Derek Achong

Se­nior Re­porter

derek.achong@guardian.co.tt

For­mer po­lice com­mis­sion­er Gary Grif­fith has called for for­mer prime min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley and for­mer pres­i­dent Paula-Mae Weekes to be in­ves­ti­gat­ed over their al­leged roles in the with­draw­al of a mer­it list rec­om­mend­ing him for a sec­ond term in 2021.

Grif­fith made the call yes­ter­day af­ter High Court Judge Kevin Ram­cha­ran up­held his mis­fea­sance in pub­lic of­fice claim against for­mer Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion (PolSC) chair­man Bliss Seep­er­sad. The case con­cerned her de­ci­sion to with­draw the list af­ter a meet­ing with Row­ley and Weekes at Pres­i­dent’s House.

In a state­ment, Grif­fith said an in­ves­ti­ga­tion was nec­es­sary de­spite the court’s rul­ing in his favour.

“But the greater is­sue is ac­count­abil­i­ty for those whose ac­tions con­tributed to this con­sti­tu­tion­al de­ba­cle. The pub­lic de­serves the full truth,” Grif­fith said.

“Kei­th Row­ley must ex­plain whether he used the au­thor­i­ty and in­flu­ence of the Of­fice of the Prime Min­is­ter to in­ter­fere with an in­de­pen­dent con­sti­tu­tion­al process. Paula-Mae Weekes must ex­plain the de­ci­sions tak­en at Pres­i­dent’s House,” he added.

In a What­sApp re­sponse to Grif­fith’s call, Row­ley not­ed that he was not named as a de­fen­dant in the law­suit against Seep­er­sad.

“I was not part of any pro­ceed­ings in the court and have no in­volve­ment in the court giv­ing away tax­pay­ers’ mon­ey to any­one,” Row­ley said.

The law­suit con­cerned Seep­er­sad’s de­ci­sion fol­low­ing a meet­ing on Au­gust 11, 2021.

Seep­er­sad claimed that Row­ley, then head of the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Coun­cil (NSC), told her about al­le­ga­tions of cor­rup­tion in the is­suance of Firearm User’s Li­cences (FULs). She said Row­ley lat­er pro­vid­ed an in­ves­tiga­tive re­port, which was shared with the oth­er mem­bers of the com­mis­sion. The com­mis­sion then be­gan its own in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the al­le­ga­tions.

Jus­tice Ram­cha­ran ruled that the com­mis­sion had the pow­er to with­draw the list be­fore it was con­sid­ered by Par­lia­ment.

“The Court is of the view that the mere fact that the Con­sti­tu­tion does not make spe­cif­ic pro­vi­sion for the Com­mis­sion to with­draw the list does not nec­es­sar­i­ly lead to the in­fer­ence that the Com­mis­sion does not have that pow­er,” he said.

“In cir­cum­stances where the suit­abil­i­ty of one of the per­sons on the list has been called in­to ques­tion, the Com­mis­sion must be em­pow­ered to re­call the list to in­ves­ti­gate the can­di­date’s suit­abil­i­ty.”

How­ev­er, Ram­cha­ran ruled that Seep­er­sad act­ed un­law­ful­ly by mak­ing the de­ci­sion with­out con­sult­ing the oth­er com­mis­sion mem­bers be­fore or af­ter it was made.

“The record of the min­utes dis­closed sug­gests that there was no dis­cus­sion con­cern­ing the re­trieval of the list from the Pres­i­dent at all, far less a rat­i­fi­ca­tion of it,” he said.

Ram­cha­ran al­so found that Seep­er­sad did not have the au­thor­i­ty to act alone.

“The De­fen­dant there­fore did not have any au­thor­i­ty on her own to sub­mit or with­draw the list. She was act­ing on be­half of the com­mis­sion at all times, and the word­ing of the Con­sti­tu­tion makes that abun­dant­ly clear,” he said.

The judge al­so found that Seep­er­sad act­ed un­law­ful­ly by plac­ing Grif­fith on ad­min­is­tra­tive leave while the PolSC in­ves­ti­gat­ed the al­le­ga­tions.

“It is the com­mis­sion that can di­rect the Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice to re­frain from at­tend­ing work, not the Chair­man or any sin­gle com­mis­sion­er there­of,” he said.

Ram­cha­ran award­ed Grif­fith $250,000 in dam­ages for harm to his rep­u­ta­tion. How­ev­er, he re­ject­ed Grif­fith’s claim for dam­ages for loss of op­por­tu­ni­ty, not­ing there was no guar­an­tee that Par­lia­ment would have rat­i­fied his reap­point­ment if the list had not been with­drawn.

Al­though Row­ley was not a de­fen­dant in the case, Ram­cha­ran ques­tioned why he wait­ed sev­er­al months be­fore dis­clos­ing the NSC re­port to Seep­er­sad.

“The Court will not spec­u­late on the for­mer prime min­is­ter’s mo­tives, but one would have thought that giv­en the na­ture of the mat­ters dis­closed in the re­port, that, in his ca­pac­i­ty of Chair­man of the NSC, he would have pro­vid­ed the PolSC with the re­port at the ear­li­est con­ve­nience as it was in the pub­lic do­main that the re­cruit­ment process for the Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice was be­ing en­gaged, or as Prime Min­is­ter, would have ob­ject­ed to the Claimant’s ap­point­ment in Par­lia­ment,” Ram­cha­ran said.

“He (Row­ley) did nei­ther, in­stead, dis­closed the ex­is­tence of the re­port to the De­fen­dant mo­ments af­ter she had pre­sent­ed the list to the Pres­i­dent. This put her in the in­vid­i­ous po­si­tion in which she found her­self,” he added.

Grif­fith was rep­re­sent­ed by Lar­ry Lal­la, SC, Taruna Man­groo and Nicholas Per­sad. Seep­er­sad was rep­re­sent­ed by Deb­o­rah Peake, SC, Ravi Heffes-Doon, Raquel Le Blanc, Am­ri­ta Ram­sook and Sara Mus­lim.