MEDIA RELEASE

My attention was drawn to a long rambling press release, issued by the Attorney
General dated 9th December 2017, under the caption THE ESTABLISHMENT OF
THE JOSEPH HAYNES LAW SCHOOL (JHLS). A large portion of the press
release is incomprehensible. From what I have been able to read and make sense
of, it appears that the Chairman of the Council of Legal Education of the West
Indies has informed the Attorney General that the Council never gave Guyana
permission to construct its own law school.
It is a matter of public record that when the announcement was made by the
Attorney General in January 2017, that the Government of Guyana will establish
its own law school and that a memorandum of understanding (MOU) was signed to
this effect by the Attorney General and representatives of two obscure institutions,
I questioned this development on two grounds.
Firstly, that legal education in the Caribbean is administered by the Council of
Legal Education of the West Indies under a common law enacted in all member
states, including Guyana; that this Council operates three (3) law schools in the
region; that no new law school can be established without the permission of the
Council; and that any law school so established runs the risk of not being
recognised by the Council and the host country that does so can be liable for
violation of treaty obligations.
My second query related to the academic integrity of the two institutions that were
party to the aforementioned MOU, since they are unknown to this part of the
world. My interest here related to the quality of the legal education which would be
offered.
In his usual arrogance, the Attorney General mocked at my concerns and publicly
stated that Guyana recently obtained permission from the Council to establish its
own law school. As a former Executive Member of the Council with more years
standing than the current Attorney General, I knew what the Councils position
was and possibly still is, in relation to the establishment of additional law schools
in the Region and I therefore knew, immediately, that he was lying and that he
never obtained such permission as he claimed. As a result, I dispatched a letter to
the Chairman of Council of Legal Education of the West Indies on the 21st January
2017, in the following terms:
Dear Mr. Chairman,
Unfortunately, we have never met in person. I am the immediate Former Attorney
General and Minister of Legal Affairs of the Co-operative Republic of Guyana and
currently a Member of Parliament of the Opposition, with responsibility for the
legal sector.
The Government of Guyana, through the Attorney General, recently signed a
Memorandum Of Understanding (MOU) with two institutions calling themselves,
University College of the Caribbean and The Law College of Americas for the
establishment of a law school in Guyana.
I would be most grateful if you could furnish me with the following information:
(1.) is the Council of Legal Education aware of this initiative? ;
(2.) does this initiative enjoy the authority and support of the Council? ;
(3.) are the aforementioned institutions recognized by the Council? ;
I would be most grateful for an urgent response.
On the 23rd January 2017, I received the following response:
Subsequently, I received a media statement from the Council of Legal Education of
the West Indies in the following terms:
It would now appear that the Council has completed the search of its records and
has now made its decision public. It is that decision which the Attorney General is
now trying to distort and obfuscate. As usual, he launches into his characteristic
blame game tirade, trying to shift blame to former Chancellor Carl Singh, the
Chairman of the Council of Legal Education of the West Indies and I. The public
must now be most familiar with the Attorney Generals modus operandi: at almost
everything he fails and then tries to extricate himself by shifting blame to others.
The truth of the matter is that he never obtained the permission of the Council of
Legal Education to establish a law school in Guyana. When I exposed this in
January, he then lied to the nation by saying that he did. Now his lie has been
exposed.

It is the same modus operandi which he carried to the Caribbean Court of Justice
(CCJ), recently, in the matter of Dipcon Ltd V the Attorney General. The court
swiftly threw out the case on the ground that he filed the wrong proceedings and
that the story he peddled for not filing the appeal in time in which he blamed a
whole host of persons, was simply ridiculous.