Let it be pellucidly clear – the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) made a unanimous ruling dismissing the appeal brought by Azruddin Mohamed and Nazar Mohamed, who alleged that the Guyanese courts were wrong to declare that bias did not affect extradition proceedings. None of the CCJ Judges dissented with the ruling. The present CCJ email controversy does not change the fact that the CCJ unanimously dismissed Azruddin’s appeal.
The orchestrated effort in the last few days to create a hype that the Guyana Government, miraculously, somehow influenced the CCJ is nothing but a desperate, wicked conspiracy to support the false allegations that the extradition proceedings are part of an Irfaan Ali/Bharrat Jagdeo-led political persecution of the Mohameds.
The unrestrained freedom with which the Mohameds have attacked both the CCJ and the local courts, questioning their integrity and fairness, demands our attention and our voice. It is commendable, therefore, that the Guyana Bar Association issued a statement cautioning about normalising leaks of communication that are intended to be confidential business among the Judges of the CCJ.
Azruddin Mohamed has always patterned his behaviour and strategies after famous Latin American drug lords, such as Pablo Escobar and El Chapo. Very much like them, he has invoked claims of political persecution, and, just like these drug lords in Colombia, Mexico, and other places, he has attacked the fairness of the courts to avoid extradition and jail. Just like the drug lords attacked the integrity and fairness of the ICC, he now attacks the integrity of the CCJ. Like Latin American drug lords, Azruddin Mohamed freely and massively finances public relations campaigns to promote claims of bias and political persecution to delay legal actions, and buy public sympathy. Just like these drug lords, he portrays himself as a victim of corrupt Governments and courts.
Leaked emails where the President of the CCJ panel is alleged to act in a dictatorial manner in administering the court are part of the conspiracy to bring disrepute to the CCJ and to question its integrity and fairness. Importantly, nothing in the leaked emails in the CCJ thread indicated any difference between the Judges in the final ruling on the main appealed matter. But the email leaks are being used in Guyana by Azruddin Mohamed and his sycophants to maximally question the integrity and fairness of the court.
It is no coincidence that soon after the CCJ dismissed the appeal brought by the Mohameds in their attempt to stymie the extradition proceedings in the Magistrate’s Court, there has been a coordinated massive political attack against the CCJ. Our view is that there is a centrally directed effort by players politically directed to question the CCJ’s integrity and fairness.
The playbook has been widely predicted. The integrity and fairness of the CCJ were bound to become the newest battlefield in the Mohameds’ desperate attempt to further stall their extradition. It was always the plan by the Mohameds to frame their sanctions and criminal charges for money laundering and gold smuggling by the US Government as political persecution. It is their only defence against a mountain of evidence behind the criminal charges. The CCJ is collateral damage in a desperate effort to avoid facing the American courts.
To be clear, President Irfaan Ali and his Government have nothing to do with the sanctions and criminal charges brought by the Government of the United States. The sanctions and the criminal charges against Azruddin Mohamed and his father, Nazar Mohamed, were a result of an investigation by Government authorities in America. The investigation was started long before Dr Irfaan Ali became President; long before he was even selected as the PPP Presidential Candidate. The sanctions against the Mohameds occurred before the re-election of President Irfaan Ali. The indictment and charges were filed by the US Government, and it is the US Government that requested the extradition of the Mohameds.
Once the courts determined that the extradition request met the provisions of the treaty, President Ali had no say in the matter. The extradition treaty between Guyana and the US existed long before the Irfaan Ali-led Government came into place, and long before the Mohameds became politicians. The extradition proceedings before Chief Magistrate Judy Latchman are not intended to establish guilt or innocence. That would be done by an American court in Miami, before an American Judge, and with an American prosecutor.
These are hard, cold facts. Political persecution that the Mohameds and their mostly paid defenders have been aggressively pushing is merely a desperate ploy to find some way of avoiding criminal persecution in the US. One would think that if the Mohameds truly believed that the Government of Guyana controls and influences rulings of the Guyanese courts and the CCJ, they would be eager to face the charges in the US. Or is it that they know that the evidence against them is overwhelming? We must not forget that the Mohameds know of some of the evidence because they were confronted by the FBI in a meeting the FBI arranged in Barbados.
The leaked emails coming out almost immediately after the CCJ’s Mohameds’ ruling raise the question of motivation and who leaked the emails. We perhaps will never know if the Mohameds were involved with something nefarious in the leaked CCJ emails. This is especially so since we know that the Mohameds have used their almost unlimited resources to buy favours and votes. Whether they have the ability to reach into the belly of the CCJ is another matter. But enquiring minds cannot avoid the temptation of pondering whether their capacity to buy favours has anything to do with the leaked CCJ emails. We have no evidence that the Mohameds somehow have anything to do with leaked emails. But the coincidence is too pregnant with possibilities.
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