SHAR­LENE RAM­PER­SAD

Op­po­si­tion leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar has called on US au­thor­i­ties to in­ves­ti­gate whether this coun­try’s At­tor­ney Gen­er­al com­mit­ted per­jury in a Mi­a­mi court.

Speak­ing dur­ing a Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) vir­tu­al meet­ing last night, Per­sad-Bisses­sar said the Op­po­si­tion had put the ques­tion to act­ing Prime Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert in Par­lia­ment ear­li­er in the day.

“The act­ing Prime Min­is­ter was asked to­day by Sad­dam (Ho­sein) whether US law en­force­ment au­thor­i­ties have launched an in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the AG (Regi­nald) Amour in re­la­tion to his per­jury in this mat­ter to a Mi­a­mi court. He told us he doesn’t know,” Per­sad-Bisses­sar said.

AG Regi­nald Ar­mour found him­self in hot wa­ter last week when he was dis­qual­i­fied from rep­re­sent­ing this coun­try in a civ­il suit against for­mer fi­nance min­is­ter Bri­an Kuei Tung and oth­ers, di­rect­ly re­lat­ed to the Pi­ar­co Air­port fraud case.

A Mi­a­mi Dade judge found Ar­mour breached the Flori­da Rules of Pro­fes­sion­al Re­spon­si­bil­i­ty, which pro­hibits an at­tor­ney from serv­ing as coun­sel on be­half of a client who is di­rect­ly ad­verse to a for­mer client in the same or sub­stan­tial­ly same pro­ceed­ings when he held meet­ings with the US law firm, Se­quor Law, who rep­re­sent T&T in this mat­ter.

Ar­mour had rep­re­sent­ed Kuei Tung and his then-girl­friend, Re­nee Pierre, in the crim­i­nal mat­ters in T&T be­tween 2003 and 2008.

Yes­ter­day, Per­sad-Bisses­sar sent out a call to the US law en­force­ment, say­ing, “Tonight, on your be­half, I call on the US au­thor­i­ties to in­ves­ti­gate whether Reg­gie Ar­mour com­mit­ted the felony of per­jury when he lied in his de­c­la­ra­tion to the Mi­a­mi court.”

The Op­po­si­tion leader al­so sent out a call to the Law As­so­ci­a­tion of Trinidad and To­ba­go, ask­ing why it was so silent on this mat­ter.

“I call on you to add your voic­es, this is a very se­ri­ous mat­ter for the le­gal fra­ter­ni­ty in Trinidad and To­ba­go, for the rule of law and the ad­min­is­tra­tion of jus­tice,” she said.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said the ap­point­ment of for­mer At­tor­ney Gen­er­al, now Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Min­is­ter, Faris Al-Rawi, to act on be­half of T&T in the Mi­a­mi case was al­so a con­sti­tu­tion­al cri­sis.

She said if Al-Rawi were to be grant­ed this au­thor­i­ty to act for T&T, that de­ci­sion must be in writ­ing and pub­lished in the Gazette.

“The act­ing Prime Min­is­ter was un­able to tell us to­day if any re­al­lo­ca­tion or re­as­sign­ment of the AG’s port­fo­lio was made to give Al Rawi pow­er and le­gal au­thor­i­ty to man­age these pro­ceed­ings,” Per­sad-Bisses­sar said.

Act­ing Prime Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert, ad­dress­ing that is­sue in Par­lia­ment yes­ter­day, said Al-Rawi could rep­re­sent T&T in the mat­ter.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar ac­cused Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley, who has re­mained in the US seek­ing med­ical treat­ment af­ter at­tend­ing the Sum­mit of the Amer­i­c­as, of hid­ing there from the is­sues hap­pen­ing lo­cal­ly.

Op­po­si­tion Sen­a­tor Sad­dam Ho­sein, who al­so spoke dur­ing the meet­ing, said the Op­po­si­tion had filed a mo­tion of no-con­fi­dence in the AG.

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