled that it has no jurisdiction to deal with the decision to strike out Granger as a defendant in the cuts case after Granger had appealed the decision. Justice Chang struck out Granger and Finance Minister Dr Ashni Singh as defendants and dismissed the case against them, saying Nandlall’s cause of action against them was based on words spoken by them before the Assembly or for motions brought by them while the Constitution procedurally debarred the institution of curial proceedings (criminal or civil) against them for words spoken by them before the Assembly or for moving motions therein, among other things. As a result, Speaker Raphael Trotman was the lone defendant in the action.
Williams said he was surprised to learn that a ruling in the case was made without waiting to see what would have been the outcome of Granger’s appeal. He then informed that APNU was prepared to seek redress at the Caribbean Court of Justice if it was not satisfied with the outcome of legal proceedings here as he was adamant that the Chief Justice’s decision was wrong. “The whole thing is flawed,” he charged.
Meanwhile, AFC leader Khemraj Ramjattan yesterday said that he is going to appeal Justice Chang’s decision. “We will appeal it. I am going to file an appeal in a couple of days… Standing Orders are indeed rules that will guide the parliament business, and the Standing Order says we can reduce. But, of course, the Chief [Justice] has said that is not law so we are going to go the Court of Appeal,” he told reporters shortly after the ruling was handed down.
Ramjattan stated that he will be going to the highest court in Guyana to settle the matter since he believes that an error was made by the Chief Justice. “I believe that there has been an error made because the National Assembly, especially the Committee of Supply, has the power of the purse of any nation in any Westminster-type democracy and we can amend budgetary allocations,” he asserted.
“What we were doing there, merely, if we were to take [the ruling] from its logical conclusion, would mean that we are simply being a rubber stamp of the executive branch,” he noted.
However, he said there are checks and balances as it relates to budgetary allocations. “There is where the Chief Justice made an error. We are going to settle it right up to the highest court,” he added.
Ramjattan added that during the consideration of this year’s estimates, his party will effect reductions where it believes there should be reductions. “We will say that the law of Parliament and our Standing Orders are what we are governed by and we will proceed to reduce in the 2014 budget,” he stressed.
In his ruling, Justice Chang noted the argument that a Standing Order of the Assembly had permitted the Assembly to effect cuts to the estimates but pointed out that Standing Orders are not written law.
Speaker Trotman last year ruled that the National Assembly has the power to amend the budgetary allocations.
