Letter of the Day | The leak did not create this crisis; it revealed it

THE EDITOR, Madam:

The Gleaner is right that the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) must regain its balance. But I disagree that “the most critical question” is who leaked the judges’ emails.

The leak is messy and raises legitimate concerns about confidentiality. But it did not create this crisis; it revealed it. Insofar as it brought serious questions about the governance of our regional apex court into public view, the leak performed a public service.

The real issue is what the leaked correspondence and President Winston Anderson’s own statement reveal about the exercise of authority within the court. These concerns were not raised by disgruntled litigants or outside critics, but by the court’s experienced appellate judges, several of whom reportedly believed that its internal governance had crossed troubling lines.

Anderson also confirms that Justice Eboe-Osuji was removed from a panel during a dispute over dress. Whatever one thinks of that dispute, personally, I find the underlying issue laughably colonial-minded, excluding a judge from judicial work to enforce an aesthetic preference looks less like normal court administration and more like a troubling exercise of power. Nor does decreeing that all judges will now sit on all panels resolve the question of whether past discretion was properly exercised.

The CCJ needs an independent, public examination of the substantive concerns raised by the leak, several of which go well beyond the questions highlighted in the editorial, as well as any reforms required to clarify panel assignments, presidential authority, and internal accountability.

None of this weakens my support for the CCJ. Quite the opposite. Regionalism cannot mean defending our institutions from criticism simply because they are ours. It means taking responsibility for them when weaknesses emerge.

This is our court. We should confront the real problems, fix what needs fixing, and make it stronger.

Gerald Lindo

Christ Church, Barbados