Hugh Wildman

Wildman says he is taking the matter of his ill-fated appointment as attorney general of Grenada to the Court of Appeal, promising a fight to the end.

When the GBA protested against Wildman’s proposed appointment last year, the matter was taken before the Judicial and Legal Services Commission (JLSC), which turned it down.

Wildman then sought to have the JLSC’s decision quashed by the High Court by way of judicial review, and that application was heard in November last year, with a decision handed down on April 5 by Judge Justice Davidson Baptiste.

Baptiste’s ruling upheld the decision made by the JLSC.

Wildman, in a news conference, in addition to announcing that he was further challenging the decision, read a letter signed by the GBA’s President Ruggles Fergurson and addressed to the Supreme Court Registrar Robert Branch, outlining the GBA’s concern over the continued late payment of High Court Judge Baptiste.

Armed with this information, Wildman says this has serious implications for the administration of justice in the country.

“And what this clearly demonstrates members of the media, is that the elements of the Bar Association have hijacked the administration of justice in Grenada,” he said.

He went on to state that some members of the Grenada Bar Association are not lawyers but politicians who have a vested interest in removing the government of the day.

Wildman says his understanding is that the government is not responsible for the late payment of Justice Baptiste’s salary and noted if the judge has problems in this regard, the proper thing to do is take the matter to the legal services commission, since it is not a matter to be championed by the GBA.

“Do you really expect that Wildman could have gotten justice in the circumstances? Hence the reason why we have made bias one of the principle grounds of appeal which we had filed on Thursday April 6th in the registry. We intend to fight this case to the end, because we are confident that we are going to succeed,” he noted.

Wildman said he thanked God that the Privy Council is still around for he intends to take it to that level, he said he will be seeking the support of outside reputable jurists to highlight the glaring injustice taking place in Grenada.

Dr Francis Alexis

As the legal debate continued, Dr Francis Alexis, a former Attorney General, indicated that Hugh Wildman is only implicating himself.

“He is saying in effect now that the judge was incompetent to hear the matter because the judge was answerable to the commission and the commission was a party. When Mr Wildman brought the case before the judge, he is now turning around and saying the application for judicial review was made against the commission and the judge is answerable to the commission. So who does he want to hear the case? He takes the case before the judge and now he is saying that the judge in effect should not have heard the case because the judge is answerable to the commission,” Alexis said.

Alexis told Caribbean Net News that the people of this country are entitled not to have their public finances frittered away in the kind of frivolity that Wildman is presenting. He said if Wildman had to pay the cost out of his own pocket, he was sure “he wouldn't be doing this kind of nonsense.”