Court preserves wiretapping recourse during COVID-19 lockdown

…also remains open to election-related filings

The Supreme Court of Judicature has announced that matters related to the General and Regional Elections and Guyana’s Interception of Communications Laws (wiretapping) are deemed to be urgent, for the purposes of the application of the COVID-19 emergency measures.
As such, applications to the court in relation to the election-related matters and wiretapping will be permitted despite other restrictions such as the stoppage of in-person court hearings.
Additionally, restrictions imposed as part of the court’s COVID-19 emergency measures include the suspension of a range of filings and other parameters on the operations of the Judiciary.
The disclosure was made on Friday last, a day before it was announced that former Head of the Guyana Defence Force’s Military Intelligence Unit, Retired Lieutenant Colonel Joseph Harmon—who up until the end of last week served as Director General of the Ministry of the Presidency (MotP) was appointed as Chief Executive Officer of the National COVID-19 Task Force.
He was removed from the post of Director General, in which he served since May 2019 after it was revealed that he was a dual citizen and could no longer serve as a Member of Parliament or a Minister.
Additionally, it was announced that another Retired Colonel of the GDF, Lawrence Paul, Senior Executive Director of the Bertram Collins College of the Public Service has been seconded to the Task Force.
The National COVID-19 Task Force was set up by the caretaker A Partnership for National Unity/Alliance For Change (APNU/AFC) Government under Executive Order by President David Granger under the Public Ordinance Act.

Additional measures
According to the announcement by the court, the directions, in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic, are in addition to the Supreme Court of Judicature Practice Directions, COVID-19 Emergency Directions gazetted on March 23 last, in addition to the updated notices at the beginning of April.
Those measures included the restrictions on a number of services, including in-person hearings in the court and the greater use of technology for remand hearings among other initiatives.
The Court said that the measures it has since outlined would take immediate effect and shall last for one month “unless revoked or extended by notice after an assessment of the prevailing public health circumstances”.
The COVID-19 Task Force, which has been tasked with leading the country’s fight against the pandemic is chaired by Moses Nagamootoo, but Granger has since had to intervene and overturn some decisions taken by the Task Force.
On Friday, he convened a meeting of that body where he directed that Harmon carry out the functions of CEO of the Task Force.
Harmon has since been placed in charge of setting up of a permanent National Task Force Secretariat in addition to assigning permanent staff to manage the national campaign.
The MotP in a statement to the media noted that the Task Force under Harmon would also be responsible for creating preventive measures against the disease to safeguard citizens’ health and collaborate with regional task forces and stakeholders to safeguard citizens’ health.
The CEO is also responsible, “for directing the NCTF operations and restarting interrupted activities; all important logistics measures necessary to prevent the disease from spreading further, directing rapid responses to unexpected and emergency incidents; developing short-term plans for disease prevention and safety of the people and communicating directly with agencies, Ministries, regional task forces, agencies and stakeholders”.
Harmon, as CEO, will also be responsible for disseminating accurate information with regard to COVID-19 to the public.