A Guyana High Court judge Monday dismissed a motion by eight opposition legislators who sought to overturn their suspension for their role in an unrest at the legislative chambers in December 2021.
The fracas in the National Assembly occurred while Finance Minister Dr. Ashni Singh was outlining the benefits of the new Natural Resources Fund legislation.
In her ruling, Justice Damon Younge said the court cannot intervene in the work of the Parliament as the Standing Orders are not subject to the provisions of the Guyana Constitution.
The judge also ordered that the eight have until February 6 to meet the GUY$350,000 (One Guyana dollar=US$0.004 cents) costs to the defendants.
In her ruling the judge said the National Assembly’s Standing Orders are only subjected to the Constitution if there are regulations and the Parliament must be able to conduct its affairs without interference from the court.
She said when it comes to the internal operations of the National Assembly, only that organ could exclusively control the management of its own internal affairs, not the judiciary.
The eight opposition legislators had argued that they were not given a right to a hearing by the bipartisan Privileges Committee which recommended that they be suspended for their part in the incident on December 29, 2021.
Based on the report of the Privileges Committee, Jones, Duncan, Singh-Lewis, Mahipaul and Philadelphia were suspended from four consecutive sittings for conducting themselves in a gross disorderly, contumacious, and disrespectful manner, and repeatedly ignoring the authority of the Assembly and that of the Speaker, and thereby committing contempt and breaches of privileges.
Ferguson and Jordan were suspended for six consecutive sittings for committing serious violations which were severe and egregious by unauthorizedly removing the parliamentary mace from its rightful position in a disorderly fashion, causing damage to the mace, injuring, and assaulting a staff of the Parliament Office, while attempting to remove the mace from the chamber.
Parliamentarian Tabitha Sarabo-Halley was suspended for six consecutive sittings for unauthorized entry to the communication control room of the Arthur Chung Conference Centre and destroying several pieces of audio-visual equipment, being public property.
CMC/
