Sat loses Central Bank case against Cudjoe

PRIME MINISTER Patrick Manning yesterday won a lawsuit filed by the Sanatan Dharma Maha Sabha (SDMS) against him for appointing Prof Selwyn Cudjoe  a director of the Central Bank. Secretary General Sat Maharaj and the SDMS failed to have a High Court judge remove Cudjoe as a bank director when Justice Judith Jones ordered, in the San Fernando High Court yesterday, that the SDMS’s case against Manning be struck out on the ground that good administration of the bank does not demand it. Maharaj filed the lawsuit which challenged Cudjoe’s appointment some 13 months after the professor of African Studies was appointed to the bank by Government on April 11, 2003.

Justice Jones ruled the Maha Sabha’s delay in filing the action was undue. Jones ordered Maharaj and the SDMS to pay legal costs fit for Senior Counsel Russel Martineau and junior attorney. Martineau argued the case for the State. The SDMS’ lawsuit named PM Manning as one of the respondents. The SDMS contended that as Minister of Finance, Manning appointed Cudjoe to the Central Bank though he (Cudjoe) did not possess qualifications in finance and management. The appointment therefore, SDMS pleaded, was contrary to provisions of the Central Bank Act. The Act stipulates that only persons qualified in banking and finance should be appointed Board members. The SDMS was granted leave in July by Justice Carol Gobin to seek judicial review of Manning’s appointment of Cudjoe. 

However, Martineau filed an application to strike out the application for judicial review on the ground that it was filed some 13 months after Cudjoe was appointed. Judicial review lawsuits, according to law, must be filed within three months of whatever decision is being challenged. Martineau’s application to strike out came up before Justice Jones in the Civil Court in San Fernando last week. Martineau also submitted to Justice Jones that good governance of the bank demanded that Cudjoe not be removed. In a written ruling yesterday, Justice Jones noted the State had provided information on initiatives taken by the bank since April 2003, in providing training to Cudjoe. Those initiatives included, the judge stated, a regional workshop on corporate governance.