Attorney General John Jeremie yesterday came under fire for his recent defence of Prime Minister Patrick Manning’s veto power.
Opposition Senator Jennifer Jones Kernahan, in her 2009/2010 Budget contribution at the Senate sitting, heavily criticised Jeremie’s statements, which he had made in his own budget contribution on Wednesday. She read parts of Jeremie’s statement, beginning with his defence of Manning’s veto power, where he said, ’We should all be cognizant of the fact that there should be a presumption that the Prime Minister will not act capriciously in making appointments to executive position.’
After reading this out, Kernahan asked, ’I want to find out from the Attorney General what kind of neo-Nazi, fascist, supreme leader, mumbo jumbo talk is that we have in Trinidad and Tobago in 2009? How can the Attorney General tell us that we should presume that the Prime Minister would act capriciously?’
She questioned whether the AG thought that this country had forgotten Marlene Coudray or the Maha Sabha’s action against the State with respect to the denial of a radio licence.
Kernahan asked why should the people be asked to presume, when ’every Monday morning the Prime Minister in the High Court defending some capricious act that he has perpetrated on some helpless public servant’.
She further criticised Jeremie’s remark that in the era of judicial review and mistrust of institutions, the Prime Minister’s veto is used. She said people have a right to know why they had been vetoed against and she did not think the framers of the Constitution meant that this veto power should be abused.
Kernahan then continued to tear into Jeremie’s statement and his emphasis that the Prime Minister’s veto power was for key executive appointments.
’So what does that mean?... that because is the executive arm, the Prime Minister is supposed to be able to do what he want? The Prime Minister is God, he has the divine right and he gets a message from above, therefore who he decides to put there and veto whoever he decides to veto... we should not question that? Is that the message?’ she asked.
Although Kernahan knocked the AG on his statements, she eventually still took the opportunity to thank him for highlighting the weakness of the Constitution and the need for reform.
