CSME Network News

Nation Editorial published April 4, 2010 - VERY OFTEN events make it necessary for the citizenry of a country to stop and reflect on the merits of their system of governance.

Sometimes the event which induces reflection may be akin to the violent disruption of the system of government as happened when the Gairy administration was overthrown by the New Jewel Movement, and Maurice Bishop and Bernard Coard were catapulted into leadership positions.

It happened again when a few years later, Caribbean and American forces "liberated" the island from the consequences of the Bishop/Coard split and the murder of Prime Minister Bishop and other cabinet ministers.

But some such occasions that provide a "cause for pause" may be as peaceful and as ordinary as the ruling last week by the election court in Antigua, which declared as invalid, the election results returned in respect of three constituencies, including one held by the Prime Minister.

In due course the political and constitutional commentators among us will have a chance to dissect and analyse the judgment, but one of the immediate lessons of this situation is that there are actors other than politicians who play vital roles in the system of governance, and in this instance the civil servants administering the electoral system come under the spotlight.

Our democracies demand an impartial but efficient public service, and on this occasion the system appeared to have failed Antigua, since a major point in the case was that the law provides that voting is to take place from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. on election day, but some polling stations opened as late as 8:30 a.m. and, it would appear, one or more closed as late as 7:30 p.m. in the constituencies where the results were questioned.

It seems that the late printing of a photo register was due to a breakdown of a printer on the morning of the elections and triggered the late opening in the three constituencies, and the learned judge spoke of what she called "lack of competence" on the part of election officers!

It is singularly unfortunate at this critical time in the affairs of Antigua and Barbuda that administrative snafus should have caused the invalidation of these elections, but this only underlines the need for efficient execution of public service functions, at all times. Perhaps in hindsight, all necessary printing might have been done on the evening before election day.

Judges are not, by definition, politicians. Indeed they are insulated from the messy details of politics, yet they are in a real sense a major part of the system of governance, since they referee constitutional disputes which arise in the course of the governance of the country. And we regard ourselves bound by their decisions because we accept and promote their independence from and of the legislature and the executive.

So that we ought to draw from the case too, our good fortune in having a Judge who is prepared to call it as she sees it according to the law, and to let the chips fall where they may.

To this day, there are still those who are not satisfied with the judgment of the United States Supreme Court in the Florida segment of the Gore v Bush battle for the White House, but there too, the result of a momentous election was played out in court as a result of issues which originated from administrative breakdown in the management of elections.

The overarching lesson in this instance is that a heavy responsibility rests on all those civil servants and public officers everywhere who have the duty to execute any public functions.

On this (regional) occasion it was the task of managing elections, and it shows that the consequences of slipping up on the job may have the most far-reaching implications, and the incident validates the constant efforts at public sector reform!