Joshua Seemu­n­gal

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia In­ves­tiga­tive Jour­nal­ist

joshua.seemu­n­gal@guardian.co.tt

Af­ter three years in of­fice, At­tor­ney Gen­er­al Regi­nald Ar­mour, SC’s move to step down has been marked by grow­ing dis­con­tent and scruti­ny with­in the Cab­i­net.

His de­par­ture, timed just be­fore the swear­ing-in of Stu­art Young as Prime Min­is­ter to­mor­row, comes amid crit­i­cism with­in the Gov­ern­ment over his per­for­mance.

Ar­mour’s tenure, which be­gan on March 16, 2022, was marked by high ex­pec­ta­tions but has been over­shad­owed by con­cerns re­gard­ing his fre­quent trav­el, both for of­fi­cial and per­son­al rea­sons, and his per­ceived in­abil­i­ty to push the Gov­ern­ment’s leg­isla­tive agen­da ef­fec­tive­ly.

In­sid­ers have cit­ed this fail­ure as a key fac­tor in his de­par­ture, with Gov­ern­ment sources de­scrib­ing Ar­mour’s per­for­mance as “dis­ap­point­ing”.

Ab­sences

Ac­cord­ing to Guardian Me­dia’s cal­cu­la­tions, in his 1,097 days as AG, Ar­mour spent more than 149 days trav­el­ling abroad, ac­cord­ing to re­leas­es from the of­fice of the At­tor­ney Gen­er­al. That works out, on av­er­age, to one day of trav­el for every 7.4 days of work.

More than half of the time AG Ar­mour spent abroad, at least 53 per cent was for pri­vate busi­ness and va­ca­tion. He spent 79 days abroad for nine trips clas­si­fied as pri­vate busi­ness and va­ca­tion. An­oth­er nine trips, to­talling 58 days, were for of­fi­cial busi­ness. The re­main­ing 12 days, over three trips, were for gov­ern­ment busi­ness. His trav­el has been a point of con­tention.

The Se­nior Coun­sel al­so missed 17 Cab­i­net meet­ings. The Cab­i­net meets every Thurs­day, ex­cept dur­ing Christ­mas break.

Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter Mar­vin Gon­za­les, En­er­gy and En­er­gy In­dus­tries Min­is­ter Stu­art Young, Rur­al De­vel­op­ment and Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Min­is­ter Faris Al-Rawi and Hous­ing Min­is­ter Camille Robin­son-Reg­is have all act­ed in the role.

Ac­cord­ing to Guardian Me­dia’s re­search, Al-Rawi—who served as AG for more than six years be­tween Sep­tem­ber 2015 and March 2022—took 12 days of per­son­al/va­ca­tion leave in 2018.

Be­tween May 1, 2019, and March 15, 2022—1,050 days (47 few­er days than Ar­mour’s tenure)—Al-Rawi trav­elled on of­fi­cial state busi­ness five times, as con­firmed by Ar­mour in No­vem­ber 2022 in re­sponse to ques­tions from the Op­po­si­tion in the Sen­ate.

Guardian Me­dia con­tact­ed AG Ar­mour for com­ment sev­er­al times from March 12 to 14. On Fri­day morn­ing, he sent Guardian Me­dia a for­ward­ed ar­ti­cle from the Ja­maican Glean­er where Bar­ba­dos PM Mia Mot­t­ley ex­pressed her readi­ness to have her Unit­ed States visa re­voked amid con­tro­ver­sy sur­round­ing the Caribbean’s Cuban doc­tors health pro­gramme.

Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley and Young opt­ed not to com­ment.

On Fri­day Se­nior Coun­sel Is­rael Khan was blunt in his as­sess­ment of Ar­mour. He said while Ar­mour has im­pec­ca­ble in­tegri­ty as an at­tor­ney, he has not been im­pressed by his per­for­mance as AG.

“He was a good civ­il lawyer, but as At­tor­ney Gen­er­al, there’s noth­ing spec­tac­u­lar that he would have done. He was just pass­ing through,” Khan said.

