Senior counsel Anthony Astaphan and lawyer for the DLP cabinet of ministers in a 2014 treating matter has moved swiftly to appeal a decision handed down by the Eastern Caribbean Court of Appeal (ECCA) last week. The decision which did not favor the DLP’ s cabinet of ministers said that the criminal complaint must be reinstated.
Astaphans said that the decision of the ECCA should not stand. He said that the documents have been drafted to appeal the decision at the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ).
“Our team has had a chance to look a the majority judgement; we think they got it terribly wrong. We think the judgement of the dissenting judge, the more senior member of the bench at that time, Madam Justice Blenman, is absolutely one hundred percent correct and because of the great public interest in ensuring which is the relevant and applicable law for the determination of these matters and to avoid any sort of uncertainty and any sort of ambush where politicians can lose an election and don’t file a petition and then wait several weeks or months to file cases in the magistrates court for matters that occurred before the election; justice and the public interest demand that this matter be dealt with by the CCJ at the highest level.”
Astaphans said that they will be asking the court to expedite the matter and to grant a stay of proceedings pending the application and the hearing of the appeal before the CCJ.
