Shal­iza?Has­sanali

For­mer at­tor­ney gen­er­al Ramesh Lawrence Ma­haraj says the en­tire Cab­i­net could be the sub­ject of a po­lice in­ves­ti­ga­tion if it is proven that pres­sure has been ap­plied on Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Gary Grif­fith to with­draw his state­ment in the mat­ter in­volv­ing Anand Ram­lo­gan and David West.Ma­haraj said Cab­i­net mem­bers could face a probe "for at­tempt­ing to per­vert the course of jus­tice" if this had in­deed hap­pened. He said this would mean the en­tire Cab­i­net was now "con­t­a­m­i­nat­ed."

"If it is cor­rect that mem­bers of Cab­i­net, at a week­ly meet­ing, al­leged­ly tried to ap­ply pres­sure on Grif­fith to change his sto­ry...to bury in­for­ma­tion re­lat­ing to a crim­i­nal of­fence, it would mean that the po­lice would have to di­rect their in­ves­ti­ga­tions for an at­tempt to per­vert the course of jus­tice by mem­bers of the Cab­i­net."So all the mem­bers of Cab­i­net who par­tic­i­pat­ed and en­cour­aged this must be the sub­ject of a po­lice in­ves­ti­ga­tion.

"It looks like Grif­fith is stand­ing for the truth. The is­sue is, did they try to put pres­sure on Grif­fith? If they tried to put pres­sure on Grif­fith, that is where the of­fence is com­mit­ted."The for­mer AG said act­ing Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Stephen Williams should call for a po­lice in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to Cab­i­net im­me­di­ate­ly.While there is im­mu­ni­ty for mem­bers of Par­lia­ment, Ma­haraj said, "there is no im­mu­ni­ty for mem­bers of Cab­i­net if they are en­gaged in an un­law­ful con­duct."

In the last week, Ma­haraj said, the Gov­ern­ment had lost all cred­i­bil­i­ty and moral­i­ty.Ma­haraj said the ram­i­fi­ca­tions of this new de­vel­op­ment could lead "Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar to fire the At­tor­ney Gen­er­al, dis­solve Par­lia­ment, and call a gen­er­al elec­tion."He said al­though this had nev­er hap­pened in T&T be­fore, it would be the start­ing point for the coun­try to be "purged be­cause no one is above the law...not even a mem­ber of the Cab­i­net."

"It is un­heard of for Cab­i­net mem­bers to ap­ply pres­sure on one of their own...It is not what you would hear in a de­mo­c­ra­t­ic coun­try and ac­cord­ing to the rule of law. In an­oth­er coun­try, if that had oc­curred, the Prime Min­is­ter and her Cab­i­net would have to re­sign. And we should fol­low suit. If the PM fails to act swift­ly, more pres­sure will come her way."Ma­haraj de­scribed the PM's ex­pla­na­tion for not fir­ing Ram­lo­gan as weak and lame.

"She should have dealt with the mat­ter up­on her re­turn from Cos­ta Ri­ca the same night or next morn­ing. That is of pri­or­i­ty to "the coun­try. The Prime Min­is­ter is ob­vi­ous­ly afraid to deal with this sit­u­a­tion. And there may be good rea­son why she be­lieves that she should not deal with it."Ma­haraj said even if the PM re­moved Ram­lo­gan it would still show she lacked lead­er­ship.

mis­steps in­volv­ing ag ram­lo­gan

Email­gate–The mat­ter was first brought to the pub­lic's at­ten­tion by Op­po­si­tion Leader Dr Kei­th Row­ley dur­ing a mo­tion in Par­lia­ment in May 2013. Row­ley had read out a thread of e-mails in the Sec­tion 34 fi­as­co, which he claimed al­leged se­ri­ous mis­con­duct on the part of those in­volved.

The e-mails were pur­port­ed to have come from e-mail ad­dress­es be­long­ing to the PM, At­tor­ney Gen­er­al Anand Ram­lo­gan, and three oth­er se­nior min­is­ters. Row­ley is mov­ing to strike out a le­gal vic­to­ry be­ing claimed by Ram­lo­gan in the Email­gate scan­dal.

Sec­tion 34–was pro­claimed on Au­gust 31, 2012. Ap­prox­i­mate­ly 42 ap­pli­cants filed mo­tions to have their crim­i­nal cas­es dis­missed. The act sought to abol­ish pre­lim­i­nary in­quiries for se­ri­ous crim­i­nal mat­ters. Sec­tion 34 had caused wide­spread con­cern and anger. There were al­so re­ports that busi­ness­men Ish Gal­barans­ingh and Steve Fer­gu­son who are fac­ing fraud charges on the Pi­ar­co Air­port project might have been able to go free be­cause of Sec­tion 34. The AG was linked to this mat­ter.

Pris­ongate–On Au­gust 30, 2013, then So­lic­i­tor Gen­er­al Eleanor Don­ald­son-Hon­ey­well by­passed her line min­is­ter At­tor­ney Gen­er­al Anand Ram­lo­gan and wrote to Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar ex­press­ing con­cerns about what she called an "un­eth­i­cal busi­ness" ven­ture in prison lit­i­ga­tion mat­ters. Last April, Per­sad-Bisses­sar broke her si­lence on the is­sues re­lat­ed to the al­leged un­eth­i­cal con­duct of lawyers and in­mates in­volved in prison-re­lat­ed law­suits against the State, and in which calls have been made for the Of­fice of the At­tor­ney Gen­er­al to be in­ves­ti­gat­ed, and re­ferred the mat­ter back to Ram­lo­gan for in­ves­ti­ga­tion.

Failed State of

Emer­gency–Six­teen men ar­rest­ed dur­ing the 2012 State of Emer­gency (SoE), and al­leged­ly linked to a plot to kill Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar and three gov­ern­ment mem­bers, had sig­nalled their in­ten­tion to sue the State if com­pen­sa­tion for their al­leged wrong­ful de­ten­tion was not made. The men were re­leased from the East­ern Cor­rec­tion­al Fa­cil­i­ty, San­ta Rosa, with­out be­ing charged when the SoE was lift­ed. Op­po­si­tion Leader Kei­th Row­ley slammed Ram­lo­gan "for threat­en­ing peo­ple" who seek to take le­gal ac­tion if they be­lieve that they have been wrong­ful­ly ar­rest­ed, ma­li­cious­ly pros­e­cut­ed, or faced false im­pris­on­ment.