RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Sources with­in the Ju­di­cia­ry say for­mer Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions (DPP) Ge­of­frey Hen­der­son may be Pres­i­dent Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo’s pre­ferred choice to be­come the next Chief Jus­tice of T&T. How­ev­er, oth­er in­sid­ers point to for­mer DPP Mark Mo­hammed as the front-run­ner with­in the Ju­di­cia­ry, as he is cur­rent­ly the most se­nior ap­pel­late judge af­ter Jus­tice Nolan Bereaux, who is set to re­tire soon. On so­cial me­dia, some mem­bers of the pub­lic have in­stead called for High Court Judge Frank Seep­er­sad to be con­sid­ered.

Since Chief Jus­tice Ivor Archie an­nounced his re­tire­ment, there has been re­newed scruti­ny of how the coun­try se­lects its top ju­di­cial of­fi­cer. Sev­er­al mem­bers of the Ju­di­cia­ry have sug­gest­ed that the Law As­so­ci­a­tion should have a for­mal role in the process.

Un­der Sec­tion 102 of the Con­sti­tu­tion, the Chief Jus­tice is ap­point­ed by the Pres­i­dent af­ter con­sul­ta­tion with both the Prime Min­is­ter and the Leader of the Op­po­si­tion. How­ev­er, a source who re­quest­ed anonymi­ty de­scribed this re­quire­ment as a “farce,” claim­ing the Pres­i­dent’s choice can­not be chal­lenged.

“She can put who­ev­er she wants. There is no open com­pe­ti­tion for the role of Chief Jus­tice be­cause the Pres­i­dent has the fi­nal say. Her choice can­not be chal­lenged,” the source said.

By law, can­di­dates must be drawn from among se­nior judges or at­tor­neys with at least 15 years’ ex­pe­ri­ence. In­tegri­ty, im­par­tial­i­ty and the abil­i­ty to in­spire pub­lic con­fi­dence are con­sid­ered key qual­i­ties for the of­fice. One judge told Guardian Me­dia that, al­though lawyers have re­peat­ed­ly rec­om­mend­ed greater trans­paren­cy through in­de­pen­dent short­list­ing and wider con­sul­ta­tion, such mea­sures have nev­er been adopt­ed.

For­mer min­is­ter of le­gal af­fairs Prakash Ra­mad­har said the Of­fice of the Chief Jus­tice is “one of the high­est and most sa­cred of­fices in the land and must be be­yond re­proach.”

“There is al­ways a be­lief of po­lit­i­cal in­ter­fer­ence, and so we have to en­sure the of­fice is be­yond all con­t­a­m­i­na­tion or al­le­ga­tion of po­lit­i­cal in­ter­fer­ence,” he said.

Ra­mad­har agreed there should be a pub­lished list of po­ten­tial can­di­dates, with mem­bers of the Ju­di­cia­ry hav­ing a voice in de­ter­min­ing who as­sumes the of­fice, in­de­pen­dent of favouritism.

“While I cast no as­per­sions on the Of­fice of the Pres­i­dent, Trinidad and To­ba­go has found it­self in a quag­mire be­cause the cur­rent Pres­i­dent had been a mem­ber of the PNM,” he added.

He al­so rec­om­mend­ed a ten-year term lim­it for the Chief Jus­tice, af­ter which the of­fice-hold­er could reap­ply.

Ra­mad­har called for greater trans­paren­cy in the ap­point­ment process, say­ing the Law As­so­ci­a­tion and the South­ern As­sem­bly of Lawyers should have a for­mal say in the se­lec­tion, es­pe­cial­ly now that the gov­ern­ment holds a par­lia­men­tary ma­jor­i­ty to im­ple­ment leg­isla­tive changes.

Ra­mad­har not­ed that Hen­der­son is among the names be­ing float­ed for Chief Jus­tice. On Tues­day, at­tor­ney Is­rael Khan al­so spec­u­lat­ed that like­ly can­di­dates in­clude Hen­der­son, Mo­hammed and Jus­tice Ron­nie Boodoos­ingh.

Guardian Me­dia reached out to Jus­tice Mo­hammed for com­ment, but there was no re­sponse at the time of pub­li­ca­tion. Jus­tice Seep­er­sad de­clined to com­ment, say­ing he did not want to en­gage in spec­u­la­tion.