Barbados Today – President of the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) Justice Adrian Saunders has bemoaned the fact that Caribbean people, for the most part, have not been making greater use of their rights under the Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas.
He was speaking at the handing-over ceremony in which third-year law students of the Cave Hill Campus of the University of the West Indies – who participated in a Trade Lab Clinic, hosted in conjunction with the Shridath Ramphal Centre for Trade Law, Policy and Services (SRC) – produced 34 summaries of CCJ decisions.
The summaries of the CCJ decisions between 2008 and 2020 were prepared by Chelsea Lawrence, Mya Brathwaite, James Morris, and Régine Mondesir.
The students were supervised by SRC director Dr. Jan Yves Remy and lecturer in the Faculty of Law Dr. Ronnie Yearwood, while international trade law practitioner Claude Chase acted as mentor to the students.
Dr. Remy, who conceptualised the trade lab, explained that the project was established to deepen the “understanding of the Court’s role in interpreting and applying the Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas and deciding on issues regarding freedom of movement, trade, services and money in the CARICOM region”.
In a presentation to students, Remy said it was her desire that the project will achieve greater implementation of “this hope of Caribbean integration”.
In his comments, Justice Saunders commended the project. “Any initiative that highlights how the rights are to be enjoyed; that places a spotlight on the jurisprudence that has been developed in this area; and that makes this jurisprudence more easily accessible to the people and States of the Community, does a tremendous service to the region,” he said.
Moreover, the senior regional judicial officer said the “digest is more than just concise summaries of the cases. It includes aids that give significant added value for researchers, quite apart from providing a readily accessible snapshot of the decisions for the public at large.”
Dr. Yearwood noted that the CCJ summaries would allow practitioners and academics to “digest and reach into the cases in a quicker way”.
