Derek Achong

Se­nior Re­porter

derek.achong@guardian.co.tt

A pair of sib­lings from south Trinidad are set to re­ceive over $10 mil­lion in com­pen­sa­tion from the State over the un­law­ful sus­pen­sion of their li­cences for their gas sta­tions in 2012. 

In 2020, the Unit­ed King­dom-based Privy Coun­cil up­held Prakash and Adesh Ma­haraj’s case over a de­ci­sion by for­mer En­er­gy Min­is­ter Kevin Ram­nar­ine to sus­pend their li­cences for gas sta­tions in Fyz­abad and King’s Wharf in San Fer­nan­do. 

While the British Law Lords found that the sib­lings were en­ti­tled to sig­nif­i­cant com­pen­sa­tion, they re­mit­ted the is­sue back to the lo­cal courts.

The ap­pro­pri­ate com­pen­sa­tion was re­cent­ly as­sessed by High Court Mas­ter Wren­er­son Lochan.

Mas­ter Lochan or­dered $4,707,362 in com­pen­sa­tion for Prakash and $4,550,532 for Adesh, plus sig­nif­i­cant in­ter­est. 

The com­pen­sa­tion was cal­cu­lat­ed based on the ev­i­dence of a char­tered ac­coun­tant, who analysed the broth­ers’ fi­nan­cial records to de­ter­mine the loss­es they sus­tained dur­ing the pe­ri­od their gas sta­tions were closed. 

He al­so or­dered $150,000 in vin­di­ca­to­ry dam­ages for each sib­ling as well as $125,000 for the an­guish they en­dured and the rep­u­ta­tion­al dam­age they suf­fered. 

He said the ad­di­tion­al dam­ages were nec­es­sary to high­light the se­ri­ous­ness of the State’s ac­tions and to dis­suade sim­i­lar con­duct in the fu­ture. 

“Cit­i­zens rea­son­ably ex­pect that no of­fi­cer of the state would ar­bi­trar­i­ly in­ter­fere with their prop­er­ty with­out em­bark­ing up­on a process of law, one which is pro­ce­du­ral­ly fair and con­sis­tent with nat­ur­al jus­tice,” Mas­ter Lochan said. 

“The man­ner in which the un­for­tu­nate events un­fold­ed speaks for it­self,” he added. 

Ac­cord­ing to the ev­i­dence in the case, the sib­lings in­her­it­ed the ser­vice sta­tions from their fa­ther Sookdeo Bat­ton Ma­haraj and con­tin­ued to pay the an­nu­al li­cence fees af­ter he died in 2007. 

In mid-2010, Ram­nar­ine an­nounced that his min­istry would no longer be is­su­ing pa­per li­cences as its tech­nocrats were re­view­ing terms and con­di­tions and pro­ce­dures for the is­su­ing and re­new­al of such.

Op­er­a­tors were al­lowed to op­er­ate with­out the li­cences pro­vid­ed they un­der­went an­nu­al in­spec­tions and paid re­new­al fees.

In late 2012, the Ma­hara­js’ li­cences were sus­pend­ed as the min­istry be­gan in­ves­ti­gat­ing re­ports over faulty stor­age fa­cil­i­ties, adul­ter­at­ed fu­el and fu­el bunker­ing. 

The broth­ers de­nied any wrong­do­ing and took le­gal ac­tion over the sus­pen­sions.

They have nev­er been pros­e­cut­ed sep­a­rate­ly over the ini­tial al­le­ga­tions. 

The broth­ers won their case be­fore High Court Judge Car­ol Gob­in, but her de­ci­sion was even­tu­al­ly over­turned by the Court of Ap­peal, which stat­ed that Ram­nar­ine had the pow­er to sus­pend un­der the In­ter­pre­ta­tion Act. 

In its judge­ment, the Privy Coun­cil agreed with both Gob­in and the Ap­peal Court that the broth­ers’ li­cences con­tin­ued de fac­to af­ter the li­cens­ing scheme was ini­tial­ly stopped by Ram­nar­ine. 

The Law Lords stat­ed that the min­is­ter had no im­plied pow­er to sus­pend based on the al­le­ga­tions as such sanc­tions should have been stip­u­lat­ed in the orig­i­nal pa­per li­cences. 

“Since the li­cence con­sti­tutes the ba­sis of the li­censee’s com­mer­cial ac­tiv­i­ty, he needs clear no­tice from the li­cence it­self or from the ex­press terms of the Act of the cir­cum­stances in which his rights to car­ry out his com­mer­cial op­er­a­tions un­der the li­cence may be sus­pend­ed or ter­mi­nat­ed,” Lord Philip Sales, who wrote the judge­ment, stat­ed. 

While Sales stat­ed that the Pe­tro­le­um Act has pro­vi­sions for the “tem­po­rary dis­con­tin­u­a­tion” of li­cences, he not­ed that this was on­ly to be ap­plied by the Pres­i­dent and in cir­cum­stances of re­peat­ed breach­es and vi­o­la­tions. 

He al­so said that there are oth­er laws that could be utilised in emer­gency sit­u­a­tions. 

The sib­lings were rep­re­sent­ed by Ramesh Lawrence Ma­haraj, SC, and Vi­jaya Ma­haraj.

Rus­sell Mar­tineau, SC, Rachael Ja­cob and Vin­cent Jar­dine rep­re­sent­ed the State.