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Commission Adjourned
By Micah George

The Commission of Inquiry into certain matters that arose under the previous Labour Party Government started yesterday in the House of Parliament, but the political overtones that cloaked it from the day it was announced could back-fire and favour the Labour Party as commissioners concluded that nothing in documents before them adversely impacted in any way on either former Minister Felix Finisterre, who appears before the Commission regarding two road development projects, or former Prime Minister Dr. Kenny Anthony who appears regarding a payment of over US$17 million to the Royal Merchant Bank of Trinidad & Tobago to satisfy debts owned by Fenwell Limited, known here as the Rochamel affair.
Although the Inquiry was adjourned to Monday next week, yesterday’s opening seems to have paved the way for some interesting times ahead, even with a possibility that the deadline (March 12th) given for its completion, being extended.
One attorney appearing for one of those having to answer to the Commission described the entire procedure as flawed threatening non participation of his client in the process.
Elliot Mottley, counsel for Finisterre yesterday challenged the Commission’s mandate that pertains to his client and questioned the time span between the announcement of such an inquiry back in December 2006 by the government and appointment of the Commission in January 2009 juxtaposing that time span with what he called the short space of time the Commission has to make findings and recommendations.
“The fact that a Commission of Inquiry has been appointed carries with it certain suspicions to the public about the conduct of the members of the former government and I find it a bit difficult that they are not being afforded a proper opportunity to defend themselves before this Commission,” Mottley said.
“I take issue with the procedures that you have outlined. I know of no Commission that would start hearing evidence on a particular date and then five days or four days later you are going to finish getting statements. That is not the way a Commission of Inquiry should operate….” Mottley said.
Sir Fenton Ramsahoye, Chairman of the Commission interrupted Mottley explaining that what he, Ramsahoye, said in his opening remarks was that statements should be in by March 6th.
“This does not mean that you should wait until the sixth to submit statements. If you can submit them before it will help. We are expecting, indeed we have got statements from people already. It is not correct to say that we are asking for statements on the sixth. We want the statements, if we can have them before or on the sixth,” Ramsahoye said.
“You are starting to take evidence on the 2nd (March) and after you start taking evidence you are saying that you want statements to be sent in, my issue with that is this: that the Commission, before it starts taking evidence…all the statements should be before you. Not only should these papers be before you but the statements which have been submitted should be circulated to the persons mentioned in the particular statements. In reference to section one which relates to sections of the highway, anything that you have relating to that should be in the hands of counsel for Mr. Finisterre before any evidence is taken. That is the way I understand Commissions of Inquiry should operate.

 
It is not a Commission by ambush and therefore all the evidence, everything that you have in relation to the execution and administration of road projects 001 and 002 should be in the hands of counsel for Mr. Finisterre before the evidence is taken. That is the way a Commission of Inquiry should operate,” Mottley said, pointing out that if this is not done in the way he mentioned the Commission would not complete its work in the allotted time it was given for it to complete its work.
“We need to have all of the statements before hand. Mr. Chairman you mentioned that the process must be fair but that cannot be a fair process. A fair process demands that we should be in possession of all the statements. If you are still at a stage asking people, asking witnesses to send in statements it means that the Commission is not ready, not properly ready and constituted to start an investigation. It is only after such time that you have had all the statements in your possession, and to do that you must allow time for the public, or anybody who wants to make a statement to send in those statements. You cannot have a Commission that was constituted on the 29th January and hope to start now and still ask people to send in statements.
“It is a wrong and flawed process and we take strong objections to it. It is not right and my client will not take part in a Commission that is based on that procedure. It is a flawed procedure. It started out flawed and will continue to be flawed and that is not the only aspect of the procedure that I take issue with” Mottley said.
Mottley took issue with section four of the Commission’s mandate established by its terms of reference to investigate any losses suffered by the Government of Saint Lucia in relation to payments and/or expenditure concerning Road Development Projects 001 and 002.
“The terms of reference pre-supposed that there are losses, the correct terms of reference, in my view, should be to investigate whether there were any such losses and the extent of any such losses. The terms of reference should not pre-suppose that there were losses. Are you going to tell that there were no losses? That is not your terms of reference, you are supposed to find losses,” Mottley said.
The attorney from Barbados also took issue with sections six, seven and eight of the Commission’s mandate noting that with section six, which calls on the Commission to investigate whether any losses identified were the result of breaches of the civil and/or criminal law, he knows of no Commission having such a mandate. He called for the terms of reference to be amended if the Commission does not want “any other body intervening”.
“If these terms of reference remain as is, Mr. Chairman and it continues in this way and we deem it necessary we may have to take action to have a review of these terms of reference,” Mottley said, adding that his side is not afraid of the terms of reference.
Sir Fenton, in his remarks to Mottley’s comments, noted that if the Commission has nothing adverse against Finisterre there should be no need for any fuss on the part of Mottley.
“If we find that there is something which we need to tell you about we will tell you and we will give you all of the documents. So far, from the documents we have examined the Minister was not involved. If it should turn out that we have information showing anything slightly adverse to the Minister we will let you know with every document. If there is nothing there is nothing for us to let you know,” Sir Fenton told Mottley.