By RASHAD ROLLE
Tribune News Editor
rrolle@tribunemedia.net
THE government faces a new legal challenge over the possible demolition of shanty towns after an appeal was filed against an earlier ruling.
The Court of Appeal has been asked to overturn the Supreme Court ruling that sanctioned the Minnis administration’s shanty towns eradication policy and paved the way for the Davis administration’s eradication exercises.
Respect Our Homes Limited and 177 residents/occupants of shanty towns in The Bahamas filed their Notice of Appeal Motion on March 10, 2023, a month after Justice Cheryl Grant-Thompson ruled their constitutional rights were not violated when the government issued legal notices for them to vacate the land.
Fred Smith, KC, leads a team of lawyers representing the appellants.
News of the appeal comes after the government posted 260 eviction notices in unregulated communities off SC Bootle Highway, Abaco, last week.
The appellants oppose the government’s decision to allegedly take “apparent” possession of the shanty town land, to disconnect utilities in those areas, and to issue general, blanket notices under the Buildings Regulation Act to demolish shanty town buildings.
Their appeal relies on six grounds.
First, they argue Justice Grant-Thompson wrongly concluded the government showed no intention to possess shanty town land in Abaco.
Their motion says: “Hurricane Dorian struck on September 1, 2019, and therefore post-dated the Possession Decision. Action taken in light of an event post-dating a decision cannot rationally affect the assessment of whether the original decision was in fact taken, and accordingly, the learned judge misdirected herself in the consideration of the evidence on this issue.”
“As a result of this finding, the learned judge did not consider the lawfulness of the Possession Decision. Had she done so, she ought to have found that it was unlawful for the reasons advanced by the Appellants.”
The second ground of appeal is that the judge “failed to address grounds for review, advanced, misconstrued and misapplied the provisions of the Water Sewerage Act and the Electricity Act, and wrongly applied the case of Mercury Energy LTD vs Electricity Corporation of New Zealand”.
The third ground of appeal is that the judge “misdirected herself by conflating two separate grounds of review, namely who was authorized to issue the Notices… and the question whether the Ministry of Public Works acted under dictation”.
The fourth ground of appeal is that the judge “failed to make any finding and/or give sufficient reasons in respect of her decision on the appellants’ challenges to the Notices Decision based on extraneous purpose, acting under dictation, fettering of discretion and irrelevant considerations”.
The fifth ground of appeal is that the judge “wrongly failed to find that the Notices were invalid on their face”.
The final ground of appeal is that the judge “misdirected herself in relation to the application for constitutional relief and failed to give reasons for dismissing it”.