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– To negotiate with TCL, Rudisa Beverage Company for reductionAfter several years of delay, Guyana will finally comply with judgments handed down by the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) in favour of companies from two CARICOM states.Minister of State, Joseph HarmonThis was revealed by Minister of State, Joseph Harmon yesterday during a press conference at the Ministry of the Presidency.Harmon said that on Tuesday Cabinet was briefed by Minister of Legal Affairs and Attorney General (AG), Basil Williams, on the two court judgments in which Guyana continues to be in default.As a law abiding country where the rule of law will reign supreme, the Minister of State said that Cabinet decided that the judgments of the court have to be respected unless they are vacated, hence the first judgment awarded to Trinidad Cement Limited by the CCJ in the sum of TT$2,599, 971, will be honoured.He said that the judgement includes a sum that was put there because of Guyana’s contempt for the court.The Trinidadian Company had filed the case in 2006 claiming that Guyana was in breach of the provisions of Article 82 of the Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas (RTC) by failing to implement and maintain the Common External Tariff (CET).It was also ruled that TCL is entitled to the benefit of having the CET maintained by Guyana, subject to Guyana’s right to make an application to the Council for Trade and Economic Development (COTED), or the Secretary-General in accordance with the RTC.According to the final judgment that was handed down to the litigants,Supply NHL Gear Store, none of the witnesses called byFormer Attorney General, Anil NandlallGuyana could explain the continued unwillingness or refusal by Guyana to honour its treaty obligations by seeking the prior approval of the (COTED).The second CCJ judgment is in favour of the Surinamese company, Rudisa Beverages in the sum of about US$6.5M.The company had taken Guyana to the CCJ because it felt that the $10 per bottle environmental tax that it was being charged when importing its soft drinks (Thrill) to Guyana, was in contravention of the RTC which outlines free trade to signatory countries.The company had argued that the tax was discriminatory since local importers didn’t have to pay it.The CCJ had ruled in Rudisa’s favour, citing that Guyana had to honour its treaty obligations and ordered that the claimants are entitled to repayment.The previous government had argued that it had proposed legislation to rectify the discriminatory effect of the environmental tax, but the proposed amendment was rejected by A Partnership for National Unity and the Alliance For Change (APNU+AFC) when it served as the opposition in the National Assembly.Harmon said that these sums of money are due to be repaid to the companies and in the spirit of the new administration accepting this responsibility, Cabinet has been advised, by the AG to seek to enter into negotiations with these companies with a view to ascertain if they are prepared to accept a smaller sum as a final settlement in these matters.He was also quick to condemn comments made by the former AG, Anil Nandlall, who was reported in some sections of the media as saying that Guyana is likely to face even more legal challenges based on the law as it stands and based on the fact that the present government, when it was in opposition, refused to allow such changes.Harmon said, “The judgment is for a violation of the Treaty by Guyana… It is not because the Opposition in the Tenth Parliament voted down a piece of legislation. That was not directly related to this.”He said that the previous government brought a piece of legislation which was styled as an environmental tax. Rather than removing the obnoxious imposition of a container tax, it was meant to create additional taxes on other persons.“And this is what we objected to. We said that if you wanted to have an environmental tax, then in the first place it should be directed to the environment and not just go into a lump sum and then we utilize it for any and everything. Also, there was no distinction between containers which were bio-degradable and those which were not…,” Harmon said.The Minister continued, “We raised these issues in the Tenth Parliament and we spoke about the fact that there are billions of dollars already collected on that tax that was never applied to anything that had to do with the environment, and when the tax was first introduced it was supposed to go into a separate account…”“The matter was vigorously argued in the National Assembly and the PNC representative at that time pointed out that if you insist on applying this tax in such a manner, then you are going to run afoul of the CARICOM Treaty obligations and they insisted on doing it.”Harmon said that while Nandlall may be attempting to distort the facts about who was really responsible for the judgments handed down by the CCJ, he said that it was Nandlall who was actually in contempt of the court.“My research has shown that the former Cabinet approved for the sums of moneys to be paid and in spite of that, this crass contempt continued…So it is not about Mr. Nandlall challenging the AG as to who is right and who is wrong, the records are there,” Harmon told the media.Foreign Affairs Minister, Carl Greenidge, who served in the Tenth Parliament as the APNU Shadow Minister of Finance had argued that the opposition was being wrongfully blamed for the judgments handed down by the CCJ.He had said, “The legislation was simply a device for raising money; it has nothing to do with the environment. When they went to the CCJ, the government had no case except to blame the opposition that they tried to pass legislation and it’s the opposition’s fault. This is a very childish approach to law.”“The government failed to remedy the situation and now that the case has been taken to the CCJ, you would’ve thought that Government would’ve withdrawn the tax in the first place.”“The government in 2013 did bring a proposal, a Bill to the Assembly and the proposal was that they would modify the tax to apply to all Caribbean countries.”According to Greenidge, the difficulty with that is that the government had on this occasion come to the Parliament with a proposal pertaining to an environmental tax.He outlined that an environmental tax “provides penalties for actions and materials which are relatively harmful to the environment. So the tax, if it is to be an environmental tax, has to provide an incentive to users, consumers and producers to minimize the use of things that would stay and harm the environment for years and provide an incentive for consumers and producers to switch to materials that are biodegradable.”“The proposal that the government bought had nothing to do with an environmental tax. It did not discriminate against materials that were not bio-degradable and therefore both sides of the opposition said to the government, this is simply another means of raising money.“You are now adding other importers to the list to those who pay taxes, so instead of moving to an environmental tax all you are doing is raising more money.”
