Did the President breach the Constitution when he appointed a new Police Commissioner without consultation held with the Leader of the Opposition and the Head of the Police Service Commission, as required by the Constitution? It is not in the DNA of the President and in the DNA of the PPP to violate the Constitution. In fact, as the President himself strongly asserted, he acted through the lens of the “Doctrine of Necessity”. The President could not consult with the Leader of the Opposition, since there is no Leader of the Opposition. APNU/AFC has failed to elect a Leader of the Opposition after more than two months. The President could not have decided on an arbitrary person to consult with in the place of the Leader of the Opposition, since that in itself would have violated the Constitution. Similarly, the President could not have consulted with the head of the Police Service Commission, since there is no PSC, because the old one refuses to go. It is embarrassing that a party of more than 60 years cannot accomplish this simple task. The AFC Leader, Khemraj Ramjattan, has admitted this.
While this doctrine has been known and used extensively for centuries, most Guyanese became aware of the doctrine in early 2018, when President David Granger invoked the Doctrine of Necessity to appoint Judge James Patterson as GECOM Chairman. After the then Leader of the Opposition had submitted three lists of candidates with eighteen distinguished Guyanese, David Granger found favour with none of these persons, and decided that he could not await the Leader of the Opposition submitting another list, since the country needed a Chairman of GECOM.
In this case, the Doctrine of Necessity was created by a contrived situation. The only reason the vacancy for a GECOM Chair persisted was not that the Leader of the Opposition abrogated his constitutional responsibility. It was caused by the intransigence of the President refusing to appoint one of the candidates given to him via a constitutional process. He had always had his man; he was not going to appoint anyone else to the post.
Unlike the time when Granger appointed Chairman of GECOM, today, there is a real need for the Doctrine of Necessity. There is no Leader of the Opposition because of the recklessness and irresponsibility of the Opposition party. No democracy worth its salt can function effectively without a Leader of the Opposition. The Constitution says so in the case of Guyana – the Leader of the Opposition must be consulted in the appointment of a number of statutory office holders. Allowing months to go past without addressing this issue is an assault on the Constitution. We also know that the Chancellor and the Chief Justice can be appointed only with the Leader of the Opposition’s agreement. The Doctrine of Necessity has caused Guyana to have only an acting Chancellor of the Judiciary and an acting Chief Justice since 2001.
It is now just over seventy (70) days since Joseph Harmon, Guyana’s worst-ever Leader of the Opposition, resigned his post. Since that day on January 26, 2022, Guyana has been without a Leader of the Opposition. At the same time, there is a Leader of the PNC, the largest party in the Opposition APNU/AFC, who is frothing at the mouth to take up the position of Leader of the Opposition. He is unable to do so because he was not considered good enough for Parliament by his own party when the party had to choose MPs in August 2020. But the PNC and APNU/AFC have been unable to fill two vacant MP seats in Parliament.
Nicolette Henry had resigned since February 2022, with an effective date of March 31st. Her body-language at the time she announced her resignation indicated clearly that she had unwillingly resigned, and that it was mostly a forced exit. When Joe Harmon also resigned as an MP on March 15, the two seats became available to place Aubrey Norton as an MP and clear the way for the Leader of the PNC to be appointed as the Leader of the Opposition.
Norton had been elected Leader of the PNC since December 2021. There is nothing that should have prevented Norton from assuming a seat in Parliament, at least since March 15. We have all seen MPs from both parties leaving Parliament and being replaced within days by their party. We have seen this done with the PNC within one day. Charrandas was expelled and recalled from Parliament in December 2018, and replaced immediately with an MP from New Amsterdam named Pilgrim on the same day. But APNU/AFC has not been able to do the simplest of functions – name two persons from their list to take up vacant positions in Parliament. On April 4th, they eventually did.
The question is: if the PNC and its “creature”, APNU/AFC, cannot complete a simple task like replacing two MPs on a timely basis and electing a Leader of the Opposition, who can trust them to run the country? The period of 2015-2020 already confirmed they are incapable of governing the country. While the PNC is failing its supporters, the PPP is governing a country that is right now the fastest developing country in the world, forcing some PNC MPs to urge the PPP to slow down. Nonsense!
