IN WELCOMING the Barbados Government’s announcement of its recent $77 240 payment to the aggrieved Jamaican Shanique Myrie – as determined by the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) – current Caribbean Community chairman, Prime Minister Dr Ralph Gonsalves, told me in a telephone conversation on Monday evening: “I never had any doubt that this would be done . . . .”
While he understood the anxiety of Myrie, who the CCJ awarded that payment eight months ago for the trauma she suffered at Grantley Adams International Airport in March 2011, over an illegal cavity search and subsequent deportation, Gonsalves said he knew that Barbados’ integrity would ensure delivery on the court’s ruling, and consistent with its commitment to the regional appellate institution of which this country is an original member.
Gonsalves, whose own government has been frustrated by a national referendum on constitutional changes – which included severing the colonial link with the British Privy Council in favour of accessing the CCJ as his country’s final appellate court – has emerged as one of the more robust and articulate advocates among CARICOM leaders of the Port of Spain-based court.
Not surprisingly, therefore, he placed the CCJ at the centre of a special guest lecture at the University of the West Indies St Augustine Campus earlier this month when he chose as his theme Free Movement Of Community Nationals, CCJ, Shanique Myrie And Community Law And Our Caribbean Civilisation.
He reminded his audience that the CCJ, in delivering its “historic judgment” last October 4, noted that Myrie’s “right of entry, without harassment or imposition of impediments”, had been breached as well as her “unjustified deportation”.
Together, those acts contravened a collective decision by the 2007 Heads of Government Conference (highest organ of the now 41-year-old Community), in conjunction with Article 45 of the Revised Treaty Of Chaguaramas (RTC).
However, a critical issue for determination by the CCJ in the Myrie case was Barbados’ legal contention that a proper reading of Article 40 of the RTC decision of the 2007 CARICOM Heads of Government Conference “must be enacted into local law before they become binding on the Community . . .”.
Therefore, according to the argument by Barbados, since the government had not enacted the 2007 Conference of Heads decision into domestic law, that decision could not have created a legally binding right for CARICOM nationals in Barbados.
Rejected submission
The CCJ rejected this submission by Barbados and reasoned that “although it is evident that a state with a dualist approach to international law sometimes may need them enforceable at the domestic level, it is inconceivable that such a transformation would be necessary in order to create binding rights and obligations at the Community level”.
For his part, the Vincentian leader contended in his UWI address that the CCJ’s judgment had placed the 2007 CARICOM Heads of Government Conference’s decision on the “entitlement of Community nationals to an automatic stay of six months in its historical and legal contexts”.
Indeed, Gonsalves argues that the wording of the decision by the 2007 Heads of Government Conference in reference to an “automatic stay” or “definite entry” upon arrival, suggests that this “right does not depend on discretionary evaluations of immigration officers or other authorities at the port of entry . . .”.
Known since his earlier years, when he lectured at the UWI (Cave Hill campus), as a passionate regionalist and subsequently as a CARICOM prime minister who strongly favours both economic and political integration of member states of the Community, Dr Gonsalves in alluding to a perceived “fallout” of the CCJ’s Myrie judgment, told his audience:
“My reflections lead me to conclude that many governments, individual ministers of governments and immigration officials across the CARICOM region do not as yet appreciate the significance of the Myrie judgment to the freedom of movement of Community nationals and the CSME (CARICOM Single Market and Economy) . . . .”
Gonsalves’ message to his audience was that despite “the limitations” of CARICOM, the “supranational CCJ” has offered by its ruling in the Myrie case “immense possibilities to further ennoble our Caribbean civilisation . . . .
“Additionally,” he said, “the court is prepared to hold governments of member states accountable for any failure to observe requisites of the Revised Treaty Of Chaguaramas and decisions of the Heads of Government Conference.”
Gonsalves, who hands over the chairmanship of CARICOM next month to the newly elected Prime Minister of Antigua and Barbuda Gaston Browne, added: “The CCJ has clearly been creative in plugging loopholes in the RTC and to fill the lacunae within the framework of the purposes of the Revised Treaty and regional integration generally . . . . And we must ensure that the gains secured through the CCJ and other organs of CARICOM be not eroded.”
• Rickey Singh is a noted Caribbean journalist.
