Basseterre, St. Kitts, March 10, 2017 (SKNIS): In perusal of the government’s legislative agenda on the tabling of certain laws relating to good governance, a series of lectures is being held under the theme “Laws for Peace, Order and Good Governance: Promoting Democracy, Natural Justice and the Rule of Law.”
The first of these lecture series was held on March 09, 2017, at the Sir Cecil Jacobs Auditorium at the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank (ECCB), which featured main speaker The Honourable Mr. Justice Adrian Saunders, Judge of the Caribbean Court of Justice.
Attorney General, Honourable Vincent Byron, said that it is hoped that these lectures will serve the public well and would afford the people of St. Kitts and Nevis convenient opportunities to consider and discuss these important matters.
It is anticipated that the next lecture would be held at the ECCB on the 30th of March, 2017.
Honourable Vincent Byron said that the next lecture will feature the Head of the Integrity Commission of one of the neighbouring jurisdictions so that persons would be able to get “a real and practical exposure to how questions of good governance, questions of complaints, questions of dealing with sensitive information of private individuals are normally handled in other jurisdictions in a practical way.”
The attorney general said that after that lecture, it is hoped that another person will be invited to deliver a lecture on his or her own experiences in relation to the bills and the whole concept of good governance. He said that at the end of the lecture series the Cabinet has determined that it will have a Cabinet retreat in which it would take on board much of what has been gathered from the series.
He said that the public will also be engaged in the continuation of the series of town hall meetings where the consultative approach to good governance will help sensitize persons on the topic.
Attorney General Byron said that “the pursuit of meaningful democracy within the 21st century as an objective of any serious government must by right involve an equal pursuit of the promotion of good governance, natural justice and the rule of law. These tenets are always worthy goals but are the particular concern of the Team Unity Administration.”
He said that the government’s legislative agenda for 2017 is based fundamentally on one of the two pillars of the Team Unity Administration’s search for and eventual election to office in 2015.
“We campaigned as a Team Unity Movement on the two pillars of restoring democracy and a posterity agenda here in St. Kitts and Nevis,” said the attorney general. “While we have worked assiduously to promote an economic programme, which we are justly proud of, there were a number of constitutional issues, which grounded our commitment to a good governance agenda.”
He said that Team Unity made several manifesto commitments pertaining to the concept of good governance.
“[This] for us is an ethos of which we consider ourselves to adhere to, the rule of law to create an ethos spirit in our country in which we treat all our people fairly so that we do, so in a transparent and an accountable way in which we see ourselves as being true to the wishes of our people to deliver our good services and a quality way of life.”
