When Justice Falters: The CCJ’s Lesson to Guyana’s Courts

Dear Editor,

The recent decision by the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) to grant an interim stay in the extradition proceedings against businessmen Azruddin and Nazar “Shell” Mohamed is not merely a procedural development — it is a sobering mirror held up to Guyana’s legal system. It reveals, in stark contrast, the quality of jurisprudence now administered within our local courts and the creeping erosion of confidence in their independence.

When CCJ President Justice Winston Anderson emphasized that the stay was granted “in the interest of justice,” it was more than judicial courtesy. It was a carefully worded admonition — a reminder that justice, in its purest form, demands prudence, patience, and moral courage. The apex court acted squarely within the confines of the law, demonstrating restraint and propriety where lower courts, by comparison, appeared hurried, reluctant, and even fearful to exercise their own discretion.

For months, the High Court and the Court of Appeal refused to stay the committal proceedings, ignoring the reasonable concern that the process was tainted by political bias. Instead of offering judicial relief to legitimate grievances, local benches seemed captive to an unspoken anxiety — weary of political interference and overly obedient to executive expectations. The result was a series of decisions that made the path to justice more burdensome, less humane, and demonstrably skewed in favor of expedience rather than fairness.

As one senior practitioner confided to this publication, with characteristically Guyanese candor, “that is where I does ketch them and put lashes pon them.” Crude as the phrasing may be, the sentiment echoes widely within the legal community — a frustration born of watching justice reduced to formality while citizens’ rights are trampled under bureaucracy and invisible influence.

It is a damning reflection of our democracy when citizens must rely on the CCJ — an external institution — to be the final, and often only, guarantor of integrity in the judicial process. The time, cost, and emotional toll incurred before one can reach that level of review is not just an institutional failure; it is a moral one. It exposes a judiciary plagued by compliance rather than conviction — too often sacrificing fairness on the altar of political convenience.

The CCJ’s stay, therefore, is more than a legal reprieve for the Mohameds. It is a vindication of the principle that justice must remain uncorrupted by power. That a regional court must remind our own of that duty is the tragedy — and the truth — of modern Guyanese jurisprudence.

If there were ever a moment demanding introspection within Guyana’s judiciary, it is now. The CCJ’s restraint has illuminated what our local courts have too long concealed — an institutional weariness that confuses political correctness with prudence, and obedience with duty. Those who shirk their sacred mandate in pursuit of expedience or approval must confront the truth that every abdication of judicial courage deepens the country’s democratic decay. It is not an overstatement that our legal system stands in urgent need of comprehensive reform — reform grounded not in rhetoric, but in moral reconstruction. For until our courts rediscover the courage to act without fear or favor, justice in 

Guyana will continue to stumble in an abyss of darkness, where law becomes performance and fairness a distant echo.

Regards 

Hemdutt Kumar