Legal battle begins over OP budget cuts

– House Speaker warns of constitutional crisis

Speaker of the National Assembly Raphael Trotman said that the grave and gathering danger of a constitutional crisis is looming amid a flurry of court motions by the government questioning “the legitimate decision of the National Assembly”.
Trotman’s statements come one day after the administration moved to the High Court asking for the restoration of some Gy$20 billion chopped from the budget.
“The continued resort to the High Court to question legitimate decisions of the National Assembly, points to the grave and gathering danger of a constitutional crisis, which has the potential to assume proportions, the like of which the nation has never seen and may be unable to handle,” Trotman warned in a statement to the media.
He quoted Article 51 of the Constitution of Guyana which states: “There shall be a Parliament of Guyana, which shall consist of the president and the National Assembly”. Trotman said it is pellucid that the various branches of government were meant to work in consonance, and not in conflict, with each other.
“These challenges, in my humble opinion, are as unnatural and unhealthy as they are unconstitutional, and will weaken the already fragile fabric of our constitutional democracy. Despite the government’s seeming abhorrence to negotiations, it is still being suggested that these are the best means to resolving our political differences,” Trotman stated.

He said the latest High Court action brings into question, and possible derision, the very constitutional pillars upon which the country’s democracy is founded, as it strangely asserts that the timeless, sacred, and sacrosanct function of the National Assembly to approve public spending is only perfunctory.
“I am confident that a properly constituted, informed, and unfettered constitutional court will strike down the requests of the claimant, the Attorney General, Anil Nandlall.
“Because of the supremacy of the rule of law, and not of diktat, there will be no comments on the merits or demerits of individual allegations and statements made, and suffice to say that the latest action will have to be stoutly defended as this must be seen as the constitutional and public duty of every Member of Parliament.”   Trotman said while the matter ensues, and without prejudice to its outcome, the constituent parties of the National Assembly are urged to meet and sort out the issues that continue to beset the 10th Parliament.

Alliance For Change (AFC) Chairman and MP Khemraj Ramjattan called the motion a “massive distraction”. He said the AG’s decision to include Finance Minister Dr Ashni Singh as one of the defendants “shows the sham, partisan nature of the administration – to sue your minister of finance as the AG did is a rather ludicrous thing”.
“But he did it for purposes of when now the minister of finance is going to appoint somebody as a lawyer, Ralph Ramkarran or some senior counsel, and they will go to court and you know what they will say, we consent to the judgement that the AG is asking for.”
Ramjattan said it is perverse for the government through its motion to say that Parliament does not have the capacity or authority to reduce the budget.
“The articles in the Constitution make it quite clear that the National Assembly has to vote on an appropriation bill and further says that before we vote on the appropriation bill, an estimate has to be brought and the estimate has to be deliberated on … It is clear, even our Standing Orders indicate that you got to give 24 hours notice of cuts, so how you are going to say now that we don’t have an authority to cut.  The Financial Management and Accountability Act makes it clear that we can’t increase but we could reduce, we could reduce to zero dollar or one dollar or we can reduce by half.  Why you now coming by wasting the court’s time and taxpayers money; it is a massive piece of distraction.”
Cathy Hughes, another AFC MP, told reporters on Wednesday: “We have to take it with a grain of salt and smile at … We said clearly more information is needed, we cannot approve some of these expenditures … and there is always a provision for supplementary. We have not heard of any attempt to garner any additional information and to bring it back to Parliament, so it can be reconsidered.  So at this point, it is quite amusing that we would be going to the court to overturn the decision that the Parliament of this country made.”  The budget cuts motion is the second by the administration to challenge the work of the National Assembly controlled by the opposition. An earlier motion dealt with the composition of the parliamentary select committee, which the court had thrown out.
By virtue of an ex parte application by way of affidavit for interim orders filed by Attorney General and Legal Affairs Minister Anil Nandlall, government is arguing that “no power resides in the National Assembly, either in the Committee of Supply, or at all, to move an amendment to reduce any aspect of the annual estimates of revenues and expenditure laid by the finance minister, and certainly, the National Assembly has no power whatsoever, in proposing a new, or different sum, or any sum at all”. The application names three defendants: Trotman, Opposition Leader David Granger and Dr Singh. The defendants must make an appearance before acting Chief Justice Ian Chang 10 days after the writ was filed.
Head of the Presidential Secretariat and Cabinet Secretariat Dr Roger Luncheon prepared the application. He said that the move by the combined opposition, the A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) and the AFC, “amounted to an arrogation of powers which the Constitution does not confer upon them, but was also a usurpation of function which the Constitution exclusively resides in the executive, thereby abrogating the doctrine of separation of powers”.
Dr Luncheon said that it is the role of the executive to prepare the national budget and that of the National Assembly to approve such. He said changes to the budget were not provided for in the Constitution of Guyana, and as such, is ultra vires.
Dr Luncheon argued that the Constitution contemplates that Parliament’s two components, the president, as the supreme executive authority and head of the executive, and the National Assembly will function constructively and in harmony with each other.
It is in this spirit that the National Assembly must rationalise the budget, because the executive needs these finances to manage and conduct the affairs of the nation, the affidavit stated. Dr Luncheon stated that “the financial strangulation of the executive” by the reductions to various government entities “constitute an unlawful and unconstitutional interference with the independence of the executive, as well as a contravention of the doctrine of separation of powers”.