Con­tro­ver­sies dur­ing Ar­mour’s tenure

The Of­fice of the At­tor­ney Gen­er­al faced a few high-pro­file con­tro­ver­sies dur­ing Ar­mour’s tenure. In April 2022, a Mi­a­mi-Dade Cir­cuit Judge dis­qual­i­fied Se­quor Law (hired by the State) and Ar­mour from the State’s civ­il as­set re­cov­ery case for the Pi­ar­co In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port Con­struc­tion Project.

The judge made the de­ci­sion based on Ar­mour al­leged­ly down­play­ing his role in the lo­cal case.

In Oc­to­ber 2022, in a case that large­ly pre­dates his tenure, crim­i­nal charges against for­mer AG Anand Ram­lo­gan and at­tor­ney Ger­ald Ramdeen were dis­con­tin­ued by the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions Roger Gas­pard. That case’s star wit­ness, Vin­cent Nel­son, King’s Coun­sel, re­fused to give ev­i­dence, claim­ing the State did not hold up its side of the deal.

In Jan­u­ary 2023, the State failed to file a de­fence in a civ­il ac­tion claim by nine men ac­cused of mur­der in the Vin­dra Naipaul-Cool­man case, re­sult­ing in a de­fault judg­ment of $20 mil­lion for ma­li­cious pros­e­cu­tion.

The case file ‘dis­ap­peared,’ re­sult­ing in an in­ves­ti­ga­tion.

In De­cem­ber 2023, High Court Judge Joan Charles up­held an ap­pli­ca­tion to set aside the de­fault judg­ment she grant­ed in Jan­u­ary 2021. An ap­peal was filed, and the Ap­peal Court heard sub­mis­sions in 2024. The Ap­peal Court is yet to de­liv­er its rul­ing on the mat­ter.

De­spite the con­tro­ver­sies, Ar­mour’s tenure was not with­out its suc­cess­es.

Ar­mour’s achieve­ments

2023:

* Launched a re­gion­al plat­form to fast-track the im­ple­men­ta­tion of the UN Con­ven­tion Against Cor­rup­tion in the Caribbean, aimed at iden­ti­fy­ing gaps and chal­lenges in tack­ling cor­rup­tion.

* Suc­cess­ful­ly de­fend­ed the chal­lenge of Vi­jay Ma­haraj re­gard­ing the Sedi­tion Act be­fore the Privy Coun­cil, con­firm­ing the law’s va­lid­i­ty in T&T.

* The State won an ap­peal us­ing the Civ­il As­set Re­cov­ery and Man­age­ment and Un­ex­plained Wealth Act to tack­le crime by tak­ing prof­its from it.

2024:

* De­vel­oped an in­tel­lec­tu­al prop­er­ty man­age­ment sys­tem for T&T’s Car­ni­val Mu­se­um.

* In­tro­duced the Mis­cel­la­neous Pro­vi­sions (Test­ing and Iden­ti­fi­ca­tion) Act 2024, es­tab­lish­ing a frame­work for poly­graph test­ing, drug test­ing, and bio­met­ric iden­ti­fi­ca­tion to ad­dress cor­rup­tion and sub­stance abuse. The act aimed to tack­le threats from rogue na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty and civ­il ser­vice of­fi­cers.

* Es­tab­lished an ad hoc work­ing com­mit­tee to im­ple­ment Need­ham’s Point De­c­la­ra­tion, ad­vo­cat­ing for re­forms in T&T’s crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem.

* De­fend­ed the chal­lenge of UNC ac­tivist Ravi Bal­go­b­in Ma­haraj re­gard­ing CoP Er­la Hare­wood-Christo­pher’s ex­ten­sion of ser­vice, with the Privy Coun­cil rul­ing in favour of the ex­ten­sion.

* Suc­cess­ful­ly de­fend­ed the chal­lenge of Keros Mar­tin and oth­ers seek­ing bail for mur­der, pre­vent­ing bail for ac­cused mur­der­ers.

