Richard Lord

The Sen­ate ap­proved the Fi­nan­cial In­tel­li­gence Unit (Amend­ment) Bill short­ly af­ter 11 pm on Tues­day af­ter a ten-and-a-half-hour de­bate. In con­clud­ing the de­bate, At­tor­ney Gen­er­al Anand Ram­lo­gan said the ap­point­ment of David West as di­rec­tor- des­ig­nate of the FIU was an il­le­gal and un­law­ful act by the for­mer Patrick Man­ning gov­ern­ment. He said the law had no pro­vi­sions for a di­rec­tor-des­ig­nate of the FIU.

"That is why I say, with­out fear of con­tra­dic­tion, there has nev­er, ever been a di­rec­tor of the FIU," he added.

Ram­lo­gan stressed West's ap­point­ment "was un­law­ful and il­le­gal." He said while West had signed doc­u­ments as di­rec­tor, "that is not a ca­pac­i­ty which he held be­cause he was nev­er ap­point­ed." He in­sist­ed West was ap­point­ed di­rec­tor-des­ig­nate. Ram­lo­gan added as At­tor­ney Gen­er­al he could not re­tain West be­cause his ap­point­ment was un­law­ful.

"The minute I dis­cov­ered that was an il­le­gal ap­point­ment that un­der­mined the very rule of law and the con­sti­tu­tion, I had a du­ty in law to ter­mi­nate it (his ap­point­ment)," he told leg­is­la­tors. He said the FIU law be­came ef­fec­tive on Feb­ru­ary 9 last year and West was ap­point­ed di­rec­tor-des­ig­nate of the Unit on March 12, 2010. Ram­lo­gan ques­tion what train­ing West could have gone on to bet­ter pre­pare him for the job. He in­sist­ed West ex­per­tise was in the field of ex­tra­di­tion. The Sen­ate will meet again next Tues­day at 1.30 pm.