Dear Editor,
I am not an attorney, a constitutional expert, a politician or a current or former member of the National Assembly and therefore do not seek to pronounce on matters of the Assembly. I would however like to throw in something for consideration by those persons currently debating whether it is within the powers of the Speaker of the National Assembly to request that the Clerk convene a sitting of that Assembly.
Article 180 of the Constitution of the Co-operative Republic of Guyana provides as follows:
(1) If notice in writing is given to the Speaker of the National Assembly, signed by not less than one-half of all the elected members of the Assembly, of a motion alleging that the President has committed any violation of the Constitu-tion or any gross misconduct and specifying the particulars of all the allegations and proposing that a tribunal be established under this article to investigate those allegations, the Speaker shall –
(a) if Parliament is then sitting or has been summoned to meet within five days, cause the motion to be considered by the Assembly within seven days of the notice; or
(b) if Parliament is not then sitting (and notwithstanding that it may be prorogued) summon the Assembly to meet within twenty-one days of the notice and cause the motion to be considered at that meeting.
While we are not in a situation where there is a Notice as contemplated in (1), I would like to have considered whether the Speaker’s powers set out in (b) above is not in effect the power that some say the Speaker does not have.
Yours faithfully,
(Name and address provided)