* Reg­is­tered the Ge­o­graph­i­cal In­di­ca­tion for Steel­pan in T&T, high­light­ing its ori­gin and cul­tur­al sig­nif­i­cance.

Bills Passed Dur­ing Ar­mour’s Tenure

Dur­ing Ar­mour’s tenure, 24 bills were passed to be­come acts. Ac­cord­ing to Guardian Me­dia’s re­search, Ar­mour draft­ed ten of those bills—42 per cent. Most of the work for the re­main­ing 14 bills, 58 per cent, was done un­der Al-Rawi’s stew­ard­ship.

As stat­ed on the Of­fice of the At­tor­ney Gen­er­al and Min­is­ter of Le­gal Af­fairs web­site, the of­fice is re­spon­si­ble for, among oth­er things, the leg­isla­tive agen­da, law re­form, the ap­point­ment to qua­si-ju­di­cial bod­ies, and the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem.

9 bills Pri­mar­i­ly Draft­ed by Ar­mour

Jan 2024-The Na­tion­al Mu­si­cal In­stru­ment Act 2024-Des­ig­nat­ed Steel­pan as the Na­tion­al In­stru­ment.

2024-Firearms (Amend­ment) Act 2024-It al­lows prison of­fi­cers to car­ry firearms off-du­ty un­der cer­tain con­di­tions. It al­so es­tab­lished a firearm ID card to im­prove pub­lic safe­ty and ad­dress crim­i­nal threats.

April 2024-The ICC Men’s T20 Crick­et World Cup 2024 Bill 2024

May 2024-The Ad­min­is­tra­tion Of Jus­tice (In­dictable Pro­ceed­ings) (Amend­ment) Bill 2024-It fur­ther amend­ed an act that pro­vides for the abo­li­tion of pre­lim­i­nary en­quiries and for the con­duct of ini­tial and suf­fi­cien­cy hear­ings by a Mas­ter of the High Court.

May 2024-The Mis­cel­la­neous Pro­vi­sions (Ad­min­is­tra­tion Of Jus­tice) Bill 202-The bill made pro­vi­sions for con­duct­ing vir­tu­al and hy­brid court pro­ceed­ings.

Ju­ly 2024-The Bail (Amend­ment) Bill 2024-Re­strict­ed bail for peo­ple charged with se­ri­ous of­fences.

Ju­ly 2024-The Mis­cel­la­neous Pro­vi­sions (Ju­di­cial And Le­gal Ser­vice) Bill 2024-The bill pro­posed re­struc­tur­ing di­vi­sions in the Le­gal Af­fairs Min­istry, in­clud­ing merg­ing the chief state so­lic­i­tor and so­lic­i­tor gen­er­al de­part­ments.

Ju­ly 2024-The Ad­min­is­tra­tion Of Jus­tice (In­dictable Pro­ceed­ings) (Amend­ment No 2) Bill 2024-The bill fur­ther amend­ed an act that pro­vides for the abo­li­tion of pre­lim­i­nary en­quiries and for the con­duct of ini­tial and suf­fi­cien­cy hear­ings by a Mas­ter of the High Court.

Sept 2024-The Mis­cel­la­neous Pro­vi­sions (Ju­di­cial And Le­gal Ser­vice) Bill 2024

Bills draft­ed by Al-Rawi be­came acts dur­ing Ar­mour’s tenure:

May 2022-Cannabis Con­trol Bill 2020

May 2022-Mis­cel­la­neous Pro­vi­sions (Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Re­form) Bill 2020

June 2022-Bills Of Ex­change (Amend­ment) Bill 2022

June 2022-The In­sur­ance (Amend­ment) Bill 2022

June 2022-Sex­u­al Of­fences (Amend­ment) (No2) Bill 2021

June 2022-The Bills Of Ex­change (Amend­ment) Bill 2022

Ju­ly 2022-The Mis­cel­la­neous Pro­vi­sions (Crim­i­nal Pro­ceed­ings) Bill 2021

