KINGSTOWN, St. Vincent, CMC – Two defeated candidates of the main opposition Unity Labour Party (ULP) have filed election petitions challenging the victory of Prime Minister Dr. Godwin Friday and his Foreign Affairs Minister, Fitz Bramble, following the November 27 general elections.
Carlos Williams and Luke Browne are challenging the victories of Friday and Bramble in the Northern Grenadines and East Kingstown after the New Democratic Party (NDP) won an overwhelming 14-1 seat majority, ending the 25-year rule of the ULP.
The two defeated candidates want the High Court to rule that the election victories of Friday and Bramble are invalid because they were not qualified to be nominated as candidates, given that they both hold Canadian citizenship.
The nominations of Friday, who has been representing the Northern Grenadines since March 2001, and Bramble, who was first elected to Parliament in November 2020, had become the lead-up to the elections, with the ULP challenging their nominations on Nomination Day.
Notices published in the local media also urged voters not to “waste” their ballots voting for either of the two NDP candidates, pointing to section 26 (1) of the Constitution of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, which states “No person shall be qualified to be elected or appointed as a Representative or Senator (hereinafter in this section referred to as a “member”) if he —
(a) is by virtue of his own act, under any acknowledgement of allegiance, obedience or adherence to a foreign power or state”.
The media notices also pointed to the statutory declaration that a candidate is required to sign, which states “That I am duly qualified to be elected as a member of the House of Assembly for this constituency, and that — … I am not by virtue of my own act, under any acknowledgement of allegiance, obedience or adherence to a foreign power or state”.
The notices stated that both Friday and Bramble are Canadian citizens.
Before the election and ahead of Nomination Day, then Prime Minister Dr. Ralph Gonsalves had indicated that the issue of candidates elected to Parliament while holding dual citizenship would be taken to court.
Gonsalves, who was seeking an unprecedented sixth consecutive term as head of government, confirmed that the ULP had attempted to prevent Friday and Bramble from being nominated as candidates for the elections because of their Canadian citizenship.
Both Bramble and Friday were born in St Vincent and the Grenadines but obtained Canadian citizenship as adults.
Gonsalves said the two Opposition legislators “have a huge problem” as he defended the decision of “registered electors” to object to their nominations.
He said section 26 of the Constitution states that you are disqualified if you are “by your own voluntary act, under the acknowledgement of allegiance or adherence to a foreign power or state, that foreign power being Canada.
“That is repeated word for word in the Representation of the People’s Act at section 35,” Gonsalves said, adding that this provision, along with another one about a Commonwealth citizen, had been considered in a case involving for the former St. Kitts-Nevis prime minister, Dr Denzil Douglas, who had been granted a diplomatic passport by Dominica a few years ago.
“The court held that the mere possession of the passport, all be it a diplomatic one, pointed clearly to an act, voluntarily by Denzil Douglas, to be under acknowledgement of allegiance…obedience or adherence of a foreign power or state,” Gonsalves said.
Gonsalves, an attorney, said before the Douglas case, there were varied legal opinions in the Caribbean, but “in our jurisdiction in 2020, the Court of Appeal determined that the mere holding of the passport, not even citizenship, indicated this.
Two St. Vincent and the Grenadines legal scholars, Dr. Linton Lewis and Dr. Jason Hayne, have written commentaries on the matter.
Lewis, a former NDP senator and chairman, argued that a case against the nomination of Friday and Bramble would succeed. In contrast, Haynes argued that a proper reading of the Constitution would show that it is peculiar and provides for commonwealth citizens to contest elections. He argued that any challenge to the election of Friday and Bramble based on their Canadian citizenship would, therefore, fail.
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