Fresh questions are now being asked about the relationship between Chief Justice Ivor Archie and Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley after it was revealed that Archie contacted Rowley just days after he (Rowley) took office to access houses for three people.
Former minister of Housing Dr Roodal Moonilal is now calling on Rowley to answer whether he and Archie were friends while Archie sat on the crucial Court of Appeal hearing which had to determine the legality of the United National Congress (UNC) 2015 general election petitions for five marginal seats. A ruling in favour the UNC could have changed the outcome of the general election.
The PNM won that election 23 to 18.
Moonilal confirmed on Saturday that he was interviewed by the Law Association of Trinidad and Tobago (LATT) which investigated whether Archie used his office to obtain State houses for people he selected. According to the LATT investigations, Archie recommended 13 people for State homes in 2015. He also requested help for two people in 2013 back when Moonilal was Minister of Housing.
“I can say that the LATT asked me and I submitted a letter to them saying that I have never been contacted by the Chief Justice,” he said.
However, he said that it was curious that the CJ and Rowley were close enough that Archie felt comfortable approaching Rowley just days into his term as Prime Minister.
Neither the CJ nor the PM responded to questions from LATT seeking clarity on this approach.
In 2015, when Archie made the request to the Prime Minister for the State houses, the United National Congress (UNC) had an election petition before the Court of Appeal challenging the election outcome.
Archie sat on that tribunal when it unanimously dismissed the petition.
In August 2016, High Court Judge Mira Dean-Armorer ruled that the Elections and Boundaries Commission acted illegally when it extended voting time by one hour during the September 7 2015 general elections.
Despite that finding, the judge then dismissed the petitions by the UNC saying she could not go against the majority of the voters who voted for the People’s National Movement (PNM) in the five contested marginal seats.
The UNC then took the matter to the Court of Appeal which has final determination on election petition matters. Archie sat as the chair of the three-member panel, which included Justices of Appeal Allan Mendonca and Peter Jamadar.
“As it unravels, it becomes more murky. It appears that upon coming into office, within days of becoming Prime Minister, Dr Rowley was engaged in some type of interaction with the Chief Justice over the allocation of housing. This is startling,” he said.
“At that time the UNC was engaged in an election petition at the highest level at the Court of Appeal, and the panel included the Chief Justice”, Moonilal said.
“I cast no aspersions on the Chief Justice or the Prime Minister, but it is passing strange that at the same time that an election petition is being heard to determine the legitimacy of the Government, the Prime Minister was having some type of contact with the Chief Justice, which he has never revealed.
“I was taken aback,” he said.
“The PM must come clean on this matter and ought to reveal his relationship with the Chief Justice and whether, in fact, he was entertaining the Chief Justice when the election petition was before the court on the issue of housing,” he said.
Moonilal said Rowley “kicked up a storm” when he accused the former People’s Partnership government of “giving away houses to lowly-ranked police officers”.
“The PM needs to explain this carefully, his role in this matter,” he said.
Moonilal said the broader issue is whether the Prime Minister is “tainted and polluted” and could adjudicate on this matter fairly.
Moonilal suggested that Rowley should leave the jurisdiction and let an acting PM decide on this matter.
“Cabinet and the acting PM can make that decision with an acting Prime Minister,” he said. Former Chief Justice Micheal de la Bastide, in an earlier interview with Guardian Media, said the PM can still decide on the matter under the doctrine of necessity, even though he was someone involved in the same issue. The opinions of two Caribbean jurists — Sir Francis Alexis QC, and Eamon Courtenay SC — which were submitted with the LATT report also called on the PM to initiate Section 137 based on the evidence against Archie.
The LATT also interviewed former Housing Development Corporation managing director Jearlean John, but she refused to comment on that meeting or on whether she was approached by the Chief Justice to help facilitate houses to people he selected.
“No comment on any of it,” she said on Saturday.
However, a former senior executive at HDC confirmed that it was not uncommon for high-ranking officials to pass along names to the HDC hierarchy to help secure houses for selected people. The senior executive confirmed that the Chief Justice did as well.
“Yes, the Chief Justice requested houses, but that is nothing special. Almost everyone with access or some type of clout would send requests for help,” the insider said.
The Chief Justice holds the nation’s third highest office and his requests for housing was made on the behest of two convicted fraudsters, Dillian Johnson and Kern Romero, with whom he shared close personal relationships.
Johnson and Romero benefited financially from promising State housing to people and used Archie as their medium to facilitate their criminal act, the LATT report found. Romero died in hospital in May while Johnson fled to the UK seeking political asylum.