No­vem­ber 2022-The Civ­il Avi­a­tion (Amend­ment) Bill 2022

April 2023-Full Procla­ma­tion Of The Re­main­ing Sec­tions Of The Pub­lic Pro­cure­ment Act And Dis­pos­al Of Pub­lic Prop­er­ty Act No 1 Of 2015

May 2023-The Mu­nic­i­pal Cor­po­ra­tions (Ex­ten­sion Of Terms Of Of­fice And Val­i­da­tion) Bill 2023

June 2023-The Ar­bi­tra­tion Bill 2023

June 2023-The An­ti-Dop­ing In Sports (Amend­ment) Bill 2023

June 2023-The Ad­min­is­tra­tion Of Jus­tice (In­dictable Pro­ceed­ings) (Amend­ment) Bill 2023

Dec 2023-The Mis­cel­la­neous Pro­vi­sions (Reg­is­trar Gen­er­al, Com­pa­nies, Reg­is­tra­tion Of Busi­ness Names, And Non-Prof­it Or­gan­i­sa­tions) Bill 2023

Ju­ly 2024-The Whistle­blow­er Pro­tec­tion Bill 2022

Ar­mour’s Dates of Trav­el

* Feb 18–22, 2025—Of­fi­cial, 1 Cab­i­net meet­ing missed (Feb 20).

* Feb 12–15, 2025—Of­fi­cial, 1 Cab­i­net meet­ing missed (Feb 13).

* Dec 28, 2024–Jan 4, 2025—Pri­vate, 1 Cab­i­net meet­ing missed (Jan 2).

* Nov 30–Dec 8, 2024—Of­fi­cial, 1 Cab­i­net meet­ing missed (Dec 5).

* Nov 19–24, 2024—Of­fi­cial, 1 Cab­i­net meet­ing missed (Nov 21).

* Nov 6–13, 2024—Pri­vate, 1 Cab­i­net meet­ing missed (Nov 7).

* Oct 2–5, 2024—Of­fi­cial (The Caribbean Fi­nan­cial Ac­tion Task Force Min­is­te­r­i­al Sub Com­mit­tee and Steer­ing Group Meet­ings (CFATF), 1 Cab­i­net meet­ing missed (Oct 3).

* Aug 16–Sept 1, 2024—Pri­vate, 2 Cab­i­net meet­ings missed (Aug 22, 29).

* Jul 28–31, 2024—Of­fi­cial, no meet­ings missed.

* Jul 7–13, 2024—Pri­vate, 1 Cab­i­net meet­ing missed (Jul 11).

* May 22–27, 2024—Of­fi­cial, 1 Cab­i­net meet­ing missed (May 23).

* Feb 9, 2024—Un­known Re­turn—Pri­vate, Cab­i­net meet­ing sta­tus un­cer­tain.

* Dec 26, 2023–Jan 4, 2024—Per­son­al, no meet­ings missed.

* Nov 25–Dec 4, 2023—Of­fi­cial, 1 Sen­ate sit­ting missed (Nov 28), 1 Cab­i­net meet­ing missed (Nov 30).

* Nov 16–19, 2023—Pri­vate, 1 Cab­i­net meet­ing missed (Nov 1, 2024).

* Oct 3–7, 2023—Of­fi­cial (CFATF Meet­ings), 1 Cab­i­net meet­ing missed (Oct 5).

* Aug 3–17, 2023—Pri­vate, 2 Cab­i­net meet­ings missed (Aug 3, 10).

* Jun 17–25, 2023—Of­fi­cial, 1 Cab­i­net meet­ing missed (Jun 22).

* Jan 29–31, 2023—Gov­ern­ment Busi­ness, 1 Sen­ate sit­ting missed (Jan 31).

* Dec 27, 2022–Jan 5, 2023—Fam­i­ly Va­ca­tion, no meet­ings missed.

* Jun 14–16, 2022—Of­fi­cial Busi­ness.