Fran­cis Joseph

The Uff Com­mis­sion of En­quiry in­to the op­er­a­tions of the Ur­ban De­vel­op­ment Cor­po­ra­tion of T&T (Ude­cott) and the con­struc­tion sec­tor is up and run­ning again. When it seemed that the in­quiry would be on hold for an in­def­i­nite pe­ri­od while Ude­cott ar­gues a ju­di­cial re­view mat­ter, lawyers for Ude­cott and the com­mis­sion re­turned to the Port-of-Spain High Court yes­ter­day and set­tled pub­lic con­cerns. On Oc­to­ber 2, by a con­sent agree­ment be­tween lawyers for Ude­cott and the com­mis­sion, it was or­dered that Uff's re­port, even if it was com­plet­ed, could not be re­leased or pub­lished un­til a ju­di­cial re­view case filed by Ude­cott was com­plet­ed.

It was al­so agreed that the sub­stan­tive case would be heard be­tween Feb­ru­ary 8 and Feb­ru­ary 12, 2010. The agree­ment stat­ed that coun­sel for the de­fen­dants (com­mis­sion) gave an un­der­tak­ing that there would be no re­in­state­ment or re­sump­tion of the in­quiry by way of fur­ther hear­ings or re­cep­tion of ev­i­dence, prepa­ra­tion, pub­li­ca­tion or dis­sem­i­na­tion, of any re­port un­til the hear­ing of the ju­di­cial re­view ap­pli­ca­tion brought by the claimants, Ude­cott. Ude­cott had gone to the Port-of-Spain High Court, seek­ing a re­view of the de­ci­sion of the com­mis­sion to con­tin­ue hear­ings, al­though the in­quiry was not gazetted. The state com­pa­ny is al­so claim­ing bias against for­mer com­mis­sion­er Is­rael Khan and present com­mis­sion­er Ken­neth Sir­ju.

Yes­ter­day, the par­ties were back be­fore Jus­tice Mi­ra Dean-Ar­mor­er. British Queen's Coun­sel An­drew God­dard and De­vesh Ma­haraj ap­peared for Ude­cott, and Ian Roach and Ker­wyn Gar­cia for the com­mis­sion. But be­fore any or­der was ar­rived at, the judge want­ed to hear from the At­tor­ney Gen­er­al. Michael Quam­i­na ap­peared for the AG and gave his ap­proval for the or­der that would be agreed up­on.The judge moved the dates of the ju­di­cial re­view mat­ter for­ward. Hear­ings will now take place on Jan­u­ary 11, 12, 15, 18, and 22.

The com­mis­sion, through its coun­sel, gave an un­der­tak­ing to give Ude­cott 28 days' no­tice, should the com­mis­sion de­cide to pro­ceed with any fur­ther hear­ing of the in­quiry, or to pub­lish any part of the re­port.

The com­mis­sion has un­til No­vem­ber 13 to re­spond to the claims of Ude­cott. The state com­pa­ny has been giv­en un­til De­cem­ber 11 to re­ply. Writ­ten sub­mis­sions for both sides must be filed by Jan­u­ary 7, and the fol­low­ing day, the judge will hold a pre-tri­al re­view, to en­sure that all is set for the tri­al. The fi­nal part of the in­quiry was due to start on Sep­tem­ber 7. But it was de­railed af­ter it was dis­cov­ered that it was not gazetted. At­tor­ney Gen­er­al John Je­re­mie moved swift­ly to save the in­quiry. The Sen­ate passed the Val­i­da­tion Act last week, to val­i­date the work of the com­mis­sion. That means all the ev­i­dence tak­en at the in­quiry in the last eight months will be saved and used for a fi­nal re­port. Speak­ing in Par­lia­ment on Sep­tem­ber 11, Je­re­mie an­nounced that re­tired Jus­tice of Ap­peal An­tho­ny Lucky would con­duct an "ur­gent probe" on how the Gov­ern­ment failed to com­ply with the le­gal re­quire­ment to pub­lish in the Gazette, the hold­ing of the com­mis­sion of en­quiry.

Lucky hand­ed in a six-page in­ter­im re­port to Je­re­mie on Sep­tem­ber 16, be­fore he flew out to Ham­burg, Ger­many, to sit with the oth­er judges of the In­ter­na­tion­al Tri­bunal for the Law of the Sea (IT­LOS).