Attorney General and Minister of Legal Affairs Anil Nandlall says that organisations have already been shortlisted to conduct a review of legal education in the region.
“Time is of the essence, as soon as the Heads of Government commit their financial resources that process will begin,” Nandlall recently told the Government Information Agency (GINA).
Although the top 25 performing law graduates of the University of Guyana (UG) have been guaranteed places at the Hugh Wooding Law School for the new semester, after months of being in limbo due to a decision by the Council of Legal Education (CLE) against accepting admissions from non-University of the West Indies campuses, a permanent arrangement is still to be agreed.
Nandlall and a delegation including UG Vice Chancellor, Jacob Opadeyi, Head of the Department of Law, President of the Bar Association, as well as an executive of the Guyana Bar Association met recently with officers of the CLE and discussions were held on the way forward for the top 25 UG law students.
“The issue of the admission of the Guyana Law students graduating from UG was a live one. I am pleased to report that all arrangements are in place for the 25 top Guyanese graduate to enjoy automatic entry and the 10 other non-Guyanese are to be accommodated at the UWI and other law schools based on the zoning of the territory from which they may come,” Nandlall was quoted as telling GINA.
However, it was noted that a decision has not been taken that will ensure that it does not reoccur, although it had engaged the attention of the Heads of Government at their last summit in Antigua. Nandlall said that the Heads delegated the issue to the Council to review the process of legal education in the region. “That directive of the Heads of Government was comprehensively discussed at the Council of Legal Education meeting and a sub-committee has been appointed by the council to carry this process forward,” he said.
At the Council level, Nandlall noted they will continue to engage the Heads of Government in terms of obtaining financing, while organisations have already been shortlisted to conduct the review process.
Until financial commitment by governments, he added, several issues will be looked at, including the role of the Council and whether it should be administering the law school or merely be an accrediting centre and let law schools be run by other entities including governments, as well as whether the region has the need for the number of lawyers that is being generated. “So all those matters are going to embrace the attention of this review process and in the meanwhile I hope we will continue to have our 25 automatic entries,” Nandlall said.
Nandlall further noted that there will be a review of the collaborative agreement between UG and UWI. “The University of Guyana is contending that after 20 years they cannot be grandfathered in the way that they have been over the last 20 years, after 20 years of producing students that have excelled in every respect at the Council of Legal Education. Perhaps the time has come to relook at the current arrangement in order to give UG greater parity in the relationship,” he said, adding that he supports this concept.
At the same time, the minister said he still believes that a collaborative arrangement, whatever form it may take, is necessary to continue to guarantee UG law degree the quality that it currently enjoys and the status that it enjoys both in the academic community and professional environment.
