Jagdeo unclear on legal status of SARA’s Deputy Director

…Supports Bar Association’s criticisms of Heath-Retemyer

Opposition Leader Bharrat Jagdeo has said he is unclear whether he should refer to Aubrey Heath-Retemyer as the Deputy Director of the State Assets Recovery Agency (SARA), because Heath-Retemyer may very well be “squatting on the job”; but he agrees with the criticisms levelled against Heath-Retemyer by the Guyana Bar Association (GBA).

Jagdeo claims Heath-Retemyer was not properly elected or selected to his current position at SARA, and the new legislation was not followed when he was put in that position. As such, Jagdeo says, GBA has a right to criticise Heath-Retemyer for seeking to lecture the judiciary about its decisions.
“He wants a particular decision. Now, I have big concerns about judicial sloth, but I’m not saying that you should give a favourable position to the PPP (People’s Progressive Party) or an unfavourable position,” Jagdeo declared.
He said Heath-Retemyer is seeking to suggest that he is looking for specific outcomes.
“Here you have an individual who is trying to tell the judiciary what kind of decisions they must make. And if they make an adverse one to the SARA in protecting people’s rights, they come in for criticism. So it is within that context I support the statement,” Jagdeo said.
The Guyana Bar Association (GBA) recently condemned the SARA deputy director for saying that members of the Judiciary needed training so that the Agency’s work could get done. Heath-Retemyer had lamented an apparent resistance by judicial officers to access information from commercial banks, something which is key to the work of the anti-corruption agencies, including the Special Organised Crime Unit (SOCU).

However, the Bar Council of the GBA, in a statement on Tuesday, bashed the Deputy Director of SARA, saying that his comments could be construed as a “threat” to members of the Judiciary, as well as an attempt to direct the work and functioning of the country’s legal system – something he should avoid.
Apart from the situation being alarming and of grave concern, it was also against Article 122 (a) (1) of the Constitution, which states that the Judiciary exercises its functions independently and free from political, executive or any other form of direction and control.
The GBA went on to contend that “any insinuation that the Judiciary is somehow lacking in knowledge is unjustified, without merit, and could dangerously shake the confidence of the public in the ability of the Judiciary”. The GBA said Guyana is a democracy where the law is applied by an independent and impartial Judiciary, whose function includes restraining unlawful excesses by the Executive.
On Sunday last, former Attorney General and Legal Affairs Minister Anil Nandlall had also condemned the remarks made by Heath-Retemyer, and blamed the situation of banks being reluctant to act in supplying the information requested on the fact that several pieces of legislation are clashing.
“Some [legislation] require the bank to maintain clients’ confidentiality, and therefore prohibit them from disclosing the information requested, while some require the bank to make the disclosures,” Nandlall had pointed out.
He noted that the issue was brought to the attention of his successor, current Attorney General and Legal Affairs Minister Basil Williams, whom Nandlall said “is incapable of taking advice”.
Meanwhile, Jagdeo said the information requested places an administrative burden on the bank, and raises the issue of privacy. “And those are the issues being contested now, and the courts will rule one way or the other. The court has to balance protecting individuals’ freedom, liberties, rights and the necessity of the Government to do its work. I don’t think it’s a deficiency in the law, it’s the individuals making the political statement,” he opined.
The GBA has posited that there is no place for comments like those made by SARA’s Deputy Director, while adding his action should equally be condemned by the Government for not being its view of the Judiciary, and by the citizens of Guyana as being an unjustified attack by an agent of the Executive on the independence of the Judiciary, and done in violation of the principle of separation of powers.