KAY-MARIE FLETCH­ER

Se­nior Re­porter

kay-marie.fletch­er@guardian.co.tt

For­mer prime min­is­ter Stu­art Young is call­ing on Pres­i­dent Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo to for­mal­ly in­ter­vene fol­low­ing al­le­ga­tions made by Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar against two of her ap­point­ed In­de­pen­dent Sen­a­tors.

Though the Prime Min­is­ter has not pub­licly named the two ac­cused, Young says un­der sec­tion 81 of the Con­sti­tu­tion, the Pres­i­dent must im­me­di­ate­ly re­quest full de­tails re­gard­ing the claims, in­clud­ing any ev­i­dence in her pos­ses­sion.

He claims that Per­sad-Bisses­sar has pub­licly as­sert­ed that crim­i­nal acts were com­mit­ted by three sen­a­tors, two in­de­pen­dents and one gov­ern­ment, all ap­point­ed un­der the Con­sti­tu­tion.

Ac­cord­ing to Young, as a se­nior coun­sel sworn to up­hold the Con­sti­tu­tion, the Prime Min­is­ter is du­ty-bound to pro­vide that in­for­ma­tion to the Pres­i­dent with­out de­lay.

Post­ing to so­cial me­dia yes­ter­day, Young said the Con­sti­tu­tion is the supreme law and takes prece­dence over every oth­er law.

He warns that al­le­ga­tions of vote-trad­ing sur­round­ing the Zones of Spe­cial Op­er­a­tions (ZOSO) bill are il­le­gal, deeply dam­ag­ing to pub­lic trust in Par­lia­ment and can­not be left un­re­solved.

Young said, “This mat­ter of con­ver­sa­tions amongst sen­a­tors amount­ing to ‘horse­trad­ing’ for vot­ing sup­port on the ZOSO bill that has been raised by the Prime Min­is­ter is il­le­gal and is erod­ing the trust and con­fi­dence in the Par­lia­ment; it can­not be al­lowed to sim­ply rest. The Con­sti­tu­tion is clear, and any de­vi­a­tion from the above would be a breach of the Con­sti­tu­tion.”

Khan: PM has no oblig­a­tion to re­veal names

Se­nior Coun­sel Is­rael Khan says the Prime Min­is­ter has no oblig­a­tion to re­veal the names of the sen­a­tors to the pub­lic, on­ly to the Pres­i­dent.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia via tele­phone yes­ter­day, Khan said, “She doesn’t have to do that (re­veal the names pub­licly). Sec­tion 81 pro­vides for that. She could have done it, but she chose not to do it. The Prime Min­is­ter is a lawyer, and she topped the law school when she was a stu­dent. And she has good ad­vi­sors. So she will know when they meet her on Sec­tion 81, she shall in­form the Pres­i­dent...”

Asked if he be­lieves by not nam­ing any names, the Prime Min­is­ter is breach­ing any laws, he said no.

“No, not at all. The Prime Min­is­ter did not make the al­le­ga­tion. What the Prime Min­is­ter must read from this is that these two per­sons ap­proached a Gov­ern­ment Sen­a­tor. So the Gov­ern­ment Sen­a­tor, more like­ly than not, has in­formed the Prime Min­is­ter, and the Prime Min­is­ter made a state­ment. She made the al­le­ga­tion in re­la­tion to what a Gov­ern­ment Sen­a­tor would have told her. So, I’m not split­ting hairs here. What she must do then un­der Sec­tion 81, I think they meet once a week, or they ought to meet once a week, with the Pres­i­dent. She will in­form the Pres­i­dent. She doesn’t nec­es­sar­i­ly have to name the sen­a­tors.”

Khan added that he be­lieves it will soon be un­der po­lice in­ves­ti­ga­tion.

Ac­cord­ing to him, it is a se­ri­ous mat­ter, as it casts sus­pi­cions on all nine sen­a­tors of the in­de­pen­dent bench for now.